Four Poems | Page 4

hovering dreams,
............The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train.

But, hail! thou Goddess sage and holy!
Hail, divinest Melancholy!

Whose saintly visage is too bright
To hit the sense of human sight,

And therefore to our weaker view
O'erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's
hue;
Black, but such as in esteem
Prince Memnon's sister might
beseem,
Or that starred Ethiop queen that strove
To set her beauty's
praise above
The Sea-Nymphs, and their powers offended.
Yet thou
art higher far descended:
Thee bright-haired Vesta long of yore
To

solitary Saturn bore;
His daughter she; in Saturn's reign
Such
mixture was not held a stain.
Oft in glimmering bowers and glades

He met her, and in secret shades
Of woody Ida's inmost grove,

Whilst yet there was no fear of Jove.
Come, pensive Nun, devout and
pure,
Sober, steadfast, and demure,
All in a robe of darkest grain,

Flowing with majestic train,
And sable stole of cypress lawn
Over
thy decent shoulders drawn.
Come; but keep thy wonted state,
With
even step, and musing gait,
And looks commercing with the skies,

Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes:
There, held in holy passion still,

Forget thyself to marble, till
With a sad leaden downward cast
Thou
fix them on the earth as fast.
And join with thee calm Peace and Quiet,

Spare Fast, that oft with gods doth diet,
And hears the Muses in a
ring
Aye round about Jove's altar sing;
And add to these retired
Leisure,
That in trim gardens takes his pleasure;
But, first and
chiefest, with thee bring
Him that yon soars on golden wing,

Guiding the fiery-wheeled throne,
The Cherub Contemplation;
And
the mute Silence hist along,
'Less Philomel will deign a song,
In her
sweetest saddest plight,
Smoothing the rugged brow of Night,

While Cynthia checks her dragon yoke
Gently o'er the accustomed
oak.
Sweet bird, that shunn'st the noise of folly,
Most musical, most
melancholy!
Thee, chauntress, oft the woods among
I woo, to hear
thy even-song;
And, missing thee,I walk unseen
On the dry
smooth-shaven green,
To behold the wandering moon,

Riding near
her highest noon,
Like one that had been led astray
Through the
heaven's wide pathless way,
And oft, as if her head she bowed,

Stooping through a fleecy cloud.
Oft, on a plat of rising ground,
I
hear the far-off curfew sound,
Over some wide-watered shore,

Swinging slow with sullen roar;
Or, if the air will not permit,
Some
still removed place will fit,
Where glowing embers through the room

Teach light to counterfeit a gloom,
Far from all resort of mirth,

Save the cricket on the hearth,
Or the bellman's drowsy charm
To
bless the doors from nightly harm.
Or let my lamp, at midnight hour,

Be seen in some high lonely tower,
Where I may oft outwatch the

Bear,
With thrice great Hermes, or unsphere
The spirit of Plato, to
unfold
What worlds or what vast regions hold
The immortal mind
that hath forsook
Her mansion in this fleshly nook;
And of those
demons that are found
In fire, air, flood, or underground,
Whose
power hath a true consent
With planet or with element.
Sometime
let gorgeous Tragedy
In sceptred pall come sweeping by,

Presenting Thebes, or Pelops' line,
Or the tale of Troy divine,
Or
what (though rare) of later age
Ennobled hath the buskined stage.

But, O sad Virgin! that thy power
Might raise Musaeus from his
bower;
Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing
Such notes as, warbled to
the string,
Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek,
And made Hell
grant what love did seek;
Or call up him that left half-told
The story
of Cambuscan bold,
Of Camball, and of Algarsife,
And who had
Canace to wife,
That owned the virtuous ring and glass,
And of the
wondrous horse of brass
On which the Tartar king did ride;
And if
aught else great bards beside
In sage and solemn tunes have sung,

Of turneys, and of trophies hung,
Of forests, and enchantments drear,

Where more is meant than meets the ear.
Thus, Night, oft see me in
thy pale career,
Till civil-suited Morn appear,
Not tricked and
frounced, as she was wont
With the Attic boy to hunt,
But kerchieft
in a comely cloud
While rocking winds are piping loud,
Or ushered
with a shower still,
When the gust hath blown his fill,

Ending on
the rustling leaves,
With minute-drops from off the eaves.
And,
when the sun begins to fling
His flaring beams, me, Goddess, bring

To arched walks of twilight groves,
And shadows brown, that Sylvan
loves,
Of pine, or monumental oak,
Where the rude axe with
heaved stroke
Was never heard the nymphs to daunt,
Or fright them
from their hallowed haunt.
There, in close covert, by some brook,

Where no profaner eye may look,
Hide me from day's garish eye,

While the bee with honeyed thigh,
That at her flowery work doth sing,

And the waters murmuring,
With such consort as they keep,

Entice the dewy-feathered Sleep.
And let some strange mysterious
dream
Wave at his wings, in airy stream
Of lively portraiture

displayed,
Softly on my eyelids laid;
And, as I wake, sweet music
breathe
Above, about, or underneath,
Sent by some Spirit to mortals
good,
Or the unseen Genius of the wood.
But let my due feet never
fail
To walk the studious cloister's pale,
And love the high
embowed roof,
With antique pillars massy proof,
And storied
windows richly dight,
Casting a dim religious light.
There let the
pealing organ blow,
To the full-voiced quire below,
In service high
and anthems clear,
As may with sweetness, through mine ear,

Dissolve me into ecstasies,
And bring all Heaven before mine eyes.

And may at last my weary age
Find out the peaceful