Yet we bend above those records, till their life with
Till their quickening inspiration wakes the spirit of our thought;
Till our beings they impregnate with the fulness of
And ourselves become a portion of the idols where
What if they be dust? we fill them each with thought and feeling rife,
While imagination, sun-like, tints their godlike shades with life,
Till they walk again before us, forms embodied from
And we cling to the creation and the glories which we gave.
THE DANCE OF THE NEREIDS.
I LEFT fair Athens with the morn: the sun
Looked from his skyey temple, and inspired
Gladness into each thing. I wandered on
Free as the sea-breeze dallying with my joy:
And to avoid the windings of the shore,
I struck into the woodlands. Full of life
Abounding was my heart; Nature infused
Her happiness through me: sighings of the trees,
Buried in the soft azure, choirs of birds,
The fall of distant waters, and the low
Deep murmurings of the full and voiceful Sea,
Bore burthen to the universal song.
Among the dim glades as I passed, peeped forth Shapes of red beauty ripe as Autumn's fruits: Through wind-swung boughs I heard Pan's oaten reed,
I saw the shy Fauns hurrying in their flight.
Thou know'st, loved friend! each haunt of those wild
How there the cedar and the cypress flourish,
The linden, and the feminine silver fir
Hanging its golden flower: the mistletoe
Pensile from its thick boughs; where like a king,
The regal rhododendron throws around
His purple clusters, where the giant myrtle
Fashions impervious bowers of cloudiest green,
Star-roofed with jessamine and eglantine.
How the grey crags shoot up from tangled copse,
Baring their veteran brows, o'erseamed with scars
Of tempest past, and crowned with laurel wreaths,
Meed of endurance due and trophy won.
Thou knowest how the overshadowing woods
Cling there together sheltered by the cliffs:
And how the azure Sea with dimpling smiles
Steals into the embraces of the land
Its many arms and covert nooks, and fills
Each silent haunt through which it glides along
With a low note of music and of joy!
I felt the Spirit of beauty hung o'er all,
Attuning life to love, and harmonies
That vibrated responsive through my frame.
With a light buoyant step and lighter heart
I bounded on: now lingering for awhile
To mark the sinuous windings of the shore,
Or some fantastic oak, or anything
To feed my wandering fancies.
Of blind Mæonides, the lord of song,
And how the deities once trod the earth,
And talked with mortal heroes: and I felt
This was their chosen region, when behold,
Wafted upon the crisp and growing breeze,
I heard a sound of melody.
In the deep hollow of a shadowed dell:
The sun in mid-heaven throned scarce entered there.
Above me towered grey crags and mountain woods,
And summits shaped fantastically rose
Like clouds on clouds heaped round the twilight sky;
Beneath within a bow-shot stretched the sands,
Gleaming a golden light through mossy trees,
That veiled them dimly with their leafy screen.
I scarce had gathered breath, when rose a choir
Of voices from the bosom of the sea,
A full and breathing tone of harmony,
An exhalation rising from the deep;
And floating on the slumberous summer airs!
A sound so fine, so faint, it scarcely was:
Nought lived between it and fine silence, yet
'Twas audible to feeling; name it then
A flowing respiration, sighing forth
From the still bosom of the infinite Air,
Opening the tongue of silence into sound!
It thrilled my inmost spirit, entering
Like a rich stream of fragrance, filling me
With languor and a voiceless ecstasy.
I stood entranced, and motionless with awe,
And joy and wonderment. When lo! from forth
The bosom of the waters slowly rose
A sea-nymph beautiful as morning, fair
As ocean's feathery foam.
Till, hand in hand, twelve beauteous Nereids joined
In circle on the yellow sands: then made
Obeisance to the Sea, which reverence was
The harmony of motion. Lightly then
As floats the gossamer on the fine air,
Yet silent as the stars in their bright course,
They met in the embracing dance, they twined
Within each other's arms, now parting, now
Opening a void in their loose ranks, now met
Ordered and regular in phalanx joined.
Methought, it might be a vague fantasy,
They in their mystic measures shadowed forth
The eternal courses of the hosts of heaven:
A trumpet peal re-echoed from the deep!
They stopped, and joining circle, rapidly
Tripped to the margin of the golden sands.
Grey Triton raised his wreathèd shell, and blew
A low, long melody: anon a choir
Of sea-nymphs answered from the wave: I saw
Deep-bosomed Galatea in her shell:
The silver-sandalled Thetis, and fond Alpheus
|