Volume Ii Part 6 (1/2)
Take Snow-white back to her glimmering stall; There let her stand and feed!-- I am overweening, ambitious, small, A creature of pride and greed!
Let me wash the hoofs, let me be the thrall, Jesus, of thy white steed!
_THE GOLDEN KEY._
From off the earth the vapours curled, Went up to meet their joy; The boy awoke, and all the world Was waiting for the boy!
The sky, the water, the wide earth Was full of windy play-- s.h.i.+ning and fair, alive with mirth, All for his holiday!
The hill said ”Climb me;” and the wood ”Come to my bosom, child; Mine is a merry gamboling brood, Come, and with them go wild.”
The shadows with the sunlight played, The birds were singing loud; The hill stood up with pines arrayed-- He ran to join the crowd.
But long ere noon, dark grew the skies, Pale grew the shrinking sun: ”How soon,” he said, ”for clouds to rise When day was but begun!”
The wind grew rough; a wilful power It swept o'er tree and town; The boy exulted for an hour, Then weary sat him down.
And as he sat the rain began, And rained till all was still: He looked, and saw a rainbow span The vale from hill to hill.
He dried his tears. ”Ah, now,” he said, ”The storm was good, I see!
Yon pine-dressed hill, upon its head I'll find the golden key!”
He thrid the copse, he climbed the fence, At last the top did scale; But, lo, the rainbow, vanished thence, Was s.h.i.+ning in the vale!
”Still, here it stood! yes, here,” he said, ”Its very foot was set!
I saw this fir-tree through the red, This through the violet!”
He searched and searched, while down the skies Went slow the slanting sun.
At length he lifted hopeless eyes, And day was nearly done!
Beyond the vale, above the heath, High flamed the crimson west; His mother's cottage lay beneath The sky-bird's rosy breast.
”Oh, joy,” he cried, ”not _all_ the way Farther from home we go!
The rain will come another day And bring another bow!”
Long ere he reached his mother's cot, Still tiring more and more, The red was all one cold gray blot, And night lay round the door.
But when his mother stroked his head The night was grim in vain; And when she kissed him in his bed The rainbow rose again.
Soon, things that are and things that seem Did mingle merrily; He dreamed, nor was it all a dream, His mother had the key.
_SOMNIUM MYSTICI_
A Microcosm In Terza Rima.
I.
Quiet I lay at last, and knew no more Whether I breathed or not, so worn I lay With the death-struggle. What was yet before Neither I met, nor turned from it away; My only conscious being was the rest Of pain gone dead--dead with the bygone day, And long I could have lingered all but blest In that half-slumber. But there came a sound As of a door that opened--in the west Somewhere I thought it. As the hare the hound, The noise did start my eyelids and they rose.
I turned my eyes and looked. Then straight I found It was my chamber-door that did unclose, For a tall form up to my bedside drew.
Grand was it, silent, its very walk repose; And when I saw the countenance, I knew That I was lying in my chamber dead; For this my brother--brothers such are few-- That now to greet me bowed his kingly head, Had, many years agone, like holy dove Returning, from his friends and kindred sped, And, leaving memories of mournful love, Pa.s.sed vanis.h.i.+ng behind the unseen veil; And though I loved him, all high words above.
Not for his loss then did I weep or wail, Knowing that here we live but in a tent, And, seeking home, shall find it without fail.
Feeble but eager, toward him my hands went-- I too was dead, so might the dead embrace!
Taking me by the shoulders down he bent, And lifted me. I was in sickly case, But, growing stronger, stood up on the floor, There turned, and once regarded my dead face With curious eyes: its brow contentment wore, But I had done with it, and turned away.
I saw my brother by the open door, And followed him out into the night blue-gray.