But sweet as the incense from altars, And warm as the light on a cloud, Sad as the wail of bleak woodlands, To me was the Night when she falters In the sorrowful folds of her shroud, In the far-blowing black of her shroud,
O"er the flower-strewn bier of her lover, The Day lying faded and fair In the red-curtained chambers of air.
When disheveled I"ve seen her uncover Her gold-girdled raven of hair-- All hooped with the gold of the even-- And for this sad burial prepare, The spirit of Night in the heaven To me was most wondrously fair, So fair that I wished it were given To die in the rays of her hair, Die wrapped in her gold-girdled hair.
THE TOLL-MAN"S DAUGHTER.
Once more the June with her great moon Poured harvest o"er the golden fields; Once more her days in hot, bright shields She bore from morn to drooping noon.
A rhymer, sick of work and rhyme, Disheartened by a poor success, I sought the woods to loll the time In one long month of quietness.
It was the time when one will thrill For indolent fields, serener skies; For Nature"s softening subtleties Of higher cloud and gullied rill.
When crumpled poppies strew the halls Of all the East, where mounts the Dawn, And in the eve the skyey lawn Gold kingcups heap "neath Night"s gray walls.
The silver peace of distant wolds, Of far-seen lakes a glimmering dance, Fresh green of undulating hills, Old woodlands silent with romance.
Intenser stars, a lazier moon, The moonlit torrent on the peak, And at one"s side a maiden meek And lovely as the balmy June.
The toll-gate stood beside the road, The highway from the city"s smoke; Its long, well white-washed spear-point broke The clean sky o"er the pike and showed The draught-horse where his rest should be.
The locusts tall with shade on shade The trough of water cool beneath, From heat and toil a Sabbath made.
Beyond were pastures where the kine Would browse, and where a young bull roared; And here would pa.s.s a peeping h.o.a.rd Of duck and brood in waddling line.
A week flew by on wings of ease.
I walked along a rutty lane; I stopped to list some picker"s strain Sung in a patch of raspberries.
Upon the fence"s lanky rails I leaned to stare into great eyes Glooming beneath a bonnet white Bowed "neath a chin of dimpled prize.
Phoebe, the toll-man"s daughter she; I knew her by a slow, calm smile, Whose source seemed distant many a mile, Br.i.m.m.i.n.g her eyes" profundity.
Elastic as a filly"s tread Her modest step, and full and warm The graceful contour of her form Harmonious swelled from foot to head.
And such a head!--You"d thought that there The languid night, in frowsy bliss, Had curled brown rays for her deep hair And stained them with the starlight"s kiss.
A face as beautiful and bright, As crystal fair as twilight skies, Lit with the stars of hazel eyes, And lashed with black of dusky night.
She stood waist-deep amid the briers; Above in twisted lengths were rolled The sunset"s tangled whorls of gold, Blown from the West"s mist-fueled fires.
A shuddering twilight dashed with gold Down smouldering hills the fierce day fell, And bubbling over star on star The night"s blue cisterns "gan to well, With the dusk crescent of his wings A huge crane cleaves the wealthy West, While up the East a silver breast Of chast.i.ty the full moon brings.
For her, I knew, where"er she trod, Each dew-drop raised a limpid gla.s.s To flash her beauty from the gra.s.s; That wild flowers bloomed along the sod, Or, whisp"ring, murmured when she smiled; The wood-bird hushed to hark her song, Or, all enamored, from his wild Before her feet flew flutt"ring long.
The brook droned mystic melodies, Eddied in laughter when she kissed With naked feet its amethyst Of waters stained by blooming trees.
THE BERRIERS.
MORN.
Down silver precipices drawn The red-wine cataracts of dawn Pour soundless torrents wide and far, Deluging each warm, floating star.
A sound of winds and brooks and wings, Sweet woodland-fluted carolings, Star radiance dashed on moss and fern, Wet leaves that quiver, breathe, and burn; Wet hills, hung heavily with woods, Dew-drenched and drunken solitudes Faint-murmuring elfin canticles; Sound, light, and spicy boisterous smells, And flowers and buds; tumultuous bees, Wind-wafts and genii of the trees.
