Dreams

Just as those final words were penned, the sun broke out in power,
And gladdened all things; but, as chanced, within that very hour,
Air blackened, thunder growled, fire flashed from clouds that hid the sky,
And, for the Subject of my Verse, I heaved a pensive sigh.

Nor could my heart by second thoughts from heaviness be cleared,
For bodied forth before my eyes the cross-crowned hut appeared;
And, while around it storm as fierce seemed troubling earth and air,
I saw, within, the Norman Boy kneeling alone in prayer.

The Child, as if the thunder's voice spake with articulate call,
Bowed meekly in submissive fear, before the Lord of All;
His lips were moving; and his eyes, up-raised to sue for grace,
With soft illumination cheered the dimness of that place.

How bea...

Bring not your dreams to me -
Blown dust, and vapour, and the running stream -
Saying, "He, too, doth dream,
Touched of the moon."

Nay! wouldst thou vanish see
Thy darling phantoms,
Bring them then to me!
For my hard business - though so soft it seems -
Was ever dreams and dreams.

And as some stern-eyed broker smiles disdain,
Valuing at nought
Her bosom's locket, with its little chain,
Love's all that Love hath brought;
So must I weigh and measure
Thy fading treasure,
Sighing to see it go
As surely as the snow.

For I have such sad knowledge of all things
That shine like dew a little, all that sings
And ends its song in weeping -
Such sowing and such reaping! -
There is no cure but sleeping.

In slumber, I prithee how is it
    That souls are oft taking the air,
And paying each other a visit,
    While bodies are heaven knows where?

Last night, 'tis in vain to deny it,
    Your soul took a fancy to roam,
For I heard her, on tiptoe so quiet,
    Come ask, whether mine was at home.

And mine let her in with delight,
    And they talked and they laughed the time through;
For, when souls come together at night,
    There is no saying what they mayn't do!

And your little Soul, heaven bless her!
    Had much to complain and to say,
Of how sadly you wrong and oppress her
    By keeping her prisoned all day.

"If I happen," said she, "but to steal
    "For a peep now and then to her eye,
"Or, to quiet the fever...

The night is long
    And there are no stars, -
        Let me but dream
        That the long fields gleam
With sunlight and song,
Then I shall not long
    For the light of stars.

Let me but dream, -
    For there are no stars, -
        Dream that the ache
        And the wild heart-break
Are but things that seem.
Ah! let me dream
    For there are no stars.

No Muse will I invoke; for she is fled!
Lo! where she sits, breathing, yet all but dead.
She loved the heavens of old, she thought them fair;
And dream'd of Gods in Tempe's golden air.
For her the wind had voice, the sea its cry;
She deem'd heroic Greece could never die.
Breathless was she, to think what nymphs might play
In clear green depths, deep-shaded from the day;
She thought the dim and inarticulate god
Was beautiful, nor knew she man a sod;
But hoped what seem'd might not be all untrue,
And feared to look beyond the eternal blue.
But now the heavens are bared of dreams divine.
Still murmurs she, like Autumn, This was mine!
How should she face the ghastly, jarring Truth,
That questions all, and tramples without ruth?
And still she clings to Ida o...

I dreamed of a song, I heard it sung;
In the ear that sleeps not its music rung.
And the tones were upheld by harmonies deep,
Where the spirit floated; yea, soared, on their sweep
With each wild unearthly word and tone,
Upward, it knew not whither bound,
In a calm delirium of mystic sound--
Up, where the Genius of Thought alone
Loveth in silence to drink his fill
Of dews that from unknown clouds distil.
A woman's voice the deep echoes awoke,
In the caverns and solitudes of my soul;
But such a voice had never broke
Through the sea of sounds that about us roll,
Choking the ear in the daylight strife.
There was sorrow and triumph, and death and life
In each chord-note of that prophet-song,
Blended in one harmonious throng:
Such a chant, ere my voice has...

