Look at the stars! look, look up at the skies!
O look at all the fire-folk sitting in the air!
The bright boroughs, the circle-citadels there!
Down in dim woods the diamond delves! the elves'-eyes!
The grey lawns cold where gold, where quickgold lies!
Wind-beat whitebeam! airy abeles set on a flare!
Flake-doves sent floating forth at a farmyard scare!—
Ah well! it is all a purchase, all is a prize.
Buy then! bid then!—What?—Prayer, patience, aims, vows.
Look, look: a May-mess, like on orchard boughs!
Look! March-bloom, like on mealed-with-yellow sallows!
These are indeed the barn; withindoors house
The shocks. This piece-bright paling shuts the spouse
Sharp is the night, but stars with frost alive
Leap off the rim of earth across the dome.
It is a night to make the heavens our home
More than the nest whereto apace we strive.
Lengths down our road each fir-tree seems a hive,
In swarms outrushing from the golden comb.
They waken waves of thoughts that burst to foam:
The living throb in me, the dead revive.
Yon mantle clothes us: there, past mortal breath,
Life glistens on the river of the death.
It folds us, flesh and dust; and have we knelt,
Or never knelt, or eyed as kine the springs
Of radiance, the radiance enrings:
And this is the soul's haven to have felt.
I awoke in the Midsummer not to call night, in the white and the walk of the morning:
The moon, dwindled and thinned to the fringe of a finger-nail held to the candle,
Or paring of paradisaical fruit, lovely in waning but lustreless,
Stepped from the stool, drew back from the barrow, of dark Maenefa the mountain;
A cusp still clasped him, a fluke yet fanged him, entangled him, not quite utterly.
This was the prized, the desirable sight, unsought, presented so easily,
Parted me leaf and leaf, divided me, eyelid and eyelid of slumber.
On a starred night Prince Lucifer uprose.
Tired of his dark dominion swung the fiend
Above the rolling ball in cloud part screened,
Where sinners hugged their spectre of repose.
Poor prey to his hot fit of pride were those.
And now upon his western wing he leaned,
Now his huge bulk o'er Afric's sands careened,
Now the black planet shadowed Arctic snows.
Soaring through wider zones that pricked his scars
With memory of the old revolt from Awe,
He reached a middle height, and at the stars,
Which are the brain of heaven, he looked, and sank.
Around the ancient track marched, rank on rank,
The army of unalterable law.
Lightly stepped a yellow star
To its lofty place --
Loosed the Moon her silver hat
From her lustral Face --
All of Evening softly lit
As an Astral Hall --
Father, I observed to Heaven,
You are punctual.
I know some lonely Houses off the Road
A Robber'd like the look of --
Wooden barred,
And Windows hanging low,
Inviting to --
A Portico,
Where two could creep --
One -- hand the Tools --
The other peep --
To make sure All's Asleep --
Old fashioned eyes --
Not easy to surprise!
How orderly the Kitchen'd look, by night,
With just a Clock --
But they could gag the Tick --
And Mice won't bark --
The feet of people walking home
With gayer sandals go --
The Crocus -- til she rises
The Vassal of the snow --
The lips at Hallelujah
Long years of practise bore
Til bye and bye these Bargemen
Walked singing on the shore.
Pearls are the Diver's farthings
Extorted from the Sea --
Pinions -- the Seraph's wagon
Pedestrian once -- as we --
Night is the morning's Canvas
Larceny -- legacy --
Death, but our rapt attention
To Immortality.
The Road was lit with Moon and star --
The Trees were bright and still --
Descried I -- by the distant Light
A Traveller on a Hill --
To magic Perpendiculars
Ascending, though Terrene --
Unknown his shimmering ultimate --
But he indorsed the sheen --
One Sister have I in our house,
And one, a hedge away.
There's only one recorded,
But both belong to me.
One came the road that I came --
And wore my last year's gown --
The other, as a bird her nest,
Builded our hearts among.
She did not sing as we did --
It was a different tune --
Herself to her a music
As Bumble bee of June.
Today is far from Childhood --
But up and down the hills
I held her hand the tighter --
Which shortened all the miles --
Peace is a fiction of our Faith --
The Bells a Winter Night
Bearing the Neighbor out of Sound
That never did alight.
I watched the Moon around the House
Until upon a Pane --
She stopped -- a Traveller's privilege -- for Rest --
And there upon
I gazed -- as at a stranger --
The Lady in the Town
Doth think no incivility
To lift her Glass -- upon --
But never Stranger justified
The Curiosity
Like Mine -- for not a Foot -- nor Hand --
Nor Formula -- had she --
But like a Head -- a Guillotine
Slid carelessly away --
Did independent, Amber --
Sustain her in the sky --
Going to Him! Happy letter!
Tell Him --
Tell Him the page I didn't write --
Tell Him -- I only said the Syntax --
And left the Verb and the pronoun out --
Tell Him just how the fingers hurried --
Then -- how they waded -- slow -- slow --
And then you wished you had eyes in your pages --
So you could see what moved them so --
Tell Him -- it wasn't a Practised Writer --
You guessed -- from the way the sentence toiled --
You could hear the Bodice tug, behind you --
As if it held but the might of a child --
You almost pitied it -- you -- it worked so --
Tell Him -- no -- you may quibble there --
For it would split His Heart, to know it --