Comes the silent call of the deep-woods trail
Where Time weaves her carpet of forest duff
To muffle the step; and the verdant veil
Of hemlock and fir screens the flanking bluff.
Where the dogwood blankets with green and white
The mouldering trunk of a once proud tree,
And the chalky form of the saprophyte
Glows pale and ghostlike, The melody
Of a tinkling stream bids the traveler pause
To kneel at the brink of a moss-rimmed pool,
For thirst is but one of the woods-trail laws
Binding all that breathe with its iron-clad-rule.
Then on, where the sunlight splashes through
A break in the canopy overhead,
Where the huckleberries are turning blue,
And a glacial stream from its rocky bed
Roars a boisterous shout to the shadowed trail;
And far beyond, 'neath a drooping bough,
Like an unattainable Holy Grail,
Is the gleam of The Mountain's hoary brow.
Natt Dodge,
Ranger-Naturalist,
Summer season - 1933.
