Chapter IV

They who were fondly fain
To tell what mother pain
Of Nature makes the rain;

They who were glad to know
The sorrow of her snow,
Of her wild winds the woe;

The magic of her light,
The passion of her night,
And of her death the might;

They who had tears and sighs
For every bud that dies
While the dew on it lies;

They who had utterance for
Each warm, rose-hearted star
That stammers from afar;

The demon of vast seas,
The lips of lyric trees,
Lays of sonorous bees;

The fragrance-fays that dower
Each wildwood bosk and bower
With its faint musk of flower;

Of Time the feverish flight;
Earth, man, and, last, man's right
To thee, O Infinite!

FAIRIES.

On the tremulous coppice,
From her plenteous hair,
Large golden-rayed poppies
Of moon-litten air
The Night hath flung there.

In the fern-favored hollow
The fire-flies fleet
Uncertainly follow
Pale phantoms of heat,
Druid shadows that meet.

Hidden flowers are fragrant;
The night hazes furl
O'er the solitudes vagrant
In purple and pearl,
Sway-swinging and curl.

From moss-cushioned valley
Where the red sunlight fails,
Rocks where musically
The hollow spring wails,
And the limber fern trails,

With a ripple and twinkle
Of luminous arms,
Of voices that tinkle,
And feet that are storms
Of chaste, naked charms,

Like echoes that revel
On hills, where the brier
Vaults roofs of dishevel
And green, greedy fire,
They come as a choir.

At the root of the mountain
Where the dim forest lies,
By the spar-spouting fountain
Where the low lily dies,
With their star-stinging eyes.

They gather sweet singing
In voices that seem
Faint ringing and clinging
In dreams that we dream,
In visions that gleam.

Sweet lisping of kisses,
Dry rustle of hair;
A footfall that hisses
Like a leaf in the air
When the brown boughs are bare.

The music that scatters
From love-litten eyes;
The music that flatters
In words and low sighs,
In laughter that dies:

"Come hither, come hither,
In the million-eyed night,
Ere the moon-flowers wither
And the harvester white,
Morning reaps them with light.

"Come hither, where singing
Is pleasant as tears,
Or dead kisses, clinging
To the murdering years,
In memory's ears.

"Come hither where kisses
Are waiting for you,
For lips and long tresses,
As for wild flowers blue
The moon-heated dew.

"Come hither from coppice
And violet dale,
The mountain whose top is
In vapors that sail
With pearly hail pale.

"Why tarry? come hither
While the molten moon beams,
Ere the golden spark wither
Of the glow-worm that gleams
Like a star in still streams!"

THE TRYST.

Had fallen a fragrant shower;
The leaves were dripping yet;
Each fern and rain-weighed flower
Around were gleaming wet;
On ev'ry bosky bower
A million gems were set.

The dust's moist odors sifted
Cool with the summer rain,
Mixed with the musk that drifted
From orchard and from plain;--
Her garden's fence white lifted
Its length along the lane.

The moon the clouds had shattered
In curdled peaks of pearl;
The honeysuckle scattered
Warm odors from each curl,
Where the white moonlight, flattered,
Hung molten 'round a girl.

Then grew the night completer
With light and cloud and air;
Aromas sweet blew sweeter,
Sweet flowers fair, more fair;
Fleet feet and fast grew fleeter
Thro' that fair sorceress there.

AN ANTIQUE.

Mildewed and gray the marble stairs
Rise from their balustraded urns
To where a chiseled satyr glares
From a luxuriant bed of ferns;

A pebbled walk that labyrinths
'Twixt parallels of verdant box
To where, broad-based on grotesque plinths,
'Mid cushions of moss-padded rocks,

Rises a ruined pleasure-house,
Of shattered column, broken dome,
Where, reveling in thick carouse,
The buoyant ivy makes its home.

And here from bank, and there from bed,
Down the mad rillet's jubilant lymph,
The lavish violet's odors shed
In breathings of a fountain nymph.

And where, in lichened hoariness,
The broken marble dial-plate
Basks in the Summer's sultriness,
Rich houri roses palpitate.

Voluptuous, languid with perfumes,
As were the beauties that of old,
In damask satins, jeweled plumes,
With powdered gallants here that strolled.

When slender rapiers, proud with gems,
Sneered at the sun their haughty hues,
And Touchstone wit and apothegms
Laughed down the long, cool avenues.

Two pleated bowers of woodbine pave,
'Neath all their heaviness of musk,
Two fountains of pellucid wave,
With sunlight-tessellated dusk.

Beholding these, I seem to feel
An exodus of earthly sight,
An influx of ecstatic weal
Poured thro' my eyes in jets of light.

And so I see the fountains twain
Of hate and love in Arden there;
The time of regal Charlemagne,
Of Roland and of Oliver.

Rinaldo of Montalban's towers
Sleeps by the spring of hate; above
Bows, spilling all his face with flowers,
Angelica, who quaffed of love.

A GUINEVERE.

Sullen gold down all the sky,
In the roses sultry musk;
Nightingales hid in the dusk
Yonder sob and sigh.

You are here; and I could weep,
Weep for joy and suffering.
"Where is he?" He'd have me sing;--
There he sits asleep.

Think not of him! he is dead
For the moment to us twain;
He were dead but for this pain
Drumming in my head.

"Am I happy?" Ask the fire
When it bursts its bounds and thrills
Some mad hours as it wills
If those hours tire.

He had gold. As for the rest--
Well you know how they were set,
Saying that I must forget,
And 'twas for the best.

I forget! but let it go!--
Kiss me as you did of old.
There! your kisses are not cold!
Can you love me so,

Knowing what I am to him
Sitting in his gouty chair
On the breezy terrace where
Amber fire-flies swim?

"Yes?"--Your cheek a tear-drop wets,
But your kisses on my lip
Fall as warm as bees that sip
Sweets from violets.

See! the moon has risen white
As this bursten lily here
Rocking on the dusky mere
Like a silent light.

Let us walk. We soon must part--
All too soon! but he may miss!
Give me but another kiss;
It will heat my heart

And the bitter winter there.
So; we part, my Launcelot,
My true knight! and am I not
Your true Guinevere?

Oft they parted thus they tell
In that mystical romance.
Were they placed, think you, perchance,
For such love in hell?

No! it can not, can not be!
Love is God and God is love,
And they live and love above,
Guinevere and he!

I must go now. See! there fell,
Molten into purple light,
One wild star. Kiss me good-night;
And, once more, farewell!

CLOUDS.

All through the tepid Summer night
The starless sky had poured a cool
Monotony of pleasant rain
In music beautiful.

And for an hour I'd sat to watch
Clouds moving on majestic feet,
Had heard down avenues of night
Their hearts of thunder beat;

Saw ponderous limbs far-veined with gold
Pulse fiery life o'er wood and plain,
While scattered, fell from monstrous palms
The largess of the rain;

Beholding at each lightning's flash
The generous silver on the sod,
In meek devotion bowed, I thanked
These almoners of God.

NO MORE.

I.

The slanted storm tossed at their feet
The frost-nipped Autumn leaves;
The park's high pines were caked with sleet
And ice-spears armed the eaves.
They strolled adown the pillared pines
To part where wet and twisted vines
About the gate-posts flapped and beat.
She watched him dimming in the rain
Along the river's misty shore,
And laughed with lips that sneered disdain
"To meet no more!"