NIGHT-BLOWING FLOWERS CHILDREN of Night! unfolding meekly, slowly To the sweet breathings of the shadowy hours, To spirit-haunted sleep, O dedicated flowers! Ye, from the gaze of crowds your beauty veiling, -So doth Love's dreaming heart And but to shades disclose The inmost thought, which glows Shut from the sounds wherein the day rejoices, THE WANDERER AND THE NIGHT-FLOWERS 197 THE WANDERER AND THE NIGHT-FLOWERS CALL back your odours, lovely flowers! From the night-winds call them back; The lark lies couched in her grassy nest, And all bright things are away to rest- Is not your world a mournful one, When your sisters close their eyes, And your soft breath meets not a lingering tone Take ye no joy in the dayspring's birth, And the thousand strains of the forest's mirth, Shut your sweet bells till the fawn comes out And the woodland child with a fairy shout Nay! let our shadowy beauty bloom On the silent shrine of Night. "Call it not wasted, the scent we lend "And love us as emblems, Night's dewy flowers, Of hopes unto sorrow given, That spring through the gloom of the darkest hours Looking alone to heaven!" THE SWAN AND THE SKYLARK "Adieu, adieu! thy plaintive anthem fades Past the near meadows, over the still stream, "Higher still and higher From the earth thou springest; Like a cloud of fire The blue deep thou wingest; And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest."-SHELLEY. MIDST the long reeds that o'er a Grecian stream And where the sculpture of a broken shrine Warbled his death-chant. And a poet stood THE SWAN AND THE SKYLARK 199 "O SUMMER! I depart O light and laughing summer! fare-thee-well: No song the less through thy rich woods will swell, For one, one broken heart. "And fare-ye-well, young flowers! Ye will not mourn! ye will shed odour still, Known to my youth's fresh hours. "And ye, bright founts! that lie Far in the whispering forests, lone and deep, "Will ye not send one tone Of sorrow through the pines?-one murmur low? Shall not the green leaves from your voices know That I, your child, am gone? "No! ever glad and free, Ye have no sounds a tale of death to tell: "But thou, sweet boon! too late Poured on my parting breath, vain gift of song! Why com'st thou thus, o'ermastering, rich and strong, In the dark hour of fate? 66 Only to wake the sighs Of echo-voices from their sparry cell; Only to say-O sunshine and blue skies! Thus flowed the death-chant on; while mournfully Woke to respond: and all the air was filled "THE summer is come; she hath said Rejoice! "There is joy in the mountains! The bright waves leap "There is joy in the forests! The bird of night "Mine are the wings of the soaring morn, Sing, sing, through the echoing sky!" |