Culprit Fay and Other Poems | Page 6

from
earth the lovely Fay -
So vanished, far in heaven away!

Up, Fairy! quit thy chick-weed bower,
The cricket has called the
second hour,
Twice again, and the lark will rise
To kiss the
streaking of the skies -
Up! thy charmed armour don,
Thou'lt need it
ere the night be gone.
XXV.
He put his acorn helmet on;
It was plumed of the silk of the thistle
down:
The corslet plate that guarded his breast
Was once the wild
bee's golden vest;
His cloak, of a thousand mingled dyes,
Was
formed of the wings of butterflies;
His shield was the shell of a
lady-bug queen,
Studs of gold on a ground of green;
And the
quivering lance which he brandished bright,
Was the sting of a wasp
he had slain in fight.
Swift he bestrode his fire-fly steed;
He bared
his blade of the bent grass blue;
He drove his spurs of the cockle seed,

And away like a glance of thought he flew,
To skim the heavens
and follow far
The fiery trail of the rocket-star.
XXVI.
The moth-fly, as he shot in air,
Crept under the leaf, and hid her there;

The katy-did forgot its lay,
The prowling gnat fled fast away,

The fell mosqueto checked his drone
And folded his wings till the
Fay was gone,
And the wily beetle dropped his head,
And fell on
the ground as if he were dead;
They crouched them close in the
darksome shade,
They quaked all o'er with awe and fear,
For they
had felt the blue-bent blade,
And writhed at the prick of the elfin
spear;
Many a time on a summer's night,
When the sky was clear
and the moon was bright,
They had been roused from the haunted
ground,
By the yelp and bay of the fairy hound;
They had heard the
tiny bugle horn,
They had heard of twang of the maize-silk string,

When the vine-twig bows were tightly drawn,
And the nettle-shaft
through the air was borne,
Feathered with down the hum-bird's wing.

And now they deemed the courier ouphe,
Some hunter sprite of the

elfin ground;
And they watched till they saw him mount the roof

That canopies the world around;
Then glad they left their covert lair,

And freaked about in the midnight air.
XXVII.
Up to the vaulted firmament
His path the fire-fly courser bent,
And
at every gallop on the wind,
He flung a glittering spark behind;
He
flies like a feather in the blast
Till the first light cloud in heaven is
past,
But the shapes of air have begun their work,
And a drizzly
mist is round him cast,
He cannot see through the mantle murk,
He
shivers with cold, but he urges fast,
Through storm and darkness,
sleet and shade,
He lashes his steed and spurs amain,
For shadowy
hands have twitched the rein,
And flame-shot tongues around him
played,
And near him many a fiendish eye
Glared with a fell
malignity,
And yells of rage, and shrieks of fear,
Came screaming
on his startled ear.
XXVIII.
His wings are wet around his breast,
The plume hangs dripping from
his crest,
His eyes are blur'd with the lightning's glare,
And his ears
are stunned with the thunder's blare,
But he gave a shout, and his
blade he drew,
He thrust before and he struck behind,
Till he
pierced their cloudy bodies through,
And gashed their shadowy limbs
of wind;
Howling the misty spectres flew,
They rend the air with
frightful cries,
For he has gained the welkin blue,
And the land of
clouds beneath him lies.
XXIX.
Up to the cope careering swift
In breathless motion fast,
Fleet as the
swallow cuts the drift,
Or the sea-roc rides the blast,
The sapphire
sheet of eve is shot,

The sphered moon is past,
The earth but seems
a tiny blot
On a sheet of azure cast.
O! it was sweet in the clear

moonlight,
To tread the starry plain of even,
To meet the thousand
eyes of night,
And feel the cooling breath of heaven!
But the Elfin
made no stop or stay
Till he came to the bank of the milky-way,

Then he checked his courser's foot,
And watched for the glimpse of
the planet-shoot.
XXX.
Sudden along the snowy tide
That swelled to meet their footstep's fall,

The sylphs of heaven were seen to glide,
Attired in sunset's
crimson pall;
Around the Fay they weave the dance,
They skip
before him on the plain,
And one has taken his wasp-sting lance,

And one upholds his bridle rein;
With warblings wild they lead him
on
To where through clouds of amber seen,
Studded with stars,
resplendent shone
The palace of the sylphid queen.
Its spiral
columns gleaming bright
Were streamers of the northern light;
Its
curtain's light and lovely flush
Was of the morning's rosy blush,

And the ceiling fair that rose aboon
The white and feathery fleece of
noon.
XXXI.
But oh! how fair the shape that lay
Beneath a rainbow bending bright,

She seemed to the entranced Fay
The loveliest of the forms of light;

Her mantle was the purple rolled
At twilight in the west afar;

'Twas tied with threads of dawning gold,
And buttoned with a
sparkling star.
Her face was like the lily roon
That veils the vestal
planet's hue;
Her eyes, two beamlets from the moon,
Set floating in
the welkin blue.
Her hair is like the sunny beam,
And the diamond
gems which round it gleam
Are the pure drops of dewy