Poems (Forrest)/Sky fantasy

by Mabel Forrest

SKY FANTASY

The sky is as a great blue wave where many moons are lost,
And endless camel-trains of stars before the dawn have crost;
And the clouds are white-robed Arabs, who come at eve to pray,
While the yellow camels slake their thirst along the Milky Way.

The sun is some vast temple where the True Believers kneel;
And the moon is like Mahomet, with a morion made of steel,
Who leads a Holy War across the storm-paths of the skies,
While the lightning writes the challenge for the gathering tribesmen's eyes.

And the rainbow is a burnous that is striped in green and gold,
Where the Arab soldier hid the girl he captured in its fold.
And when Dawn comes proudly striding from the red roads of the East
'Tis the Arab's racing camel that has brought them to the feast.

When the rain that came at midnight, in a sheet of level grey,
Has hid the stars and drowned the moon that rose but yesterday:
Then I know the wily Arab in his desert of the air
Shuts his little bride securely in the tent of camel's hair.

He will steal a star to light it, in his thievish Arab way;
He will string the planets for her neck, and on the winds will play
A melody of joy and war, of ancient loves and hates;
Pluck from the silver tray of Years, the fairest of her dates!

And if to-morrow break all blue, with never cloud to dim
The lacquer bowl of Heaven, oh, "You need not look for him."
For somewhere over earth's pale rim beyond the world he goes
To a Paradise more perfect than the Unbeliever knows!