It chanced the maidens, bright and gay
As lightning-flashes on a day
Of rain-time, to the garden went
With song and play and merriment--
And there in gay attire they strayed,
And danced, and laughed, and sang, and played.
The God of Wind who roves at will
All places, as he lists, to fill,
Saw the young maidens dancing there,
Of faultless shape and mien most fair--
"I love you all, sweet girls," he cried,
"And each shall be my darling bride.
Forsake, forsake your mortal lot,
And gain a life that withers not.
A fickle thing is youth's brief span,
And more than all is mortal man.
Receive unending youth, and be
Immortal, O my loves, with me,"
The hundred girls, to wonder stirred,
The wooing of the Wind-God heard,
Laughed, as a jest, his suit aside,
And with one voice they thus replied:--
"O mighty Wind, free spirit who
All life pervadest, through and through--
Thy wondrous power we maidens know;
Then wherefore wilt thou mock us so?
Our sire is Kusanabha, King;
And we, forsooth, have charms to bring
A God to woo us from the skies;
But honor first we maidens prize.
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