I DREAMED that, as I wandered by the way, Mixed with a sound of waters murmuring Under a copse, and hardly dared to fling Its green arms round the bosom of the stream, But kissed it and then fled, as thou mightest in dream. There grew pied wind-flowers and violets, Daisies, those pearled Arcturi of the earth, The constellated flower that never sets; Faint oxlips; tender bluebells, at whose birth The sod scarce heaved; and that tall flower that wets And in the warm hedge grew lush eglantine, Green cowbind and the moonlight-coloured May, With its dark buds and leaves, wandering astray; And nearer to the river's trembling edge There grew broad flag flowers, purple prankt with white, And starry river buds among the sedge, And floating water-lilies, broad and bright, Which lit the oak that overhung the hedge With moonlight beams of their own watery light; And bulrushes, and reeds of such deep green As soothed the dazzled eye with sober sheen. Methought that of these visionary flowers I made a nosegay, bound in such a way That the same hues, which in their natural bowers Were mingled or opposed, the like array Kept these imprisoned children of the Hours Within my hand,—and then, elate and gay, I hastened to the spot whence I had come, That I might there present it!-Oh! to whom? HYMN OF APOLLO. THE sleepless Hours who watch me as I lie, Fanning the busy dreams from my dim eyes,Waken me when their Mother, the grey Dawn, Tells them that dreams and that the moon is gone. Then I arise, and climbing Heaven's blue dome, I walk over the mountains and the waves, Leaving my robe upon the ocean foam; My footsteps pave the clouds with fire; the caves Are filled with my bright presence, and the air Leaves the green earth to my embraces bare. The sunbeams are my shafts, with which I kill Fly me, and from the glory of my ray I feed the clouds, the rainbows and the flowers Are cinctured with my power as with a robe; Whatever lamps on Earth or Heaven may shine, Are portions of one power, which is mine. I stand at noon upon the peak of Heaven, For grief that I depart they weep and frown: I am the eye with which the Universe Beholds itself and knows itself divine; All prophecy, all medicine are mine, HYMN OF PAN. FROM the forests and highlands From the river-girt islands, Where loud waves are dumb Listening to my sweet pipings. The wind in the reeds and the rushes, Liquid Peneus was flowing, And all dark Tempe lay In Pelion's shadow, outgrowing Speeded by my sweet pipings. The Sileni, and Sylvans, and Fauns, And the Nymphs of the woods and waves, And all that did then attend and follow I sang of the dancing stars, I sang of the dadal Earth, And of Heaven-and the giant wars, And then I changed my pipings,- It breaks in our bosom and then we bleed : THE TWO SPIRITS: AN ALLEGORY. FIRST SPIRIT. OH thou, who plumed with strong desire Night is coming! Bright are the regions of the air, And among the winds and beams Night is coming! This and the former poem were written at the request of a friend, to be inserted in a drama on the subject of Midas. Apollo and Pan contended before Tmolus for the prize in music. SECOND SPIRIT. The deathless stars are bright above; FIRST SPIRIT. But if the whirlwinds of darkness waken The red swift clouds of the hurricane SECOND SPIRIT. I see the light, and I hear the sound; Some say, there is a precipice Where one vast pine is frozen to ruin O'er piles of snow and chasms of ice 'Mid Alpine mountains; And that the languid storm pursuing Round those hoar branches, aye renewing Some say, when nights are dry and clear, A FRAGMENT. THEY were two cousins, almost like to twins, Nature had razed their love-which could not be But by dissevering their nativity. And so they grew together, like two flowers Upon one stem, which the same beams and showers Lull or awaken in their purple prime, Which the same hand will gather-the same clime Within whose bosom and whose brain now glow He faints, dissolved into a sense of love; But thou art Love itself-ruling the motion Of his subjected spirit-such emotion Had not brought forth this morn-your wedding day. |