In Divers Tones | Page 4

convolvulus,?And matted roses glorious.
The liberal blooms o'erbrim my hands;?I walk the level, wide marsh-lands;
Waist-deep in dusty-blossomed grass?I watch the swooping breezes pass
In sudden, long, pale lines, that flee?Up the deep breast of this green sea.
I listen to the bird that stirs?The purple tops, and grasshoppers
Whose summer din, before my feet?Subsiding, wakes on my retreat.
Again the droning bees hum by;?Still-winged, the gray hawk wheels on high;
I drink again the wild perfumes,?And roll, and crush the grassy blooms.
Blown back to olden days, I fain?Would quaff the olden joys again;
But all the olden sweetness not?The old unmindful peace hath brought.
Wind of this summer afternoon,?Thou hast recalled my childhood's June;
My heart--still is it satisfied?By all the golden summer-tide?
Hast thou one eager yearning filled,?Or any restless throbbing stilled,
Or hast thou any power to bear?Even a little of my care?--
Ever so little of this weight?Of weariness canst thou abate?
Ah, poor thy gift indeed, unless?Thou bring the old child-heartedness,--
And such a gift to bring is given,?Alas, to no wind under heaven!
Wind of the summer afternoon,?Be still; my heart is not in tune.
Sweet is thy voice; but yet, but yet--?Of all 'twere sweetest to forget!
FREDERICTON, N. B.
THE PIPES OF PAN.
Ringed with the flocking of hills, within shepherding watch of Olympus, Tempe, vale of the gods, lies in green quiet withdrawn;?Tempe, vale of the gods, deep-couched amid woodland and woodland, Threaded with amber of brooks, mirrored in azure of pools,?All day drowsed with the sun, charm-drunken with moonlight at midnight, Walled from the world forever under a vapor of dreams,--?Hid by the shadows of dreams, not found by the curious footstep, Sacred and secret forever, Tempe, vale of the gods.?How, through the cleft of its bosom, goes sweetly the water Pen?us! How by Pen?us the sward breaks into saffron and blue!?How the long slope-floored beech-glades mount to the wind-wakened uplands, Where, through flame-berried ash, troop the hoofed Centaurs at morn! Nowhere greens a copse but the eye-beams of Artemis pierce it. Breathes no laurel her balm but Phoebus' fingers caress.?Springs no bed of wild blossom but limbs of dryad have pressed it. Sparkle the nymphs, and the brooks chime with shy laughter and calls.
Here is a nook. Two rivulets fall to mix with Pen?us,?Loiter a space, and sleep, checked and choked by the reeds. Long grass waves in the windless water, strown with the lote-leaf; Twist thro' dripping soil great alder roots, and the air?Glooms with the dripping tangle of leaf-thick branches, and stillness Keeps in the strange-coiled stems, ferns, and wet-loving weeds. Hither comes Pan, to this pregnant earthy spot, when his piping Flags; and his pipes outworn breaking and casting away,?Fits new reeds to his mouth with the weird earth-melody in them, Piercing, alive with a life able to mix with the god's.?Then, as he blows, and the searching sequence delights him, the goat-feet Furtive withdraw; and a bird stirs and flutes in the gloom?Answering. Float with the stream the outworn pipes, with a whisper,-- "What the god breathes on, the god never can wholly evade!" God-breath lurks in each fragment forever. Dispersed by Pen?us Wandering, caught in the ripples, wind-blown hither and there, Over the whole green earth and globe of sea they are scattered, Coming to secret spots, where in a visible form?Comes not the god; though he come declared in his workings. And mortals Straying in cool of morn, or bodeful hasting at eve,?Or in the depths of noonday plunged to shadiest coverts,?Spy them, and set to their lips; blow, and fling them away!
Ay, they fling them away,--but never wholly! Thereafter?Creeps strange fire in their veins, murmur strange tongues in their brain, Sweetly evasive; a secret madness takes them,--a charm-struck Passion for woods and wild life, the solitude of the hills. Therefore they fly the heedless throngs and traffic of cities, Haunt mossed caverns, and wells bubbling ice-cool; and their souls Gather a magical gleam of the secret of life, and the god's voice Calls to them, not from afar, teaching them wonderful things.
BEFORE THE BREATH OF STORM.
Before the breath of storm.?While yet the long, bright afternoons are warm,?Under this stainless arch of azure sky
The air is filled with gathering wings for flight;?Yet with the shrill mirth and the loud delight?Comes the foreboding sorrow of this cry--?"Till the storm scatter and the gloom dispel,
Farewell! Farewell!
Farewell!"
Why will ye go so soon,?In these soft hours, this sweeter month than June??The liquid air floats over field and tree
A veil of dreams;--where do ye find the sting??A gold enchantment sleeps upon the sea
And purple hills;--why have ye taken wing??But faint, far-heard, the answers fall and swell--
"Farewell! Farewell!
Farewell!"
OUT OF POMPEII.
Save what the night-wind woke of sweet?And solemn sound, I heard alone?The sleepless ocean's ceaseless beat,?The surge's monotone.
Low down the south a dreary gleam?Of white light smote the sullen swells,?Evasive as a blissful dream,?Or wind-borne notes of bells.
The water's lapping