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from the 1907 wildflower exhibit dedication To Joseph LeConteby Charles KeelerPeace reigns in these vast halls where thous hast roamed And wrested secrets from the patient rocks, And watched the waterfalls that brightly foamed, And marked the migrants in tumultuous flocks, -- With kindly eye interpreting each sign As evidence of spirit power benign. Still rear the rocks their peerless bulwarks high, Still sweep the cataracts elate and bright, Still joyous hosts of flowers bloom and die, Still lift the pines their tassels to the light, As when, so late, thou pondered on their ways Through all the brightness of Sierra days Here in these consecrated haunts sublime, Beloved through they life's perennial youth, Kind Nature whispered of the parting time And led they spirit on its quest of truth Beyond these symbols into high domains Where goals that baffle now, the soul attains. Dear friend who late unsealed my eyes to lore Of Nature's mystic laws, I love to think That here in swift transition thou didst soar From earth's to heaven's splendor, and didst drink Life's last draught from the mountains' melted snow, And thus rejoicing on thy journey go. I love to think that all they cherished thought Of nature, in consummate splendor wild Here gathered, should have in its beauty caught They being, and upgathered thee, its child, Leading thee on, untroubled, unafraid, Toward mightier phantasies in spirit glade. O may the gracious memory of thy name, Thus linked by death with thine, Yosemite! Still haunt the peaks in sunset's light aflame, For generations yet unborn to see The splendor of the rocks and learn to trace In granite symbols thy mysterious grace. Yosemite Valley, July 18, 1907. (Read by the author at the flower show held on this date at the LeConte Memorial Lodge.) Source: Sierra Club Bulletin, Vol. VI., No. 4 (January, 1908), p. 223. For more information, during the summer contact Sierra Club LeConte Memorial Lodge Curator, P.O. Box 755, Yosemite, CA 95389, (209) 372-4542. During the winter, contact LeConte Lodge Committee Chair, Harold Wood, P.O. Box 3543, Visalia, CA 93278; phone: (559) 697-3525; e-mail: harold.wood@sierraclub.org Tax deductible donations to support the new exhibits and renovation efforts of the LeConte Memorial can be made to "Sierra Club Foundation," marked for the LeConte Lodge Fund. Up to Top |