Thro" briers that trammel, one by one, With swinging pails comes laughing on A troop of youthful berriers, Their wet feet glitt"ring where they pa.s.s Thro" dew-drop studded tufts of gra.s.s: And oh! their cheers, their merry cheers, Wake Echo on her shrubby rock, Whom dale and mountain answering mock With rapid fairy horns, as if Each mossy hill and weedy cliff Had its imperial Oberon, Who, seeking his t.i.tania hid In bloomy coverts him to shun, In kingly wrath had called and chid.
EVENING.
Cloud-feathers oozing rich with light, Slow trembling in the locks of Night, Her dusky waist with sultry gold Girdled and buckled fold on fold.
High stars; a sound of bleating flocks; Gray, burly shadows fall"n "mid rocks, Like giant curses overthrown By some Arthurian champion; Soft-swimming sorceries of mist Haunting glad glens of amethyst; Low tinklings in dim clover dells Of bland-eyed kine with brazen bells; And where the marsh in reed and gra.s.s Burns angry as a shattered gla.s.s.
The flies blur sudden blasts of shine, Like wasted draughts of amber wine Spun high by reeling Baccha.n.a.ls When Bacchus bredes his curling hair With vine-leaves, and from ev"ry lair Voluptuous Maenads lovely calls.
They come, they come, a happy throng, The berriers with gibe and song; Deep pails brimmed black to tin-white eaves With luscious fruit kept cool with leaves Of aromatic sa.s.safras, "Twixt which some sparkling berry slips, Like laughter, from the purple ma.s.s, Wine swollen as Silenus" lips.
HARVESTING.
I.
NOON.
The tanned and sultry noon climbs high Up gleaming reaches of the sky; Below the balmy belts of pines The cliff-lunged river laps and shines; Adown the aromatic dell Sifts the warm harvest"s musky smell.
And, oh! above one sees and hears The brawny-throated harvesters; Their red brows beaded with the heat, By twos and threes among the wheat Flash their hot sickles" slenderness In loops of shine; and sing, and sing, Like some mad troop of piping Pan, Along the hills that swoon or ring With sounds of Ariel airiness That haunted freckled Caliban:
"O ho! O ho! "tis noon, I say; The roses blow.
Away, away, above the hay The burly bees to the roses gay Hum love-tunes all the livelong day, So low! so low!
The roses" Minnesingers they."
II.
TWILIGHT.
Up velvet lawns of lilac skies The tawny moon begins to rise Behind low blue-black hills of trees, As rises from faint Siren seas, To rock in purple deeps, hip-hid, A virgin-bosom"d Oceanid.
Gaunt shadows crouch by rock and wood, Like hairy Satyrs, grim and rude, Till the white Dryads of the moon Come noiseless in their silver shoon To beautify them with their love.
The sweet, sad notes I hear, I hear, Beyond dim pines and mellow hills, Of some fair maiden harvester, The lovely Limnad of the grove Whose singing charms me while it kills:
"O deep! O deep! the twilight rare Pales on to sleep; And fair, so fair! fades the rich air.
The fountain shines in its ferny lair, Where the cold Nymph sits in her oozy hair To weep, to weep, For a mortal youth who is not there."
GOING FOR THE COWS.
I.
The juice-big apples" sullen gold, Like lazy Sultans laughed and lolled "Mid heavy mats of leaves that lay Green-flatten"d "gainst the glaring day; And here a pear of rusty brown, And peaches on whose brows the down Waxed furry as the ears of Pan, And, like Diana"s cheeks, whose tan Burnt tender secresies of fire, Or wan as Psyche"s with desire Of lips that love to kiss or taste Voluptuous ripeness there sweet placed.
And down the orchard vistas he,-- Barefooted, trousers out at knee, Face shadowing from the sloping sun A hat of straw, brim-sagging broad,-- Came, lowly whistling some vague tune, Upon the sunbeam-sprinkled road.
Lank in his hand a twig with which In boyish thoughtlessness he crushed Rare pennyroyal myriads rich In pungent souls that warmly gushed.
Before him whirled in rattling fear The saffron-bellied gra.s.shopper; And ringing from the musky dells Came faint the cows" melodious bells, Where whimp"ring like a fretful hound The fountain bubbled up in sound.