I know a dim marsh place where tulés grow,
And mosses cling about the water’s edge;
The tremulous borders deepen, sedge on sedge,
And winds steel thro’ them, murmurous and slow;
The dogwood’s wingéd blossoms bend and glow
Like falling stars above the luminous pool―
How soft they are! How velvetlike and cool!
Here noiseless serpents, sliding, come and go,
Parting the grasses with a flash of gold.
The folded water lilies lie asleep,
In shallow cradles, to the drowsy croon
Of sensuous bees. It is the highest noon,
Yet all so still the frogs with murmurings deep
Make vocal marsh and wood and summer wold.
“In the Marsh” as it appears in Higginson’s The Voice of April-Land and Other Poems (1903).