Part 6 (2/2)

MORN

Morn hath a secret that she never tells: 'Tis on her lips and in her maiden eyes-- I think it is the way to Paradise, Or of the Fount of Youth the crystal wells.

The bee hath no such honey in her cells Sweet as the balm that in her bosom lies, As in her garden of the budding skies She walks among the silver asphodels.

He that is loveless and of heart forlorn, Let him but leave behind his haunted bed, And set his feet toward yonder singing star, Shall have for sweetheart this same secret morn; She shall come running to him from afar, And on her cool breast lay his lonely head.

THE SOURCE

Water in hidden glens From the secret heart of the mountains, Where the red fox hath its dens And the G.o.ds their crystal fountains; Up runnel and leaping cataract, Boulder and ledge, I climbed and tracked, Till I came to the top of the world and the fen That drinks up the clouds and cisterns the rain, And down through the floors of the deep mora.s.s The procreant woodland essences drain-- The thunder's home, where the eagles scream And the centaurs pa.s.s; But, where it was born, I lost my stream.

'Twas in vain I said: ”'Tis here it springs, Though no more it leaps and no more it sings;”

And I thought of a poet whose songs I knew Of morning made and s.h.i.+ning dew-- I remembered the mire of the marshes too.

AUTUMN

The sad nights are here and the sad mornings, The air is filled with portents and with warnings, Clouds that vastly loom and winds that cry, A mournful prescience Of bright things going hence; Red leaves are blown about the widowed sky, And late disconsolate blooms Dankly bestrew The garden walks, as in deserted rooms The parted guest, in haste to bid adieu, Trinklets and shreds forgotten left behind, Torn letters and a ribbon once so brave-- Wreckage none cares to save, And hearts grow sad to find; And phantom echoes, as of old foot-falls, Wander and weary out in the thin air, And the last cricket calls-- A tiny sorrow, shrilling ”Where? ah! where?”

THE ROSE IN WINTER

When last I saw this opening rose That holds the summer in its hand, And with its beauty overflows And sweetens half a s.h.i.+re of land, It was a black and cindered thing, Drearily rocking in the cold, The relic of a vanished spring, A rose abominably old.

Amid the stainless snows it grinned, A foul and withered shape, that cast Ribbed shadows, and the gleaming wind Went rattling through it as it pa.s.sed; It filled the heart with a strange dread, Hag-like, it made a whimpering sound, And gibbered like the wandering dead In some unhallowed burial-ground.

Whoso on that December day Had seen it so deject and lorn, So lone a symbol of decay, Had dreamed of it this summer morn?

Divined the power that should relume A flame so spent, and once more bring That blackened being back to bloom,-- Who could have dreamed so strange a thing?

THE FROZEN STREAM

Stream that leapt and danced Down the rocky ledges, All the summer long, Past the flowered sedges, Under the green rafters, With their leafy laughters, Murmuring your song: Strangely still and tranced, All your singing ended, Wizardly suspended, Icily adream; When the new buds thicken, Can this crystal quicken, Now so strangely sleeping, Once more go a-leaping Down the rocky ledges, All the summer long, Murmuring its song?

WINTER MAGIC

Winter that hath few friends yet numbers those Of spirit erect and delicate of eye; All may applaud sweet Summer, with her rose, And Autumn, with her banners in the sky; But when from the earth's cheek the colour goes, Her old adorers from her presence fly.

So cold her bosom seems, such icy glare Is in her eyes, while on the frozen mere The shrill ice creaks in the congealing air; Where is the lover that shall call her dear, Or the devotion that shall find her fair?

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