But tides creep lazily about the sands,
Washing frail land-marks, Lethe-like, away;
And though their records perish day by day,
Still stand I ever with close-clasped hands,
Gazing far westward o'er the heaving sea,
Gazing in vain, my beautiful, for thee.
I HAD a dream more pleasant than the truth,
And pliant as 't was pleasant,-must it be
Only a dream? A fancy that hath wreathed
A sunproof arbour round the sweltering brow-
Causing joy-flowers to bloom, and corbie Care
To spread her wings; up-clambering round the heart
As a rosy-faced child with ignorant wiles,
Climbing a grey-beard's knees, doth make him laugh
With its innocuous mirth, although enforced
By plucking his frosted hairs:- -can it be nought
But fancy?
This it was. As through the street, Where drays were jostling and the coachman's lash Rang o'er the necks of his thin-haunched beasts,
I had on errand of importunate haste
Passed, till in weariness I slackened pace,
To mitigate the unseemly dusty heat,
By lingering within shadow a short while.
People in long tides passed me, and some looked
An instant vacantly, still hastening on,
Hurrying somewhere with a tedious thrift;
Unto the mart or workshop, desk or ship,
The church, the tavern, or the mall.
There was obstruction in their eyes, not death,
But an obstruction of the inmost soul:
They lived, yet lived not. Had I spoke to them
What then I felt, they would have thought me mad,
And each in his own sanity rejoiced!
Anon a little boy came sauntering by,
Whistling a merry air, that, arrow-like,
Went through my memory, and a fair dear one
Drew me with gentle hand into the haze
Of dream. A strange transition, yet not strange,
If all the links that brought her image near
Were marked; nor strange, since memories are involved Together by the laws of harmonies.
I left the obdurate noise. Through paths of sward,
Where never cloud of dust had fallen, I reached
An opening in a wall of sapling boughs;
I entered, and within more still and cool
It was, and freshness through the air exhaled
From the green ground. Half dusk it was, for round
And round the branches wove a screen from heaven
Of darkest green and varied leaf, 'neath which
Flies thickly humming danced. Sometimes a bird.
Flew quickly through; and as its wing might brush
The leaves about your head, it seemed to fear
That it had missed its way. Flowers too were there,
Sprinkled about amidst the grass which grows
Hair-like and thin beneath the shade; blue bells,
Tinkling to the small breeze a bee might cause,
And violets, and poppies red and rough,
In stem. I passed still deeper through the wood
By this cool path: a wood more kindly cool,
Or harmless of dank poisons or vile beasts
That creep there cannot be, and yet so wild
And uncouth. Bushes of dusk fruit beside
The pathway from the ground, piled up to walls
Of leaves and berries, from which flocked the birds
As I passed on; or lingered with dyed hands
Plucking them listless, and with profuse waste
Pressing their juice out. Other trees were there,
Blossoming for a later month.
And now,
As if from the champaign land afar, came sounds
Of hearty laughter, mellowed by the air,
Until it scarce was audible; and song,
Like a reaper's song, a very pleasant sound,
Betokening a clear breast, and heard beneath
A clear sky chequered by thick boughs, a sound
Right happy. So I also sang. The sun
Now found an opening through the stems, to fall
Upon my path; and as I walked, across
The flowers upon my right my shadow passed.
A butterfly with purple-velvet wings,
Invested with two lines of dusky gold
And spotted with red spots, upon these flowers
Was feeding; and anon as my shadow fell
Upon it, it flew up and went before,
Lighting again until I passed and so
Continued it. The space more closed and closed
Became, and all between the trees were warped
Vine-twigs, and plants more fair than vines. Beneath
A slow stream likewise glent, and secretly
Fed spreading water-lilies, and long reeds
Heavy with seed, which might have made fair pipes,
Cut nicely by the joints, from whence a leaf
Depended. But I thought not of the task,
Watching my guide's dark wings, until the path
Seemed stayed by dense convolvulus and thorns
(Largely o'ergrown without the pruner's hands)
Of the red-hearted rose. But the dark fly lowered
Its flight till nigh the ground, and passed into
The mass of greenery by an interspace
Which I had seen not: with ray hands I raised,
And parted with my head, full lazily,
The luscious screen at this same interspace.
Behold! beneath a peristyle I stand
Of short columnar palms; before me steps
Of thickest grass descend unto a space
Smooth tapestried, with living garlands bound,
And set about with moss-cushioned seats of wood
Cut roughly from the forest, over which
Uptangling richly to the highest trees,
And waving even then into the air,
Flowers rare and unknown, and around a fount
(Of which a marble girl, with green feet through
The water and white head, seemed Nymph) bright heaps
Of lily blooms were strewn. But all these sweets
Were nothing to the influence which came o'er
My being from some unseen power, whose grace
The whole seemed imitative of, whose smile
The light seemed intimating to the flowers,
Whose goodness all around seemed fashioned by.
Half slumbering as I stretched upon the sward,
Mazed by this unknown beauty, and the swarms
Of flies like that which here had guided me
All round, the influence became more dear,
More fixed, and I beheld a lady. Round
Her hand, which held some sweet, the insects thronged,
And lighted on her hair. I did not start
With rapture nor surprise, nor did I deem
Myself unworthy of this gardened love,
This goddess-girl, nor said she aught to me,
But by her eyes, which never looked on me.
I said she was the spirit of my life;
And tho' I had not seen her until now,
I still had known her.
The sward I pressed; she leant on the rude seat
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