Mirage Poem by Hartley Burr Alexander

The footfalls of many feet are on the prairies,
Treading softly, like the rustling of shaken grasses;
In the air about me is a sound scarce audible,
As of the wings of silent birds, low-flying. . . .

What are they that move in the luminous mid-day,
Invisibly, intangibly? . . .

It is hot and whisperingly still;
I see only the quivering air, there on the far horizon,
And beyond it a lake of cool water lifted into the sky:
Pleasant groves are growing beside it,
Very distant I see them. . . .

Are these men come out of the silence to walk beside me?
Are these gods who flit with invisible wings?