Divine Adventures Part 5

Comes the painter mixing soul-tints In his fine unconscious eye-- Comes the sculptor opening marbles Where his dreaming G.o.dheads lie;

Comes embodied music seeing All of Heaven in a sound-- Call him man or rapt musician, Neither yet is wholly bound.

Comes the poet sweeping soul-strings Lo! the painter dreams again, Finds another golden pigment In the minelands of his brain.

Comes the poet sweeping soul-strings, Lo! the sculptor dreams again, Frees a rarer winged spirit In his blue marmorean brain.

Comes the poet sweeping soul-strings, Lo! the music dreams again, Finds another golden concord In the silence of his brain.

There again the Bard of Avon, Music names him not in words, Singing to a raptured eon All that life and death engirds.

There is Sh.e.l.ly, diamond hearted, Singing lightning scintilant, Wanting still a rarer l.u.s.tre, Sweeter ever than his want.

There is framed and fas.h.i.+oned music, Keats the golden tongue of song.

Browning crowned with highest heaven Ruling all of right and wrong.

There is Mifflin toying jewels, His own magic art hath wrought, Tracing dreams and fancies In the crystal depths of thought.

There is Carman of the Northland Singing all the music of the north.

Beauty urging on his music, Wagering all her soul is worth.

Goethe arm in arm with Hauptman In the vine-clad hills of Rhine, Hushed to catch the simplest whisper From the great Norwegian Pine.

All the Kings of dainty fancy, All the Kings of mighty song, All the Kings of love and laughter, All the Kings of right and wrong,

All the Kings of all the kingdoms, To the farthest bounds of art, Meeting on the swards of dreamland, Ages can not bind apart.

Thus the world is recreated With the Supermen of time, Bearing on in royal pageant, All of fullness and of prime.

Thus the world is recreated With the Supermen of dreams, Footsteps onward pressing, Plas.h.i.+ng oars on crystal streams.

Silver lakes, and cool savannahs, Mirrored in the blue clad hills, Dream miraged, dim oases Where the spirit drinks and fills.

Wanting not a dear companion, Wanting not the yester years, Thus the world is recreated, And the ring'd horizon clears.

And I turn again to April, Maiden princess of the south; Lo! the secret now has blossomed To a white rose at her mouth.

TO A MOCKING BIRD

A Rhapsody

Hail! Sweetest rhapsodist Of virgin song unfettered yet!

Sweet honey-bee of sound, What flow'ry meads hast found, Of wilding pain and rapture, In spirit births, a moment's capture?

A part of all that thou hast met, Sweet mocking bird!

How far above, how far beyond, All dream or spirit fancy, Each fountain burst of purest song!

To what fair region dost belong?

What roseate glory followeth after Thy natures gladdest laughter,-- Thine infinite necromancy, Sweet mocking bird?

Within thy song, as in thy night, What matchless dearth of fact!

Old Art bent low in arabesque, Trans.m.u.ting life to things grotesque.

And his golden mist, a still low call, From model-nature's all-in-all, Bids thee all rapture reinact, Sweet mocking bird.

And when is nature more complete, Than in thy midnight hour?

When every angle meet and mingle, Within thy misty laden dingle, And spirit pauseth in the heart, To rectify its ancient art, By the shadow on the flower, Sweet mocking bird.

And when has music kissed a string Till such a lyric breath intone?

Of all the joy, of all the pain, Sweet summer holds to earth again.

The far sweet pain of bursting Hours, Whose sparkling eyes, in tears of flowers, Yield thee a drink that's all thine own, Sweet mocking bird.

Ah! Light of dreams! when spirit hears Such music calls, can life forget?

Each night thou lightest up the gloom Within my spirits stifled room, And beckoneth on to hopes afar, My singer and my star, my star!

The all of all that thou hast met, Sweet mocking bird!

THE MYSTERY

The gos'mer web that mistifies, Lies not on any whole or part, Or stop or start, but in the art, Men hang upon their eyes.

And haply in an age afar, Two men may see the self-same mote-- The selfsame beam, with motes afloat, And learn what souls and systems are.

FAME

Triumphant Day's grand pageantry At song, and all the garlands won, Far in the west the queenly Eve, Blue misty mantled, takes her leave, Tiaraed with a Sun.

And Lo! Sweet night, a nut-brown maid, With silent wonder pursing lips, Or humming soft a bird's low song, Trips down the hall. Behold the throng Bow to her finger tips.

GOOD NIGHT MY LOVE

Thy dewy dreams, thine Ariel dreams, Then turn thee to thy dainty dreams, Thine airy sh.e.l.l is now alight, To bear thee down aeolean streams, Good night, my love, good night, good night.

By misty strands of phantom lands, By golden sh.o.r.es and phantom lands, Across the sea of starry light To drop thee on enchanted strands-- Good night, my love, good night, good night.