Text – William Bliss Carman (1861 – 1929)
In a garden over Grand Pre, dewy in the morning sun,
Here in earliest Setpember with the summer nearly done.
Musing on the lovely world and all its beauties one by one!
Blues, marigolds, and asters, scarlet poppies, purple phlox, –
Who knows where the key is hidden to those frail yet perfect locks
In the tacit doors of being where the soul stands still and knocks?
There is Blomidon’s blue sea wall set to guard the turbid straits
Where the racing tides have entry; but who keeps for us the gates
In the mighty range of silence where man’s spirit calls and waits?
Where is Glooscap? There’s a legend of that saviour of the West,
The benign one, whose all-wisdom loved beasts well though men the best,
Whom the tribes of Minas leaned on, and their villages had rest.
Once the lodges were defenceless all the warriors being gone
On an hunting or adventure. Like a panther on a fawn
On the helpless stole a war band, ambushed to attack at dawn.
But with the night came Glooscap. Sleeping he surprised them; waved his bow;
Through the summer leaves descended a great frost, as white as snow;
Sealed their slumber to eternal peace and stillness long ago.
