Green is the way to Monterey,
And once, upon a wandering day,
With breath of mist and flash of sky,
My feet were where the greenways lie;
My soul unleashed, my heart at play,
Upon the road to Monterey.
All in the morning's golden glow
I came by holy Carmelo
Where whispers still its silvery stream
Like voices from an ancient dream,
And through the haunted silence beat
The long-hushed tread of sandaled feet.
Dream-wrapped in memory's mystic spell
I rang the rusted Mission bell,
And called to hill and vale and sea
To give again their dead to me—
The brown-robed priests, the altar lights,
The hosts of dark-eyed neophytes.
I called the dead years forth to free
Their dust-thralled feet to trudge with me.
So, fared as comrades with me, then,
Fair women and brave riding men.
By wood and dune that dream-kissed day,
They passed with me to Monterey.
Blithe were the green ways then that told
The gladness of the days of old;
From chaparral with flocks athrong,
Uprose the Indian herders' song,
And ringing scythes, with laughter blent,
From fields where dusky toilers bent.
Madre de Dios! Keep for me
My dream of hill and sky and sea—
The green ways where my path was set,
The gay guitar and castanet,
And stars that hailed at close of day,
The sunset roofs of Monterey.
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