"The Mists of Puget Sound"

"The Mists of Puget Sound"

Like one great luminous thistle-down, the mist

      Flings glistening needles to the mellow skies;

      Or, like the purple dust from grapes, it lies—

Here, pink as air by wild pink roses kissed;

There, trembling with the first of amethyst,

      Or bright as gold from wings of butterflies;

      Like snows on lonely mountains, whence arise

Red suns that set them all aglow,—and list!

Like is it to the softened blush that sweeps

      Across the pure white of a maiden’s cheek,

      When love looks from her eyes; chaste as the tear

That a fond mother o’er her first-born weeps.

Yea, like unto—her name I cannot speak—

      One dear girl’s heart, so sweet, so white, so clear.

"The Mists of Puget Sound" printed in an unidentified publication with revisions by and signed by Ella Higginson, clipping courtesy of the Ella Higginson Papers, Center for Pacific Northwest Studies, Heritage Resources, Western Washington University, Bellingham WA.