Happy days; carolings of Colorado, etc.

Chapter 8: WILD-WOODLAND RAMBLINGS

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About This Book

A collection of lyrical poems and brief prose sketches that celebrate Colorado's natural scenery and frontier memories. The verses praise mountain and prairie landscapes, clear skies, rivers and woodlands, and combine joyful exhortation, pastoral reverie, and rustic reminiscence of early regional life. Imagery of angling, hunting, camping, and seasonal pleasures recurs alongside reflections on gladness, love, and simple living. Short prose pieces offer travel-minded vignettes of lakes and mountain canyons, together creating an overall tone of affectionate local portraiture and unpretentious lyricism.

WILD-WOODLAND RAMBLINGS

Down—adown among the green, wild-woodland alleys,

And across the sweet valleys,

Through forests of spruce trees and pine;

With the birds, and the beasts, and the flowers for my allies

I rove—oh I rove, with “The Spirit Divine.”

Down, deep down in the wild rocky canons;

Up, high up on the cool sterile plateau’s above,

Joy, Joy and Hope are still my companions,

For, oh, for, oh, I am charmed and elated wherever I rove.

Down, then—down through the green leafy alleys,

And across the sweet valleys

Deeper, deeper still into forests of aspens and pine;

Thus, thus ’mongst tall, shady groves I am daily making new sallies,

For, oh, for oh, the much-roving spirits of gladness and of song-singing madness are mine.