 | Songs of field and flood |  |
43
LINES
ON HEARING MENDELSSOHN'S MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM PERFORMED BY THE GERMANIANS AT NEWPORT.
It haunts me still—I hear, I see, once moreThat moonlight dance of fairies on the shore.
I hear the skipping of those airy feet;
I see the mazy twinkling, light and fleet.
The sly sharp banter of the violin
Wakes in the elfin folk a merry din;
And now it dies away, and all is still;
The silver moon-beam sleeps upon the hill;
The flute's sweet wail, a heavenly music, floats,
And like bright dew-drops fall the oboe's notes.
And hark! again that light and graceful beat
Steals on the ear, of trooping, tiny feet,—
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The muffled surf-drum booms from some far shore;
And now the fairy world is lost once more
In the grand swell of ocean's organ-roar,—
And all is still again;—again the dance
Of sparkling feet reflects the moon-beam's glance;
Puck plays his antics in the o'erhanging trees,—
Music like Ariel's floats on every breeze;—
Thus is the Midsummer Night's Dream to me,
Pictured by music and by memory,
A long midsummer day's reality.
| Songs of field and flood | |