Dreams

The moan of a wintry soul
Melted into a summer song,
And the words, like the wavelet's roll,
Moved murmuringly along.

And the song flowed far and away,
Like the voice of a half-sleeping rill --
Each wave of it lit by a ray --
But the sound was so soft and so still,

And the tone was so gentle and low,
None heard the song till it had passed;
Till the echo that followed its flow
Came dreamingly back from the past.

'Twas too late! -- a song never returns
That passes our pathway unheard;
As dust lying dreaming in urns
Is the song lying dead in a word.

For the birds of the skies have a nest,
And the winds have a home where they sleep,
And songs, like our souls, need a rest,
Where they murmur the while we may weep.

  ...

This was my dream:

It seemed the afternoon
Of some deep tropic day; and yet the moon
Stood round and bright with golden alchemy
High in a heaven bluer than the sea.
Long lawny lengths of perishable cloud
Hung in a west o'er rolling forests bowed;
Clouds raining colours, gold and violet,
That, opening, seemed from mystic worlds to let
Hints down of Parian beauty and lost charms
Of dim immortals, young, with floating forms.
And all about me fruited orchards grew,
Pear, quince and peach, and plums of dusty blue;
Rose-apricots and apples streaked with fire,
Kissed into ripeness by the sun's desire
And big with juice. And on far, fading hills,
Down which it seemed a hundred torrent rills
Flashed rushing silver, vines and vines and vines
Of purple vi...

[Greek poem here--Euripides.]



Pleasant it was, when woods were green,
    And winds were soft and low,
To lie amid some sylvan scene.
Where, the long drooping boughs between,
Shadows dark and sunlight sheen
    Alternate come and go;

Or where the denser grove receives
    No sunlight from above,
But the dark foliage interweaves
In one unbroken roof of leaves,
Underneath whose sloping eaves
    The shadows hardly move.

Beneath some patriarchal tree
    I lay upon the ground;
His hoary arms uplifted he,
And all the broad leaves over me
Clapped their little hands in glee,
    With one continuous sound;--

A slumberous sound, a sound that brings
    The feelings of a dream,
As of innumerable wings,
A...

Be gentle, O hands of a child;
Be true: like a shadowy sea
In the starry darkness of night
Are your eyes to me.

But words are shallow, and soon
Dreams fade that the heart once knew;
And youth fades out in the mind,
In the dark eyes too.

What can a tired heart say,
Which the wise of the world have made dumb?
Save to the lonely dreams of a child,
'Return again, come!'

In those dark mornings, deep in June,
    When brooding birds stir in the nest,
And heavy dews slip down the leaves,
    And drop into the rose's breast,
I woke and looked into the east,
    And saw no sign of coming day,
The pale cold morning rolled in mist,
    Slept on the hill-tops far away.

My window looked into the dawn,
    The slumbering dawn that was so nigh,
The shadow of the hills was drawn
    In waving lines against the sky.
But warmer hues began to tip
    The edges of the mountain cloud
And morning's rosy cheek and lip
    Glowed softly through her snow-pale shroud.

I turned and gazed into the west,
    The river murmured in my ear
'Gone night, and silence, dreams and rest,
    Another day of toil is here.'

...

I have opened the window to warm my hands on the sill
Where the sunlight soaks in the stone: the afternoon
Is full of dreams, my love, the boys are all still
In a wistful dream of Lorna Doone.

The clink of the shunting engines is sharp and fine,
Like savage music striking far off, and there
On the great, uplifted blue palace, lights stir and shine
Where the glass is domed in the blue, soft air.

There lies the world, my darling, full of wonder and wistfulness and strange
Recognition and greetings of half-acquaint things, as I greet the cloud
Of blue palace aloft there, among misty indefinite dreams that range
At the back of my life's horizon, where the dreamings of past lives crowd.

Over the nearness of Norwood Hill, through the mellow veil
Of the afternoon ...

I dream'd in a dream, I saw a city invincible to the attacks of the whole of the rest of the earth;
I dream'd that was the new City of Friends;
Nothing was greater there than the quality of robust love - it led the rest;
It was seen every hour in the actions of the men of that city,
And in all their looks and words.

In visions of the dark night
I have dreamed of joy departed
But a waking dream of life and light
Hath left me broken-hearted.

Ah! what is not a dream by day
To him whose eyes are cast
On things around him with a ray
Turned back upon the past?

That holy dream that holy dream,
While all the world were chiding,
Hath cheered me as a lovely beam,
A lonely spirit guiding.

What though that light, thro' storm and night,
So trembled from afar
What could there be more purely bright
In Truth's day star?

    Sunlight, moonlight,
    Twilight, starlight -
Gloaming at the close of day,
    And an owl calling,
    Cool dews falling
In a wood of oak and may.

    Lantern-light, taper-light,
    Torchlight, no-light:
Darkness at the shut of day,
    And lions roaring,
    Their wrath pouring
In wild waste places far away.

    Elf-light, bat-light,
    Touchwood-light and toad-light,
And the sea a shimmering gloom of grey,
    And a small face smiling
    In a dream's beguiling
In a world of wonders far away.

I am laughing by the brook with her,
Splashed in its tumbling stir;
And then it is a blankness looms
As if I walked not there,
Nor she, but found me in haggard rooms,
And treading a lonely stair.

