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189

The Bird and the Bower

I had a little bower when I was young;
A bird sang there,
And I, poor child, still listened while it sung
Its magic air.
For still it said, or still it seemed to say,
“The world is thine;
“See how the roses redden, waters play,
“And moonbeams shine.
“See how the sun, with golden, dreaming light,
“The valley fills;
“See how he crowds with a blue gloom like night
“The noonday hills.
“Deep in the foxglove's bell, where'er thou go,
“Still drones the bee,
“And the red trout, where warbling brooklets flow,
“Leaps up for thee.
190

“For thee the sun and moon were made of yore,
“The cloud and star;
“For thee God made the After, the Before,
“The Near and Far.
“All love, all power, all worship, all delight,
“All fancies wild;
“All rainbow hopes, all dreams of day and night,
“For thee, O child!
“The fairy sitting in her home of fern,
“The piping faun,
“The nymph that bears aloft her river urn,
“Or guards the lawn.
“For thee God made the genii of the air,
“And of the deep,
“And the quaint elves that charm, with witchery rare,
“The world of sleep.
“All, all is thine! thou, thou alone art king,
“Fair, good, and wise!
“Fresh, fresh from heaven, before thee life's great spring,
“Full-blossomed, lies.”
Thus in my little bower, when I was young,
The song began,
And all life's summer through the siren sung,
To lure the man.
191

But now grey autumn thins that magic bower,
The green leaves fall,
And the old glory fades from tree and flower,
When wild winds call.
I hear no more the fairy bugles blow,
The stars are dim,
I hear no more, at the sea's ebb and flow,
The sea-maid's hymn.
With lowly heart and meek sad thought I stand,
A dreamer vain;
But ah! that vision of the morning land
Returns again.
I dreamt it once, perchance as childhood dreams,
When life began;
I dream it now, nor think it less beseems
The time-taught man.
I cannot tell if I shall find it true,
In worlds afar,
If I shall win, in that o'erhanging blue,
My regal star.
But still the heart a far-off glory sees,
Strange music hears;
A something not of earth still haunts the breeze,
The sun, and spheres.
192

Still, still I clasp my hands, still look and pine,
Still weep and pray,
Still, still am followed by a voice divine,
And far away.
What mean these yearnings, these mysterious sighs,
This hope like fear,
This feeling in the dark, these sudden cries,
When none are near?
All things that be, all love, all thought, all joy,
Sky, cloud and star,
Spell-bind the man, as once the growing boy,
And point afar;
Point to some world of endless, endless truth,
Delight, and power,
And thus comes back that grand old dream of youth,—
The bird and bower.
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