Grass of Parnassus | Page 6

Kimmerian shore?
There no bright streams are flowing,
There day and night are one,

No harvest time, no sowing,
No sight of any sun;
No sound of song or tabor,
No dance shall greet you there;
No noise
of mortal labour
Breaks on the blind chill air.
Are ours not happy places,
Where gods with mortals trod?
Saw not
our sires the faces
Of many a present god?
The Seekers.
Nay, now no god comes hither,
In shape that men may see;
They
fare we know not whither,
We know not what they be.
Yea, though the sunset lingers
Far in your fairy glades,
Though
yours the sweetest singers,
Though yours the kindest maids,
Yet here be the true shadows,
Here in the doubtful light;
Amid the
dreamy meadows
No shadow haunts the night.
We seek a city splendid,
With light beyond the sun;
Or lands where
dreams are ended,
And works and days are done.

A BALLAD OF DEPARTURE. {3}
Fair white bird, what song art thou singing
In wintry weather of lands
o'er sea?
Dear white bird, what way art thou winging,
Where no
grass grows, and no green tree?
I looked at the far-off fields and grey,
There grew no tree but the
cypress tree,
That bears sad fruits with the flowers of May,
And
whoso looks on it, woe is he.
And whoso eats of the fruit thereof
Has no more sorrow, and no more
love;
And who sets the same in his garden stead,
In a little space he
is waste and dead.
THEY HEAR THE SIRENS FOR THE SECOND TIME.
The weary sails a moment slept,
The oars were silent for a space,

As past Hesperian shores we swept,
That were as a remembered face

Seen after lapse of hopeless years,
In Hades, when the shadows
meet,
Dim through the mist of many tears,
And strange, and though
a shadow, sweet.
So seemed the half-remembered shore,
That slumbered, mirrored in
the blue,
With havens where we touched of yore,
And ports that
over well we knew.
Then broke the calm before a breeze
That
sought the secret of the west;
And listless all we swept the seas

Towards the Islands of the Blest.
Beside a golden sanded bay
We saw the Sirens, very fair
The
flowery hill whereon they lay,
The flowers set upon their hair.
Their
old sweet song came down the wind,
Remembered music waxing
strong,--
Ah now no need of cords to bind,
No need had we of
Orphic song.
It once had seemed a little thing
To lay our lives down at their feet,

That dying we might hear them sing,
And dying see their faces sweet;


But now, we glanced, and passing by,
No care had we to tarry long;

Faint hope, and rest, and memory
Were more than any Siren's
song.
CIRCE'S ISLE REVISITED.
Ah, Circe, Circe! in the wood we cried;
Ah, Circe, Circe! but no
voice replied;
No voice from bowers o'ergrown and ruinous
As
fallen rocks upon the mountain side.
There was no sound of singing in the air;
Faded or fled the maidens
that were fair,
No more for sorrow or joy were seen of us,
No light
of laughing eyes, or floating hair.
The perfume, and the music, and the flame
Had passed away; the
memory of shame
Alone abode, and stings of faint desire,
And
pulses of vague quiet went and came.
Ah, Circe! in thy sad changed fairy place,
Our dead youth came and
looked on us a space,
With drooping wings, and eyes of faded fire.

And wasted hair about a weary face.
Why had we ever sought the magic isle
That seemed so happy in the
days erewhile?
Why did we ever leave it, where we met
A world of
happy wonders in one smile?
Back to the westward and the waning light
We turned, we fled; the
solitude of night
Was better than the infinite regret,
In fallen places
of our dead delight.
THE LIMIT OF LANDS.
Between the circling ocean sea
And the poplars of Persephone

There lies a strip of barren sand,
Flecked with the sea's last spray, and
strown
With waste leaves of the poplars, blown
From gardens of
the shadow land.

With altars of old sacrifice
The shore is set, in mournful wise
The
mists upon the ocean brood;
Between the water and the air
The
clouds are born that float and fare
Between the water and the wood.
Upon the grey sea never sail
Of mortals passed within our hail,

Where the last weak waves faint and flow;
We heard within the
poplar pale
The murmur of a doubtful wail
Of voices loved so long
ago.
We scarce had care to die or live,
We had no honey cake to give,

No wine of sacrifice to shed;
There lies no new path over sea,
And
now we know how faint they be,
The feasts and voices of the dead.
Ah, flowers and dance! ah, sun and snow!
Glad life, sad life we did
forego
To dream of quietness and rest;
Ah, would the fleet sweet
roses here
Poured light and perfume through the drear
Pale year,
and wan land of the west.
Sad youth, that let the spring go by
Because the spring is swift to fly,

Sad youth, that feared to mourn or love,
Behold how sadder far is
this,
To know that rest is nowise bliss,
And darkness is