Amy Lowell

A Coloured Print by Shokei (1912)

It winds along the face of a cliff
This path which I long to explore,
And over it dashes a waterfall,
And the air is full of the roar
And the thunderous voice of waters which sweep
In a silver torrent over some steep.

It clears the path with a mighty bound
And tumbles below and away.
And the trees and the bushes which grow in the rocks
Are wet with its jewelled spray;
The air is misty and heavy with sound,
And small, wet widflowers star the ground.

Oh! The dampness is very good to smell,
And the path is soft to tread,
And beyond the fall it winds up and on,
While little streamlets thread
Their own meandering way down the hill
Each singing its own little song, until

I forget that it’s only a pictured path,
And I hear the water and wind,
And look through the mist, and strain my eyes
To see what there is behind;
For it must lead to a happy land,
This little path by a waterfall spanned.

‘A Coloured Print by Shokei’ (BI1b) appeared in Lowell’s first book, A Dome of Many-Coloured Glass (BI1).

For an overview of Lowell’s Japanese interests see Amy Lowell and Japan in the Bibliography, and for a note about Lowell’s work that is in print see A Japanese Wood Carving.