The poem
Could Fate ordain a lot for me Beyond all human ills, I think that I would choose to be A shephard of the hills; With shaggy cloak and cape where skies Eternally are blue How I would stare with quiet eyes At passing you!
And you would stare at static me, Beside my patient flock; And I would watch you silently, A one with time and rock. Then foreign farings you would chart, And fly with fearsome wings, While I would bide to be a part Of elemental things.
Yet strangely I would have it so, Since I am kin to these,-- To heather heath and bloom ablow, And peaks and piney trees. As diamond star at evenfall, And pearly morning mist Sing in my veins, myself I call An Elementalist.
So as in city dirt and din I push a grubby pen, And toil, my bed and board to win, I hate the haunts of men. Beyond brick wall I seem to see Fern dells and rocky rills . . . O crazy dream! O God, to be A shephard of the hills!