The Complete Poetical Works of Robert Buchanan :: :: University of Virginia Library

O whither are they wending side by side
Thro' that green forest wide?
Down the deep dingles, amid ferns and flowers,
They wander hours and hours.
Bright-lock'd, with limbs of alabaster white,
Now gleaming in the light,
Now 'mong the dusky umbrage of the glade
Deep'ning to amber shade,
Their eyes on one another, whither away
Do these Immortals stray?
She murmurs, ‘Thou shalt mark all things that be;
The rivers and the sea,
The mountains that for ever crimson'd lie
Against the arctic sky,
The meteors that across the pale pole flit,
Strangely illuming it;
And thou shalt look on gods, thy kin and mine,
Since thou too art divine.’
Divine!—The forest glimmers where he goes
To crimson and to rose!
And wheresoe'er he comes no creature fears;
Each lingers, sees, and hears.
The boughs bend down to touch his yellow hair;
Around his white feet bare
The grass waves amorous; on his shoulder white
The singing birds alight,
Singing the sweeter; and in spaces clear
The brown-eyed dappled deer
With tremulous ear and tail around him stand,
Licking his outstretch'd hand
With warm rough tongues. He sings—all things around
Are husht to hear the sound!
He smiles—all things are smiling—wood and stream
With some new glory gleam,
Dark branches blossom, and the greensward nigh
Is sunnier than the sky!

She murmurs, ‘They have cherish'd thee indeed,
In answer to thy need.
Ere thou wast born, into thy veins they grew,
Earth, sunlight, air, and dew,
The flower, the leaf, star's glimmer and bird's song;
And these have made thee strong
With other strength than ours; for ne'er till now,
On any immortal brow
Have I beheld such living splendour shine
As lies this hour on thine.
O sunbeam of the gods! O fairer far
Than ev'n Immortals are!
Divinest, gentlest, by the glad Earth given
To be a lamp in heaven!’

439

Divine!—The boughs shook down their shafts of green
And gleam'd to golden sheen;
The silvern snake stole from the dark treeroot
And twined round Balder's foot
With happy eyes; the tiger-moth and bee
About him hover'd free;
With yellow aureole his head was crown'd,
And his bright body around
There swam a robe of sunshine scented sweet,
Clothing him head to feet.

She crieth, ‘Could the Father see thee there,
While on thy silken hair
The soft. light trembles like a shining hand!
Couldst thou before him stand,
Flowers round thy feet, a dove upon thy wrist,
Earth-blest and heaven-kist,
Would he not smile? would he not scorn full soon
The wearily woven rune
Which said that sorrow should be born when thou
Didst break with orient brow
The night-cloud of the Earth? O Son! my Son!
The crimson thread is spun,
The snow-white bud is blown, and now, behold!
The branch with fruit of gold
Hath grown full straight and swings i' the summer shine
Ineffably divine.’

He questions, ‘Whither go we?’ She replies,
‘To that dim Land which lies
Ev'n as a cloud around the Father's feet!’
He smiles, his pulses beat
With brighter rapture. ‘Shall mine eyes then see
My Father?’ crieth he;
‘Where dwells he? and my brethren, where dwell they?’
She answereth, ‘Far away!’
Then, her face darken'd by some dreamy dread,
She moves with sadder tread.

The shadows grow around them as they stray
From glade to glade; their way
Winds still 'mong flowers and leaves, where day and night,
Both sleepless and both bright,
One golden and one silvern, come and go.
Nor, when dark twilights sow
Their asphodels in the broad fields of blue,
And a cold summer dew
Gleams on the grass, and moths with fiery eyes
Flit, and the night-jar cries,
Doth Balder glimmer less divine. Ah, nay!
Dim things that know not day
Find him and love him; drinking his pure breath
The white owl hovereth;
About his footprints in the faint moon-ray
Wild lynxes leap and play;
The ringdoves on the branches brood; meek hares
Creep from their grassy lairs
To look upon him. So he goeth by
Of all things that descry
Beloved, and missed; around him like a veil
The moonbeams cluster pale,
And all the eyes of heaven with soft dews swim,
As they gaze down on him.

But now they leave the mighty woods, and pass
Thro' valleys of deep grass,
Sprinkled with saxifrage and tormentil;
And many a mountain rill
Leaps by them, singing. Far away, on high,
They mark against the sky
Blue-shadow'd mountains crown'd with sparkling snow;
And thitherward they go.

Thro' lonely mountain valleys in whose breast
The white grouse makes its nest,
And where in circles wheel the goshawk keen
And fleet-wing'd peregrine;
Past torrents gashing the dark heathery height
With gleams of hoary white,
Their shining feet now fall, and where they fare
Faint rainbows fill the air

440

And span the streams; with sound of rippling rain
The cataracts leap amain,
The deer cry from the heights, and all around
Is full of summer sound.

Silent, upon the topmost peak they come,
By precipices dumb
And melancholy rocks girt round; and so
They reach the realms of snow.
Far o'er their heads a hooded eagle wings
In ever-widening rings,
Till in the blinding glory of the day
A speck he fades away.
Then Balder's eyes gaze down. Stretch'd far beneath,
Forest and field and heath,
Netted with silvern threads of springs and streams,
Shine in the summer beams—
And valley after valley farther on
Fades dim into the sun.

He crieth, ‘Far away methinks I mark
A mighty Forest dark,
Crown'd by a crimson mist; yonder it lies,
Stretching into the skies,
And farther than its darkness nought I see.’
And softly answereth she,
‘O Balder! 'tis the Ocean. Vast and strange,
It changeth without change,
Washing with weary waves for evermore
The dark Earth's silent shore.’
And Balder spake not, but he gazed again
Thro' the soft mist of rain
Which curtain'd that new wonder from his sight.

At last, when day and night
Have passed, they cross a purple cape and stand
On shores of golden sand,
And pausing silent, see beneath the sky
The mighty Ocean lie.