Classic Poem

VARIATIONS ON CERTAIN MELODIES

I

ANDANTE

Under the full-blown linden and the plane,
That link their arms above
In mute, mysterious love,
I hear the strain!
Is it the far postilion's horn,
Mellowed by starlight, floating up the valley,
Or song of love-sick peasant, borne
Across the fields of fragrant corn,
And poplar-guarded alley?
Now from the woodbine and the unseen rose
What new delight is showered?
The warm wings of the air
Drop into downy indolence and close,
So sweetly overpowered:
But nothing sleeps, though rest seems everywhere.

II

ADAGIO

Something came with the falling dusk,
Came, and quickened to soft unrest:
Something floats in the linden's musk,
And throbs in the brook on the meadow's breast.
Shy Spirit of Love, awake, awake!
All things feel thee,
And all reveal thee:
The night was given for thy sweet sake.
Toil slinks aside, and leaves to thee the land;
The heart beats warmer for the idle hand;
The timid tongue unlearns its wrong,
And speech is turned to song;
The shaded eyes are braver;
And every life, like flowers whose scent is dumb
Till dew and darkness come,
Gives forth a tender savor.
O, each so lost in all, who may resist
The plea of lips unkissed,
Or, hearing such a strain,
Though kissed a thousand times, kiss not again!

III

APPASSIONATO

Was it a distant flute
That breathed, and now is mute?
Or that lost soul men call the nightingale,
In bosky coverts hidden,
Filling with sudden passion all the vale?
O, chant again the tale,
And call on her whose name returns, unbidden,
A longing and a dream,
Adelaida!
For while the sprinkled stars
Sparkle, and wink, and gleam,
Adelaida!
Darkness and perfume cleave the unknown bars
Between the enamored heart and thee,
And thou and I are free,
Adelaida!
Less than a name, a melody, art thou,
A hope, a haunting vow!
The passion-cloven
Spirit of thy Beethoven
Claimed with less ardor than I claim thee now,
Adelaida!
Take form, at last: from these o'er-bending branches
Descend, or from the grass arise!
I scarce shall see thine eyes,
Or know what blush the shadow stanches;
But all my being's empty urn shall be
Filled with thy mystery!

IV

CAPRICCIOSO

Nay, nay! the longings tender,
The fear, the marvel, and the mystery,
The shy, delicious dread, the unreserved surrender,
Give, if thou canst, to me!
For I would be,
In this expressive languor,
While night conceals, the wooed and not the wooer;
Shaken with supplication, keen as anger;
Pursued, and thou pursuer!
Plunder my bosom of its hoarded fire,
And so assail me,
That coy denial fail me,
Slain by the mirrored shape of my desire!
Though life seem overladen
With conquered bliss, it only craves the more:
Teach me the other half of passion's lore —
Be thou the man, and I the maiden!
Ah! come,
While earth is waiting, heaven is dumb,
And blossom-sighs
So penetrate the indolent air,
The very stars grow fragrant in the skies!
Arise,
And thine approach shall make me fair,
Thy borrowed pleading all too soon subdue me,
Till both forget the part;
And she who failed to woo me
So caught, is held to my impatient heart!