University of Virginia Library

The little rim of moon hangs low—the room
Is saintly with the presence of Night,
And Silence broods with knitted brows around.
The woven lilies of the velvet floor
Blend with the roses in the dusky light,
Which shows twin pictures glimmering from the walls:
Here, a mailed group kneels by the rocky sea—
There, a gray desert, and a well, and palms;
While the faint perfume of a violet,
Vague as a dream of Spring, pervades the air.
Where the moon gleams along the organ-front,
The crooked shadow of a dead branch stirs
Like ghostly fingers gliding through a tune.

Now rises one with faintly rustling robes,
And white hands search among the glistening keys.
Out of the silence sounds are forming—tones
That seem to come from infinite distances,—
Soft trebles fluttering down like snowy doves
Just dipping their swift wings in the deep bass
That crumbles downward like a crumbling wave;
And out of those low-gathering harmonies
A voice arises, tangled in their maze,
Then soaring up exultantly alone,
While the accompaniment wails and complains.
—I am upon the seashore. 'T is the sound
Of ocean, surging on against the land.
That throbbing thunder is the roar of surf
Beaten and broken on the frothy rocks.
Those whispering trebles are the plashing waves
That ripple up the smooth sand's slope, and kiss
The tinkling shells with coy lips, quick withdrawn;
And over all, the solitary voice
Is the wind wandering on its endless quest.
—A change comes, in a crash of minor chords.
I am a dreamer, waking from his dream
Into the life to which our life is sleep.
My soul is floating—floating, till afar
The round Earth rolls, with fleece of moonlit cloud,
A globe of amber, gleaming as it goes.
Deep in some hollow cavern of the sky
All human life is pleading to its God.
Still the accompaniment wails and complains;—
A wild confusion of entangled chords,
Revenge, and fear, and strong men's agony,
The shrill cry of despair, the slow, deep swell
Of Time's long effort, sinking but to swell,
While woman's lonely love, and childhood's faith
Go wandering with soft whispers hand in hand.
Suddenly from the ages one pure soul
Is singled out to plead before the Throne;
And then again the solitary voice
Peals up among the stars from the great throng,
Catching from out the storm all love, all hope,
All loveliness of life, and utters it.

Then the hushed music sobs itself to sleep,
And all is still,—save the reluctant sigh
That tells the wakening from immortal dreams.