Collected Poems Volume I Part 16

The song is lost that shook the night With wings of richer fire, Where the years had touched their eyes with light And their souls with a new desire;

And the new delight of the strange old story Burned in the flower-soft skies, And nine more years with a darker glory Had deepened the light of her eyes;

But lost, oh more than lost the song That shook the rose to tears, As hand in hand they danced along Through childhood's everlasting years.

"Oh, Love has wings," the linnet sings; But the dead return no more, no more; And the sea is breaking its old grey heart Against the golden sh.o.r.e.

She was eight years old that day, Two young lovers were they.

If every song as they danced along Paused on the springing spray; Is there never a bird in the wide greenwood Will hush its heart to-day?

There's never a leaf with dew impearled To make their pathway sweet, And never a blossom in all the world That knows the kiss of their feet.

No light to-night declares the word That thrilled the blossomed bough, And stilled the happy singing bird That none can silence now.

The weary nightingale may sob With her bleeding breast against a thorn, And the wild white rose with every throb Grow red as the laugh of morn;

With wings outspread she sinks her head But Love returns no more, no more; And the sea is breaking its old grey heart Against the golden sh.o.r.e.

Born in the City of Pain; Ah, who knows, who knows When Death shall turn to delight again Or a wound to a red, red rose?

Eight years old that day, Full of laughter and play; Eight years old and Anwyl nine,-- Two young lovers were they.

VII

And down the scented heather-drowsy hills The barefoot children wandered, hand in hand, And paddled through the laughing silver rills In quest of fairyland; And in each little sunburnt hand a spray, A purple fox-glove bell-branch lightly swung, And Anwyl told Etain how, far away, One day he wandered through the dreamland dells And watched the moonlit fairies as they sung And tolled the fox-glove bells; And oh, how sweetly, sweetly to and fro The fragrance of the music reeled and rung Under the loaded boughs of starry May.

And G.o.d sighed in the sunset, and the sea Grew quieter than the hills: the mystery Of ocean, earth and sky was like a word Uttered, but all unheard, Uttered by every wave and cloud and leaf With all the immortal glory of mortal grief; And every wave that broke its heart of gold In music on the rainbow-dazzled sh.o.r.e Seemed telling, strangely telling, evermore A story that must still remain untold.

Oh, _Once upon a time_, and o'er and o'er As aye the _Happy ever after_ came The enchanted waves lavished their faery lore

And tossed a foam-bow and a rosy flame Around the whispers of the creaming foam, Till the old rapture with the new sweet name

Through all the old romance began to roam, And Anwyl, gazing out across the sea, Dreamed that he heard the distance whisper "Come."

"Etain," he murmured softly and wistfully, With the soul's wakening wonder in his eyes, "Is it not strange to think that there can be

"No end for ever and ever to those skies, No sh.o.r.e beyond, or if there be a sh.o.r.e Still without end the world beyond it lies;

"Think; think, Etain;" and all his faery lore Mixed with the faith that brought all G.o.ds to birth And sees new heavens transcend for evermore

The poor impossibilities of earth; But Etain only laughed: the world to her Was one sweet smile of very present mirth;

Its flowers were only flowers, common or rare; Her soul was like a little garden closed By rose-clad walls, a place of southern air Islanded from the Mystery that reposed Its vast and brooding wings on that abyss Through which like little clouds that dreamed and dozed

The thoughts of Anwyl wandered toward some bliss Unknown, unfathomed, far, how far away, Where G.o.d has gathered all the eternities Into strange heavens, beyond the night and day.

VIII

And over the rolling golden bay, In the funeral pomp of the dying day, The bell of Time was wistfully tolling A million million years away;

And over the heather-drowsy hill Where the burdened bees were buzzing still, The two little sun-bright barefoot children Wandered down at the flowers' own will;

For still as the bell in the sunset tolled, The meadow-sweet and the mary-gold And the purple orchis kissed their ankles And lured them over the listening wold.

And the feathery billows of blue-gold gra.s.s Bowed and murmured and bade them pa.s.s, Where a sigh of the sea-wind softly told them _There is no Time--Time never was_.

And what if a sorrow were tolled to rest Where the rich light mellowed away in the West, As a glory of fruit in an autumn orchard Heaped and asleep o'er the sea's ripe breast?

Why should they heed it, what should they know Of the years that come or the years that go, With the warm blue sky around and above them And the wild thyme whispering to and fro?

For they heard in the dreamy dawn of day A fairy harper faintly play, Follow me, follow me, little children, Over the hills and far away;

Where the dew is bright on the heather-bells, And the breeze in the clover sways and swells, As the waves on the blue sea wake and wander, Over and under the braes and dells.

And the hare-bells tinkled and rang Ding dong Bell in the dell as they danced along, And their feet were stained on the hills with honey, And crus.h.i.+ng the clover till evensong.

And, oh the ripples that rolled in rhyme Under the wild blue banks of thyme, To the answering rhyme of the rolling ocean's Golden glory of change and chime!

For they came to a stream and her fairy lover Caught at her hand and swung her over, And the broad wet b.u.t.tercups laughed and gilded Their golden knees in the deep sweet clover.

There was never a lavrock up in the skies Blithe as the laugh of their lips and eyes, As they glanced and glittered across the meadows To waken the sleepy b.u.t.terflies.

There was never a wave on the sea so gay As the light that danced on their homeward way Where the waving ferns were a fairy forest And a thousand years as yesterday.

_She was eight years old that day, Full of laughter and play; Eight years old and Anwyl nine,-- Two young lovers were they._

And when the clouds like folded sheep Were drowsing over the drowsy deep, And like a rose in a golden cradle Anwyl breathed on the breast of sleep,

Or ever the petals and leaves were furled At the vesper-song of the sunset-world, The sleepy young rose of nine sweet summers Dreamed in his rose-bed cosily curled.

And what if the light of his nine bright years Glistened with laughter or glimmered with tears, Or gleamed like a mystic globe around him White as the light of the sphere of spheres?

And what if a glory of angels there, Starring an orb of ineffable air, Came floating down from the Gates of jasper That melt into flowers at a maiden's prayer?

And what if he dreamed of a fairy face Wondering out of some happy place, Quietly as a star at sunset s.h.i.+nes in the rosy dreams of s.p.a.ce?

For only as far as the west wind blows The sweets of a swinging full-blown rose, Eight years old and queen of the lilies Little Etain slept--ah, how close!

At a flower-cry over the moonlit lane In a cottage of roses dreamed Etain, And their purple shadows kissed at her lattice And dappled her sigh-soft counterpane;

And or ever Etain with her golden head Had nestled to sleep in her lily-white bed, She breathed a dream to her fairy lover, _Please, G.o.d, bless Anwyl and me_, she said.

And a song arose in the rose-white West, And a whisper of wings o'er the sea's bright breast, And a cry where the moon's old miracle wakened A glory of pearl o'er the pine-forest.

Why should they heed it? What should they know Of the years to come or the years to go?