There is grey in your hair.
Young men no longer suddenly catch their breath
When you are passing;
But maybe some old gaffer mutters a blessing
Because it was your prayer
Recovered him upon the bed of death.
For your sole sake—that all heart’s ache have known,
And given to others all heart’s ache,
From meagre girlhood’s putting on
Burdensome beauty—for your sole sake
Heaven has put away the stroke of her doom,
So great her portion in that peace you make
By merely walking in a room.

Your beauty can but leave among us
Vague memories, nothing but memories.
A young man when the old men are done talking
Will say to an old man, ‘Tell me of that lady
The poet stubborn with his passion sang us
When age might well have chilled his blood.’

Vagu...

I rose from dreamless hours and sought the morn
That beat upon my window: from the sill
I watched sweet lands, where Autumn light newborn
Swayed through the trees and lingered on the hill.
If things so lovely are, why labour still
To dream of something more than this I see?
Do I remember tales of Galilee,
I who have slain my faith and freed my will?
Let me forget dead faith, dead mystery,
Dead thoughts of things I cannot comprehend.
Enough the light mysterious in the tree,
Enough the friendship of my chosen friend.

The Day was dying; his breath
Wavered away in a hectic gleam;
And I said, if Life's a dream, and Death
And Love and all are dreams - I'll dream.

A mist came over the bay
Like as a dream would over an eye.
The mist was white and the dream was grey
And both contained a human cry,

The burthen whereof was "Love",
And it filled both mist and dream with pain,
And the hills below and the skies above
Were touched and uttered it back again.

The mist broke: down the rift
A kind ray shot from a holy star.
Then my dream did waver and break and lift -
Through it, O Love, shone thy face, afar.

So Boyhood sets: comes Youth,
A painful night of mists and dreams;
That broods till Love's exquisite truth,
The star of a morn-clear manhood, be...

    Perhaps you sleep now, fifty miles to the south,
    While I sit here and dream of you by night.
    The thick soft blankets drawn about your mouth
    Have made for you a nest of warm delight;
    Your short crisp hair is thrown abroad and spilled
    Upon the pillow's whiteness and your eyes
    Are quiet and the round soft lids are filled
    With sleep.

                            But I shall watch until sunrise
    Creeps into chilly clouds and heavy air,
    Across the lands where you sleep and I wake,
    And I shall know the sun has seen you there,
    Unmoving though the winter morning break.
    Next, you will lift your hands and rub your eyes
    And turn to sleep again but wake and start
    And feel, half dreaming, with a dear surprise,
...

I'd a dream last night of my boyhood's days,
And the scenes where my youth was spent;
And I roamed the old woods where the squirrel plays,
Full of frolicsome merriment.
And I walked by the brook, and its silvery tone,
Seemed to soothe me again as of yore;
And I stood by the cottage with moss overgrown
And the woodbine that trailed round the door.

No change could I see in the garden plot,
The flowers bloomed brightly around,
And one little bed of forget-me-not
In its own little corner I found.
The sky had a home-look, the breeze seemed to sigh,
In the strain I remembered so well,
And the little brown sparrows looked cunning and shy,
As though anxious some story to tell.

But as quietness reigned and a loneliness fell,
O'er the place that had onc...

Over the hills and the valleys of dreaming
Slowly I take my way.
Life is the night with its dream-visions teeming,
Death is the waking at day.

Down thro' the dales and the bowers of loving,
Singing, I roam afar.
Daytime or night-time, I constantly roving,--
Dearest one, thou art my star.

Thou who hast follow'd far with eyes of love
The shy and virgin sights of Spring to-day,
Sad soul, what dost thou in this happy grove?
Hast thou no pipe to touch, no strain to play,
Where Nature smiles so fair and seems to ask a lay?

Ah! she needs none! she is too beautiful.
How should I sing her? for my heart would tire,
Seeking a lovelier verse each time to cull,
In striving still to pitch my music higher:
Lovelier than any muse is she who gives the fire!

