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

All round the deerfold on the shrouded height
The starlight glimmer'd clear;
Therein sat Death, wrapt round with vapours white
Touching the dove-eyed deer.

And thither Balder silent-footed flew,
But found the phantom not;
The rain-wash'd moon had risen cold and blue
Above that lonely spot.

Then as he stood and listen'd, gazing round
In the pale silvern glow,
He heard a wailing and a weeping sound
From the wild huts below.

He mark'd the sudden flashing of the lights,
He heard cry answering cry—
And lo! he saw upon the silent heights
A shadowy form pass by.

Wan was the face, the eyeballs pale and wild,
The robes like rain wind-blown,
And as it fled it clasp'd a naked child
Unto its cold breast-bone.

And Balder clutch'd its robe with fingers weak
To stay it as it flew—
A breath of ice blew chill upon his cheek,
Blinding his eyes of blue.

'Twas Death! 'twas gone!—All night the shepherds sped,
Searching the hills in fear;
At dawn they found their lost one lying dead
Up by the lone black mere;

And lo! they saw the fatal finger-mark,
Which reacheth young and old,
Seal'd, livid still, upon its eyelids dark
And round its nipples cold.

Then Balder moan'd aloud and smote his breast,
‘O drinker of sweet breath,
Curst be thy cruel lips! I shall not rest
Until I clasp thee, Death!’

He track'd the footprints in the morning gray
From rocky haunt to haunt.
Far up the heights a wolf had crost Death's way;
It lay there, lean and gaunt.

He reach'd the highest snows and found them strewn
With bleaching bones of deer. . . .
Night came again,—he listen'd 'neath the moon
Shining most cold and clear.

Beneath him stretch'd vast valleys green and fair,
Still in the twilight shine,
With great waste tarns and cataracts hung in air,
And woods of fir and pine;

And on the tarns lay dim red dreams of day
The midnight sun cast there,—
Sunlight and moonlight blending in one rav
Of mother-o'-pearl most fair.

He wander'd down thro' woods that flinged the snows,
Down cliffs with ivy crown'd,
He passed by lonely tarns whence duskly rose
Great cranes, and hover'd round.

He paused upon a crimson crag, and lo!
Deep down at the crag's foot,
The Shape he sought, in shadow, far below,
With folded wings, sat mute!

Ev'n as a vulture of the east it seem'd
Brooding on something dead;
Dark was the form on which its cold eyes gleam'd,
And still and heavy as lead.

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Then Balder swung himself from tree to tree,
And reach'd the fatal place! . . .
The phantom fled as silent wild things flee,
But a white human face

Gleam'd from the ground; and Balder's glory shone
On a wild cowherd's hair!
Too late—his cheeks were chill—his breath was gone—
His bosom torn and bare.

The Shape unseen had cast him o'er the steep,
Down, down, the abysses dim,—
Then, as an eagle followeth a sheep,
Had flutter'd after him!

His bearskin dress was bloody; in his grip
He clutch'd a cowherd's horn;
His eyes were glazed, and on his stainëd lip
Death's kisses lay forlorn.

But Balder touch'd him and his face grew fair,
Shining beneath the skies,
Yea, Balder crost his hands, and smooth'd his hair,
And closed his piteous eyes. . . .

Not resting yet, the bright god wander'd soon
Down by the torrent's track;
And lo! a sudden glory hid the moon,
And dawn rose at his back.