University of Virginia Library

I.

Thou wanderer of the summer air!
Thou spirit wild and free!
In what shadowy region far and fair
May thy viewless dwelling be?
Beneath yon crispèd clouds that sleep
On the verge of the western sea?
Beyond the clouds? or beyond the deep,
Unfathomed blue of immensity,
Is it there thou makest thy halcyon home
When the joyous day is done—
Lapt in some bright, elysian dome
By the sister genii spun,
Of starry beams,
Or the lingering gleams
Of the purple-shrouded sun?

II.

I know not:—and thou singest ever
An inarticulate song.
Like the voice of a quiet river
Gliding by moonlight along,
With magic music, soft and deep,
As echoes from the world of sleep!—
But this I know, that thou art fair,
For I have seen thee in my dreams,
With parted lips and streaming hair,
Gliding in beauty down the streams
Of the azure noontide air;
Or underneath the harvest moon,
To the mossy rills below,
Singing a weird and wayward tune
While the foam-bells come and go,
Glitteringly with endless motion,
Like fairy ships on a fairy ocean!

III.

Nor boots it where thy home may be:—
Beyond the clouds, or beneath the sea;
Among the Sons of Power who guide
The planets in their fleet career;
Or with the Naiades who glide,
With blue eyen soft and clear,
Through the glimmering flowers
Of the ocean bowers:—
I feel that thou art here!
And, like a lover's when he knows
The lady of his love is near,
Swiftly my life-blood ebbs and flows
With an inexplicable fear—
A honeyed anguish, a delight
That aches, a yearning infinite,—
Doubts, hopes, and wishes strangely blent
In sweet, contenting uncontent!

IV.

I see thee not, I clasp thee not;
Yet feel I thou art nigh,
Shedding around this lonely spot
The dews of melody;
Shedding from thine aërial wings,
And from thy swift and viewless feet,
A shower of dulcet murmurings,
And wandering odours faint and sweet,
That steal about my soul, and lull
To peace its wailings sorrowful
With a delicious calm, a rest
Which even to dream were to be blest:
Although its very sweetness wrings
The heart with strange, mysterious pain—
Moving upon the frozen springs
Of feeling, till their waters rain
In burning tear-drops from the eye,
I feel not how—I know not why!
Nor know I if 'tis joy or woe
Impels them in their fiery flow.
But this I wote: that sweeter far
Than all delights of sense they are;
That rather would I dwell with thee
Alone in these green solitudes,
Than share the loud world's thoughtless glee,
Thou minstrel of the summer woods!—
Thou whisperer by the summer sea!
For thou in all my spirit's moods
Hast still a spirit-sympathy,
Love-taught, I fondly will believe!
Or never could thy trancèd voice
With such delicious sadness grieve;
With such wild mirth rejoice!

V.

Ha! art thou fled?—I felt but now
Thy faint lips kiss my wooing brow;
Felt thy far-floating locks with mine
Their odorous tresses intertwine
With soothing freshness; heard thy song
Amid the leaves, around, above—
Now like the stifled breath of love,
When eyes are dim, and fond lips press
The first sweet grape of tenderness—
Low, tremulous and long!
Now like the tinkling of a rill
That falls into a lake—
Some tiny tarn upon a hill
That fairy Mab her bath might make,
If she and her fantastic train
Should ever roam the earth again!
Now like the song of summer birds—
The mingling song of birds and bees;
Now like the long-forgotten words
Recalled by whispering twilight trees
In July gloamings, when alone
We muse on loved ones changed or gone;
Now like the echoes of a flute
Heard in some leafy dell,
Low-warbling till the birds are mute;
Now like a distant bell,
Whose saintly summons, silvery-clear,
Falls on the homeward boatman's ear,
At twilight's holy hour,
From out the depths of the rosy air,
Calling his soul to silent prayer
With still, small voice of power!