Flower Pieces and other poems By William Allingham: With two designs by Dante Gabriel Rossetti |
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TWO MOODS. |
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 | Flower Pieces and other poems |  |
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TWO MOODS.
I.
Slow drags this dreary season;The earth a lump of lead;
The vacant skies, blue skies or brown,
Bereft of joy and hope.
I cannot find a reason
To wish I were not dead,—
Unfasten'd and let glide, gone down
A dumb and dusky slope.
I recognise the look of care
In every face; for now I share
What makes a forehead wrinkles wear,
And sets a mouth to mope.
A sombre, languid yearning
For silence and the dark:
Shall wish, or fear, or wisest word,
Arouse me any more?
What profits bookleaf-turning?
Or prudent care and cark?
Or Folly's drama, seen and heard
And acted as before?
No comfort for the dismal Day;
It cannot work, or think, or pray;
A shivering pauper, sad and gray,
With no good thing in store.
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II.
What lifts me and lightens?Enriches and brightens
The day, the mere day, the most marvellous day?
O pleasure divine!
An invisible wine
Pours quick through my being; broad Heaven is benign,
And the Earth full of wonders, and both of them mine,—
What first shall I do, shall I say?
See the bareheaded frolicsome babes as they run
Go skipping from right foot to left foot in fun,—
'Tis the pleasure of living;
Too long I've o'erlook'd it,
In sulk and misgiving,
And lunatic fret;
But it wakes in me yet,
Though the world has rebuked it:
O city and country! O landscape and sun!
Air cloudy or breezy,
And stars, every one!
Gay voices of children!
All duties grown easy,
All truths unbewild'ring,
Since Life, Life immortal, is clearly begun!
| Flower Pieces and other poems | |