No impulse I beseech; my strains are vile:
To escape thee, Nature, restless here I rove.
Look not so sweet on me, avert thy smile!
O cease at length this fever'd breast to move!
I have loved thee in vain; I cannot speak my love.

Here sense with apathy seems gently wed:
The gloom is starr'd...

When the slow year creeps hay-ward, and the skies
Are warming in the summer's mild surprise,
And the still breeze disturbs each leafy frond
Like hungry fishes dimpling in a pond,
It is a pleasant thing to dream at ease
On sun-warmed thyme, not far from beechen trees.

A robin flashing in a rowan-tree,
A wanton robin, spills his melody
As if he had such store of golden tones
That they were no more worth to him than stones:
The sunny lizards dream upon the ledges:
Linnets titter in and out the hedges,
Or swoop among the freckled butterflies.

Down to a beechen hollow winds the track
And tunnels past my twilit bivouac:
Two spiring wisps of smoke go singly up
And scarcely tremble in the leafy air.

There are more shadows in this loamy cup
...

I have no happiness in dreaming of Brycelinde,
Nor Avalon the grass-green hollow, nor Joyous Isle,
Where one found Lancelot crazed and hid him for a while;
Nor Uladh, when Naoise had thrown a sail upon the wind;
Nor lands that seem too dim to be burdens on the heart:
Land-under-Wave, where out of the moon's light and the sun's
Seven old sisters wind the threads of the long-lived ones,
Land-of-the-Tower, where Aengus has thrown the gates apart,
And Wood-of-Wonders, where one kills an ox at dawn,
To find it when night falls laid on a golden bier.
Therein are many queens like Branwen and Guinevere;
And Niamh and Laban and Fand, who could change to an otter or fawn,
And the wood-woman, whose lover was changed to a blue-eyed hawk;
And whether I go in my dreams by woodland, or dun...

Thou silent power, whose welcome sway
Charms every anxious thought away;
In whose divine oblivion drown'd,
Sore pain and weary toil grow mild,
Love is with kinder looks beguil'd,
And grief forgets her fondly-cherish'd wound;
Oh whither hast thou flown, indulgent god?
God of kind shadows and of healing dews,
Whom dost thou touch with thy Lethaean rod?
Around whose temples now thy opiate airs diffuse?
Lo, midnight from her starry reign
Looks awful down on earth and main.
The tuneful birds lie hush'd in sleep,
With all that crop the verdant food,
With all that skim the crystal flood,
Or haunt the caverns of the rocky steep.
No rushing winds disturb the tufted bowers;
No wakeful sound the moon-light valley knows,
Save where the brook its liquid murmur po...

‘Te somnia nostra reducunt.’
OVID.

And ask ye why these sad tears stream?
Why these wan eyes are dim with weeping?
I had a dream–a lovely dream,
Of her that in the grave is sleeping.

I saw her as ’twas yesterday,
The bloom upon her cheek still glowing;
And round her play’d a golden ray,
And on her brows were gay flowers blowing.

With angel-hand she swept a lyre,
A garland red with roses bound it;
Its strings were wreath’d with lambent fire
And amaranth was woven round it.

I saw her mid the realms of light,
In everlasting radiance gleaming;
Co-equal with the seraphs bright,
Mid thousand thousand angels beaming.

I strove to reach her, when, behold,
Those fairy forms of bliss Elysian,
And all that rich scene wrapt...

I love a woman tenderly,
But cannot know if she loves me.
I press her hand, her lips I kiss,
But still love's full assurance miss.
Our waking life for ever seems
Cleft by a veil of doubt and dreams.

But love and night and sleep combine
In dreams to make her wholly mine.
A sure love lights her eyes' deep blue,
Her hands and lips are warm and true.
Always the fact unreal seems,
And truth I find alone in dreams.