In a Belgian Garden and Other Poems

<SPAN name="idol"></SPAN> <h3> An Idol in a Shop Window<br/> </h3> <p class="poem"> Old Lohan peers through the dusty glass,<br/> <SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">From a jumble of curios quaint and rare;</SPAN><br/> And he watches the hurrying crowds that pass<br/> <SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The whole day long, through the ancient square.</SPAN><br/></p> <p class="poem"> Wrapped in his robe of gold and jade,<br/> <SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Here by the window he patiently waits</SPAN><br/> For the sound that the gongs and the conches made,<br/> <SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">In the days of old at the temple gates.</SPAN><br/></p> <p class="poem"> He heaves no sighs and he sheds no tears,<br/> <SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">For his heart is bronze, and he does not know</SPAN><br/> That his temple has been for a thousand years<br/> <SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But a mound of dust where the bamboos grow.</SPAN><br/></p> <p class="poem"> So here he sits through the nights and days,<br/> <SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the sun goes up and down the sky;</SPAN><br/> But he often looks with a wistful gaze<br/> <SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">At the crowds that always pass him by.</SPAN><br/></p> <p class="poem"> And his eyes half closed in a mystic dream<br/> <SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of his poppy-land of long ago,</SPAN><br/> Turn back to the shores of the sacred stream<br/> <SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the kneeling throng he used to know.</SPAN><br/></p> <p class="poem"> But he sometimes smiles as he sees the crowd<br/> <SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of human folk that pass him by;</SPAN><br/> Then he wraps himself in his mystic shroud,&mdash;<br/> <SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the sun once more goes down the sky.</SPAN><br/></p> <br/><br/><br/> <div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />