And the Little Wind
Said a rose amid the June night to a little wind there walking
(And the whisper of the moonlight was no fainter than its talking):
" It is plainly providential, " so remarked the garden Tory,
" That the ultimate essential is the gentle rose's glory.
Let the sordid delvers cavil! Through the world-fog sinking seaward
And the planetary travail God was slowly groping meward.
Weary ages of designing, aeons of creative throes
Spent the Master in refining sullen chaos to a rose!
Shall He robe His chosen meanly? Look upon me; am I splendid? "
Here she stood erect and queenly, curled a lip and ended.
And the little wind there walking, not desirous of dissension,
In a gust of cryptic talking freely granted the contention.
Like the murmur of a far stream or a zephyr in the sedges,
Scarcely louder than the star-gleam raining silver on the hedges,
Came a whisper from the humus where the roots were toiling blindly:
" They enslave us, they entomb us! Is it just and is it kindly?
Ours, forever ours, to nourish — O, the drear, eternal duty! —
That the idle rose may flourish in aristocratic beauty.
Not for us the wooing, tender moon emerges from the far night;
Not for us the morning splendor and the witchery of starlight;
Not for us the dulcet cantion of the rain to throbbing lutes;
And there's no cerulean mansion for the roots. "
Now the little wind, demurely sympathetic, cogitated,
And declared the matter surely ought to be investigated.
" Fie! " observed the fair patrician, " on their silly martyr poses!
Not content with their condition, always wanting to be roses! "
Whereupon a theophanic, superlunar phosphorescence
Flung the haughty into panic, awed the humble to quiescence.
'Twas the Vintner of the June-wine on his world-wide, endless vagrance;
And he spoke the tongue of moonshine in the dialect of fragrance:
" Brother, Sister, softly, softly! Glooming, gleaming though the way be,
Who is low and who is lofty in the scheme of what you may be?
Pride and plaint are irreligious. Root and blossom, lo! you plod
Upward to some far, prodigious Rose of God! "
And the little wind, though slyly sleeping out the time of talking,
Woke to praise the sermon highly, and continued with his walking.
(And the whisper of the moonlight was no fainter than its talking):
" It is plainly providential, " so remarked the garden Tory,
" That the ultimate essential is the gentle rose's glory.
Let the sordid delvers cavil! Through the world-fog sinking seaward
And the planetary travail God was slowly groping meward.
Weary ages of designing, aeons of creative throes
Spent the Master in refining sullen chaos to a rose!
Shall He robe His chosen meanly? Look upon me; am I splendid? "
Here she stood erect and queenly, curled a lip and ended.
And the little wind there walking, not desirous of dissension,
In a gust of cryptic talking freely granted the contention.
Like the murmur of a far stream or a zephyr in the sedges,
Scarcely louder than the star-gleam raining silver on the hedges,
Came a whisper from the humus where the roots were toiling blindly:
" They enslave us, they entomb us! Is it just and is it kindly?
Ours, forever ours, to nourish — O, the drear, eternal duty! —
That the idle rose may flourish in aristocratic beauty.
Not for us the wooing, tender moon emerges from the far night;
Not for us the morning splendor and the witchery of starlight;
Not for us the dulcet cantion of the rain to throbbing lutes;
And there's no cerulean mansion for the roots. "
Now the little wind, demurely sympathetic, cogitated,
And declared the matter surely ought to be investigated.
" Fie! " observed the fair patrician, " on their silly martyr poses!
Not content with their condition, always wanting to be roses! "
Whereupon a theophanic, superlunar phosphorescence
Flung the haughty into panic, awed the humble to quiescence.
'Twas the Vintner of the June-wine on his world-wide, endless vagrance;
And he spoke the tongue of moonshine in the dialect of fragrance:
" Brother, Sister, softly, softly! Glooming, gleaming though the way be,
Who is low and who is lofty in the scheme of what you may be?
Pride and plaint are irreligious. Root and blossom, lo! you plod
Upward to some far, prodigious Rose of God! "
And the little wind, though slyly sleeping out the time of talking,
Woke to praise the sermon highly, and continued with his walking.
Translation:
Language:
Reviews
No reviews yet.