Alcyone | Page 6

where strife and care were dead, And life went by me
flowing like a placid river
Past sandy eyots where the shifting shoals
make head.
A land where beauty dwelt supreme, and right, the donor
Of peaceful
days; a land of equal gifts and deeds,
Of limitless fair fields and
plenty had with honour;
A land of kindly tillage and untroubled
meads,
Of gardens, and great fields, and dreaming rose-wreathed alleys,
Wherein at dawn and dusk the vesper sparrows sang;
Of cities set far
off on hills down vista'd valleys,
And floods so vast and old, men
wist not whence they sprang,
Of groves, and forest depths, and fountains softly welling, And roads
that ran soft-shadowed past the open doors,
Of mighty palaces and
many a lofty dwelling,
Where all men entered and no master trod
their floors.
A land of lovely speech, where every tone was fashioned
By
generations of emotion high and sweet,
Of thought and deed and
bearing lofty and impassioned;
A land of golden calm, grave forms,
and fretless feet.
And every mode and saying of that land gave token
Of limits where
no death or evil fortune fell,
And men lived out long lives in proud
content unbroken,
For there no man was rich, none poor, but all were
well.
And all the earth was common, and no base contriving
Of money of
coined gold was needed there or known,
But all men wrought
together without greed or striving,
And all the store of all to each man
was his own.
From all that busy land, grey town, and peaceful village,
Where never
jar was heard, nor wail, nor cry of strife,
From every laden stream and

all the fields of tillage,
Arose the murmur and the kindly hum of life.
At morning to the fields came forth the men, each neighbour Hand
linked to other, crowned, with wreaths upon their hair, And all day long
with joy they gave their hands to labour, Moving at will, unhastened,
each man to his share.
At noon the women came, the tall fair women, bearing
Baskets of
wicker in their ample hands for each,
And learned the day's brief tale,
and how the fields were faring, And blessed them with their lofty
beauty and blithe speech.
And when the great day's toil was over, and the shadows
Grew with
the flocking stars, the sound of festival
Rose in each city square, and
all the country meadows,
Palace, and paven court, and every rustic
hall.
Beside smooth streams, where alleys and green gardens meeting Ran
downward to the flood with marble steps, a throng
Came forth of all
the folk, at even, gaily greeting,
With echo of sweet converse, jest,
and stately song.
In all their great fair cities there was neither seeking
For power of
gold, nor greed of lust, nor desperate pain Of multitudes that starve, or,
in hoarse anger breaking,
Beat at the doors of princes, break and fall
in vain.
But all the children of that peaceful land, like brothers, Lofty of spirit,
wise, and ever set to learn
The chart of neighbouring souls, the bent
and need of others, Thought only of good deeds, sweet speech, and just
return.
And there there was no prison, power of arms, nor palace,
Where
prince or judge held sway, for none was needed there; Long ages since
the very names of fraud and malice
Had vanished from men's tongues,
and died from all men's care.

And there there were no bonds of contract, deed, or marriage, No oath,
nor any form, to make the word more sure,
For no man dreamed of
hurt, dishonour, or miscarriage,
Where every thought was truth, and
every heart was pure.
There were no castes of rich or poor, of slave or master,
Where all
were brothers, and the curse of gold was dead, But all that wise fair
race to kindlier ends and vaster
Moved on together with the same
majestic tread.
And all the men and women of that land were fairer
Than even the
mightiest of our meaner race can be;
The men like gentle children,
great of limb, yet rarer
For wisdom and high thought, like kings for
majesty.
And all the women through great ages of bright living,
Grown
goodlier of stature, strong, and subtly wise,
Stood equal with the men,
calm counsellors, ever giving
The fire and succour of proud faith and
dauntless eyes.
And as I journeyed in that land I reached a ruin,
The gateway of a
lonely and secluded waste,
A phantom of forgotten time and ancient
doing,
Eaten by age and violence, crumbled and defaced.
On its grim outer walls the ancient world's sad glories
Were recorded
in fire; upon its inner stone,
Drawn by dead hands, I saw, in tales and
tragic stories,
The woe and sickness of an age of fear made known.
And lo, in that grey storehouse, fallen to dust and rotten, Lay piled the
traps and engines of forgotten greed,
The tomes of codes and canons,
long disused, forgotten,
The robes and sacred books of many a
vanished