 | Madrigals, songs and sonnets |  |
69
ODE TO THE EARTH.
I
O thou eternal Danae, whose breastIs open ever to the showering gold,
Who ever dost in thy warm arms enfold
The god-like fervour, by a god possess'd!
Now, while the glory of the happy May
Is robing thee in festal bravery
Of vernal foliage gay,
And the sweet birds on every leafy spray
Bright minstrels are, that hymn their love to thee,—
I, too, though less melodious far than they,
Yet loving thee, O Mother, fervently,
Would sing, though faltering, one impassion'd song
In token of the praises that belong
To thee, who art our goddess, by great Jove
Lov'd, and made worthy of our reverent love.
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II
In every ferny brake and hollow wild,Warm'd into life, the children of the spring
Leap in their glory, and on foot or wing
Go forth through fair green leafage undefil'd;
Long shoots of lush and thornless eglantine
Fill up the darkening ways,
Through which Apollo darts his arrowy rays
From rosy morn on till his slow decline;
Now Philomel trills out her tenderest lays
In fragrant valleys when the moon is low;
And listening ye may hear, when she is dumb,
The sweet sedge-warbler, ere the night-winds blow,
Piping a feebler treble, till there come
Faint echoes from the hollow elms a-row.
III
Mother, the skies that o'er thy flowery dellsBend as a solemn dome, are calm and blue;
Now floats a white cloud-island slowly through
The stainless realms where nothing evil dwells;
And like a bird on spirit-wings I rise
Far up to its pure cliffs, and thence gaze down
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For Loveliness is on thy brows a crown,
And, in the clear sunlighted weather,
Glory and Hope and Love seem met together,
To fill the air with dreams of Paradise,
And that first mystic day,
When out of Chaos and dim Night God drew
Thy glimmering orb, and sped thee on thy way!
IV
Then, waking from that strange primeval trance,With joy thou didst His guiding voice obey,
And watched the planets in their pearly dance
Attend thy motion in a proud array;
Then o'er thy caverns and thy gleaming vales
Flew the clear-wingèd Spirit of the Spring,
And in her hands did bring
Such wealth of life, whether of leaf or limb,
That even the glad revival of to-day,
The fresh young breath that hails
The music of this morn, were all too dim
To shadow forth the least of that delight,
When every gloomy corner was made bright
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And all the green-wood joy of earliest May.
V
How to the core was thy profound heart stirr'dBy all this light, and fair tranquillity!
Yet from the heavens came down one awful word;
And how was all thy splendour gone and fled,—
Gone like the spirit of one dead!
For o'er thy breast flow'd the remorseless sea;
The long roll of the stormy waves was heard
In each green valley, where the brooding bird,
Deep in the noiseless leafage, had found rest,
And a fair sylvan nest;
The voice of many waters only sounded
Through the abyss, where still thy darkling globe
Roll'd on its ceaseless course, for ever bounded
By the dim belt of floods as by a robe.
VI
Then o'er thy weltering rim one moment hover'dAn angel, fire-envelop'd, rainbow-wing'd,
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Thy aching orb; the abyss was ring'd
With flame that lit thy sad and gloomy path,
And lick'd the waters with its arrowy heat;
The glory that then pulse-like beat
Upon the waters, dried their might away.
Ah! even in this repose which thy heart hath
In these late times, thou canst recall that day
Of comfort after anguish, the defeat
Of adverse powers that marr'd thy early love,
And the victorious aid that hail'd thee from above!
VII
The island-cloud whereon my spirit sateHas faded like white foam upon the shore;
For a swift wind its gauzy fabric tore:
And now on viewless wings elate
I speed my visionary flight
O'er bosky glen, and heather-mantled height;
Be thou my Guide, my Teacher, and inspire
My heart with such poetic fire,
That ever where my else-unheeded voice
Shall echo through the land, all men may know
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And feel their weary hearts with hope and gladness glow.
VIII
Far in warm lands across the Atlantic seaHast thou no home, O Mother, for thy child,
Where in the southern forest, dim and wild,
I might hold sweet communion silently
With all thy fairest subjects, and with thee?
There, there, where thou art queen and uncontroll'd,
Where gentle creatures still are calm and bold,
Where troops of mild-eyed deer unharass'd graze,
Might I not walk, and with down-gazing eyes,
Ponder in silence, and grow pure and wise,
Till, led by thee, and full of Magian lore,
I might return, and teach in tuneful lays
The lessons of those quiet days;
Or else, in that fair wilderness grown old,
Lay on thy kindly breast my scanty locks and hoar?
IX
Silence, weak heart! no words of thy repiningCan change the order of the fateful years;
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In this chill northern land! the time for tears
Is fled, with all the sorrows of the snow:
Now once again the milder zephyrs blow;
Flower-buds are dreaming in the deep fresh grass;
Waken, O Earth, my dull and weary spirit,
New glory to inherit!
Teach these faint eyes what sacred pleasures flow
From thy least valued places; wherefore go
To distant lands, when beauties here surpass
All that a poet in his dreams can see?
Therefore with humbled heart and head bent low,
Here will I rest until thou speak'st to me!
X
Great Mother, now thy solemn voice I hear!Forgive the lightness of my opening song,
In which I did thy serious story wrong,
With idle names of worship old and sere,
Prating to thee of Grecian gods once dear
To priest and poet! empty dreamers they!
The gods they dreamt of, all are pass'd and dead!
Rather would I with bow'd, uncover'd head,
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With reverent voice, to Him who set thee here;
Who guides thee on thy wild mysterious way;
Whose power and love surpass all earthly measure;
Who clothes thee now with all the bloom of May,
And fills thy vales with green and golden treasure,
And decks thy mountain-sides with purple hues of pleasure!
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