Pale sampans up the river glide,
With set sails vanishing and slow;
In the blue west the mountains hide,
As visions that too soon will go.
Across the rice-lands, flooded deep,
The peasant peacefully wades on —
As, in unfurrowed vales of sleep,
A phantom out of voidness drawn.
Over the temple cawing flies
The crow with carrion in his beak.
Buddha within lifts not his eyes
In pity or reproval meek;
Nor, in the bamboos, where they bow
A respite from the blinding sun,
The old priest — dreaming painless how
Nirvana's calm will come when won.
“All is illusion, Maya, all
The world of will,” the spent East seems
Whispering in me; “and the call
Of Life is but a call of dreams.”