The magical moonlight then Steeped every bough and cone ; Came dim from the distance blown; O my life, have we not had seasons When we went with the winds in their blow ing, When Nature and we were peers, And we seemed to share in the flowing Have we not from the earth drawn juices Have I heard, have I seen All I feel and I know? Long ago? Sometimes a breath floats by me, Of memories that stay not and go not, A something so shy, it would shame it A something too vague, could I name it, As if I had lived it or dreamed it, As if I had acted or schemed it, And yet, could I live it over, As I seem to have been, once again, The world should not lack a poet, Such as it had In the ages glad, Long ago! THE FOOT-PATH. T mounts athwart the windy hill And Fancy climbs with foot-fall still By day, a warmer-hearted blue Stoops softly to that topmost swell; Its thread-like windings seem a clew To gracious climes where all is well. By night, far yonder, I surmise An ampler world than clips mý ken, I look and long, then haste me home, Jor M Forever to the new it guides, From former good, old overmuch ; What Nature for her poets hides, "T is wiser to divine than clutch. The bird I list hath never come My prying step would make him dumb, Behind the hill, behind the sky, Behind my inmost thought, he sings; No feet avail; to hear it nigh, The song itself must lend the wings. Sing on, sweet bird close hid, and raise Sing when thou wilt, enchantment fleet, To make a twice-told tale of God. They said the fairies tript no more, MOU T was but that fools preferred to bore Pan leaps and pipes all summer long, City of Elf-land, just without Our seeing, marvel ever new, Glimpsed in fair weather, a sweet doubt Sketched-in, mirage-like, on the blue. I build thee in yon sunset cloud, Thy gates are shut to hardiest will, Thy countersign of long-lost speech, Those fountained courts, those chambers still, Fronting Time's far East, who shall reach ? I know not, and will never pry, But trust our human heart for all; Wonders that from the seeker fly Into an open sense may fall. |