No bigger than a glowworm shone the tent me, Descending; once or twice she lent her hand, And blissful palpitations in the blood But when we planted level feet, and dipt Then she, Let some one sing to us; lightlier move The minutes fledged with music;' and a maid, Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean, eyes, In looking on the happy autumn-fields, Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail, Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns The earliest pipe of half-awaken'd birds To dying ears, when unto dying eyes The casement slowly grows a glimmering square; Dear as remember'd kisses after death, She ended with such passion that the tear She sang of shook and fell, an erring pearl Lost in her bosom; but with some disdain Answer'd the Princess: If indeed there haunt About the moulder'd lodges of the past So sweet a voice and vague, fatal to men, Well needs it we should cram our ears with wool Wiser to weep a true occasion lost, But trim our sails, and let old bygones be, While down the streams that float us each and all To the issue, goes, like glittering bergs of ice, Throne after throne, and molten on the waste Becomes a cloud; for all things serve their time Toward that great year of equal mights and rights. Nor would I fight with iron laws, in the end Found golden. Let the past be past, let be Their cancell❜d Babels; tho' the rough kex break 'Know you no song of your own land,' she said, 'Not such as moans about the retrospect, But deals with the other distance and the hues Then I remember'd one myself had made, Now while I sang, and maiden-like as far O Swallow, Swallow, flying, flying south, O, tell her, Swallow, thou that knowest each, That bright and fierce and fickle is the South, And dark and true and tender is the North. 6 O Swallow, Swallow, if I could follow, and light Upon her lattice, I would pipe and trill, And cheep and twitter twenty million loves. 'O, were I thou that she might take me in, And lay me on her bosom, and her heart Would rock the snowy cradle till I died! Why lingereth she to clothe her heart with love, Delaying as the tender ash delays To clothe herself, when all the woods are green? O, tell her, Swallow, that thy brood is flown;\ Say to her, I do but wanton in the South, But in the North long since my nest is made. O, tell her, brief is life but love is long, And brief the sun of summer in the North, And brief the moon of beauty in the South. O Swallow, flying from the golden woods, Fly to her, and pipe and woo her, and make her mine, And tell her, tell her, that I follow thee.' I ceased, and all the ladies, each at each, Like the Ithacensian suitors in old time, Stared with great eyes, and laugh'd with alien lips, And knew not what they meant; for still my voice Rang false. But smiling, Not for thee,' she said, 'O Bulbul, any rose of Gulistan Shall burst her veil; marsh-divers, rather, maid, Shall croak thee sister, or the meadow-crake Grate her harsh kindred in the grass - and this A mere love-poem! O, for such, my friend, We hold them slight; they mind us of the time When we made bricks in Egypt. Knaves are men, That lute and flute fantastic tenderness, And dress the victim to the offering up, I loved her. Peace be with her. She is dead. So they blaspheme the muse! But great is song Used to great ends; ourself have often tried Valkyrian hymns, or into rhythm have dash'd The passion of the prophetess; for song Is duer unto freedom, force and growth Of spirit, than to junketing and love. Love is it? this Would this same mock-love, and Mock-Hymen were laid up like winter bats, To be dandled, no, but living wills, and sphered Know you no song, the true growth of your soil, That gives the manners of your countrywomen?' |