With radiant cheeks and rapid eyes
We sit where none espies;
Till a harsh change comes edging in
As no such scene were there,
But winter, and I were bent and thin,
And cinder-gray my hair.

We dance in heys around the hall,
Weightless as thistleball;
And then a curtain drops between,
As if I danced not there,
But wandered through a mounded green
To find her, I knew where.

March 1913.

Temples he built and palaces of air,
And, with the artist's parent-pride aglow,
His fancy saw his vague ideals grow
Into creations marvellously fair;

He set his foot upon Fame's nether stair.
But ah, his dream,--it had entranced him so
He could not move. He could no farther go;
But paused in joy that he was even there!

He did not wake until one day there gleamed
Thro' his dark consciousness a light that racked
His being till he rose, alert to act.
But lo! what he had dreamed, the while he dreamed,
Another, wedding action unto thought,
Into the living, pulsing world had brought.

When a dream is born in you
With a sudden clamorous pain,
When you know the dream is true
And lovely, with no flaw nor stain,
O then, be careful, or with sudden clutch
You'll hurt the delicate thing you prize so much.

Dreams are like a bird that mocks,
Flirting the feathers of his tail.
When you seize at the salt-box
Over the hedge you'll see him sail.
Old birds are neither caught with salt nor chaff:
They watch you from the apple bough and laugh.

Poet, never chase the dream.
Laugh yourself and turn away.
Mask your hunger, let it seem
Small matter if he come or stay;
But when he nestles in your hand at last,
Close up your fingers tight and hold him fast.

Thank God for dreams! I, desolate and lone,
    In the dark curtained night, did seem to be
The centre where all golden sun-rays shone,
    And, sitting there, held converse sweet with thee.
No shadow lurked between us; all was bright
    And beautiful as in the hours gone by,
I smiled, and was rewarded by the light
    Of olden days soft beaming from thine eye.
Thank God, thank God for dreams!

I thought the birds all listened; for thy voice
    Pulsed through the air, like beat of silver wings.
It made each chamber of my soul rejoice
    And thrilled along my heart's tear-rusted strings.
As some devout and ever-prayerful nun
    Tells her bright beads, and counts them o'er and o'er,
Thy golden words I gathered, one by one,
    And slipped them into memo...

Between the darkness and the day
As, lost in doubt, I went my way,
I met a shape, as faint as fair,
With star-like blossoms in its hair:
Its body, which the moon shone through,
Was partly cloud and partly dew:
Its eyes were bright as if with tears,
And held the look of long-gone years;
Its mouth was piteous, sweet yet dread,
As if with kisses of the dead:
And in its hand it bore a flower,
In memory of some haunted hour.
I knew it for the Dream I'd had
In days when life was young and glad.
Why had it come with love and woe
Out of the happy Long-Ago?
Upon my brow I felt its breath,
Heard ancient. words of faith and death,
Sweet with the immortality
Of many a fragrant memory:
And to my heart again I took
Its joy and sorrow in a look,

    Love, if I weep it will not matter,
        And if you laugh I shall not care;
    Foolish am I to think about it,
        But it is good to feel you there.

    Love, in my sleep I dreamed of waking,--
        White and awful the moonlight reached
    Over the floor, and somewhere, somewhere,
        There was a shutter loose,--it screeched!

    Swung in the wind,--and no wind blowing!--
        I was afraid, and turned to you,
    Put out my hand to you for comfort,--
        And you were gone!    Cold, cold as dew,

    Under my hand the moonlight lay!
        Love, if you laugh I shall not care,
    But if I weep it will not matter,--
        Ah, it is good to feel you there!

        Wherefore in dreams are sorrows borne anew,
    A healed wound opened, or the past revived?
        Last night in my deep sleep I dreamed of you;
    Again the old love woke in me, and thrived
        On looks of fire, and kisses, and sweet words
    Like silver waters purling in a stream,
        Or like the amorous melodies of birds:
    A dream - a dream!

        Again upon the glory of the scene
    There settled that dread shadow of the cross
        That, when hearts love too well, falls in between;
    That warns them of impending woe and loss.
        Again I saw you drifting from my life,
    As barques are rudely parted in a stream;
        Again my heart was torn with awful strife:
    A dream - a dream!

        Again the deep ni...

The stars are spinning their threads,
    And the clouds are the dust that flies,
And the suns are weaving them up
    For the day when the sleepers arise.

The ocean in music rolls,
    The gems are turning to eyes,
And the trees are gathering souls
    For the day when the sleepers arise.

The weepers are learning to smile,
    And laughter to glean the sighs,
And hearts to bury their care and guile
    For the day when the sleepers arise.

Oh, the dews and the moths and the daisy-red,
    The larks and the glimmers and flows!
The lilies and sparrows and daily bread,
    And the something that nobody knows!

Spare us our Dreams, O God! The dream we dreamed
When we were children and dwelt near the Land
Of Faery, which our Childhood often planned
To reach, beholding where its towers gleamed:
The dream our Youth put seaward with; that streamed
With Love's wild hair, or beckoned with the hand
Of stout Adventure: Then that dream which spanned
Our Manhood's skies with fame; that shone, it seemed,
The one fixed star of purpose, fair and far,
The dream of great achievement, in the heaven
Of our desire, and gave the soul strong wings:
Then that last dream, through which these others are
Made true: The dream that holds us at Life's even,
The mortal hope of far immortal things.