With sound of happy mirth and sheen Of daylight-whether by the green You fare that moment, or the grey; Whether you dwell in March or May; Or whether treat of reels and rods Or of the old unhappy gods:
Still like a brook your page has shone, And your ink sings of Helicon.
N ancient tales, O friend, thy spirit dwelt;
I thy and there
High expectation, high delights and deeds, Thy fluttering heart with hope and terror moved. And thou hast heard of yore the Blatant Beast, And Roland's horn, and that war-scattering shout Of all-unarmed Achilles, ægis-crowned.
And perilous lands thou sawest, sounding shores And seas and forests drear, island and dale
And mountain dark. For thou with Tristram rod'st Or Bedevere, in farthest Lyonesse.
Thou hadst a booth in Samarcand, whereat Side-looking Magians trafficked; thence, by night, An Afreet snatched thee, and with wings upbore Beyond the Aral mount; or, hoping gain, Thou, with a jar of money, didst embark, For Balsorah, by sea. But chiefly thou In that clear air took'st life; in Arcady
The haunted, land of song; and by the wells
Where most the gods frequent. There Chiron old,
In the Pelethronian antre, taught thee lore
The plants, he taught, and by the shining stars In forests dim to steer. There hast thou seen Immortal Pan dance secret in a glade,
And, dancing, roll his eyes; these, where they fell, Shed glee, and through the congregated oaks A flying horror winged; while all the earth To the god's pregnant footing thrilled within. Or whiles, beside the sobbing stream, he breathed, In his clutched pipe, unformed and wizard strains, Divine yet brutal; which the forest heard, And thou, with awe; and far upon the plain The unthinking ploughman started and gave ear.
Now things there are that, upon him who sees, A strong vocation lay; and strains there are That whoso hears shall hear for evermore. For evermore thou hear'st immortal Pan And those melodious godheads, ever young And ever quiring, on the mountains old.
What was this earth, child of the gods, to thee? Forth from thy dreamland thou, a dreamer, cam'st, And in thine ears the olden music rang, And in thy mind the doings of the dead, And those heroic ages long forgot. To a so fallen earth, alas! too late, Alas! in evil days, thy steps return, To list at noon for nightingales, to grow A dweller on the beach till Argo come That came long since, a lingerer by the pool Where that desirèd angel bathes no more.
As when the Indian to Dakota comes, Or farthest Idaho, and where he dwelt, He with his clan, a humming city finds; Thereon awhile, amazed, he stares, and then To right and leftward, like a questing dog, Seeks first the ancestral altars, then the hearth. Long cold with rains, and where old terror lodged, And where the dead. So thee undying Hope, With all her pack, hunts screaming through the years: Here, there, thou fleeëst; but nor here nor there The pleasant gods abide, the glory dwells.
That, that was not Apollo, not the god.
This was not Venus, though she Venus seemed A moment. And though fair yon river move,
She, all the way, from disenchanted fount
To seas unhallowed runs; the gods forsook Long since her trembling rushes; from her plains Disconsolate, long since adventure fled;
And now although the inviting river flows, And every poplared cape, and every bend Or willowy islet, win upon thy soul And to thy hopeful shallop whisper speed; Yet hope not thou at all; hope is no more; And O, long since the golden groves are dead, The faery cities vanished from the land!
THE sun,
year runs through her phases; rain and
Springtime and summer pass; winter succeeds; But one pale season rules the house of death. Cold falls the imprisoned daylight; fell disease By each lean pallet squats, and pain and sleep Toss gaping on the pillows.
Uprise and take thy pipe.
But O thou!
Bid music flow,
Strains by good thoughts attended, like the spring The swallows follow over land and sea. Pain sleeps at once; at once, with open eyes, Dozing despair awakes. The shepherd sees His flock come bleating home; the seaman hears Once more the cordage rattle. Airs of home! Youth, love and roses blossom; the gaunt ward Dislimns and disappears, and, opening out, Shows brooks and forests, and the blue beyond Of mountains.
Small the pipe; but O! do thou, Peak-faced and suffering piper, blow therein The dirge of heroes dead; and to these sick,
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