Classic Poem

I.

It was a day of mingled joys and fears
Blending like light and shade,
And boyish smiles with lingering sweetness played
Through penitential tears.

II.

It was a feast whereon soft memories
Of an old saint do stay, —
Of one who came bearing the cross this way
From his own eastern skies.

III.

It was the eve of a high festival —
A day of serious hours,
For grief that one all full of gifts and powers
So faithlessly should fall.

IV.

It was the day whereon a Sovereign knelt
Before the King on high,
And through the realm was heard one loyal cry,
One beating heart was felt.

V.

And thoughtful men were startled at the sound,
And good men fell to prayer,
For with the glory and the pageant rare
Shadows were gathering round.

VI.

There is a well, a willow-shaded spot,
Cool in the noontide gleam,
With rushes nodding in the little stream.
And blue forget-me-not.

VII.

Set in thick tufts along the bushy marge,
With big bright eyes of gold,
Where glorious water-plants, like fans, unfold
Their blossoms strange and large.

VIII.

That wandering boy, young Hylas, did not find
Beauties so rich and rare,
Where swallow-wort and pale bright maiden's hair
And dog-grass greenly twined.

IX.

A sloping bank ran round it like a crown,
Whereon a purple cloud,
Of dark wild hyacinths, a fairy crowd,
Had settled softly down.

X.

And dreamy sounds of never-ending bells
From a city's ancient towers
Came down the stream, and went among the flowers,
And died in little swells.

XI.

There did I keep my birth-day feast, with all
These gentle things around,
While their soft voices rising from the ground
Unto my heart did call.

XII.

It is not good to be without a home, —
Young hearts should not be free:
Yet household thoughts have long been closed to me
Within my father's tomb.

XIII.

And I have roamed through places fair and good,
Like a wild bird that drops
To rest somewhere among the thousand tops
Of a broad fir-wood.

XIV.

My love hath strewn in many a youthful breast
Fancies of tender mould,
And I have memories lodged among the old
In their eternal rest.

XV.

Sunny and bright all earthly glories seem,
Like an enchanter's show,
And yet it frets me all the while to know
That this is but a dream.

XVI.

I cannot burst the fetters of the spell: —
The silvery light of mirth
Streams within me over all the earth,
As from an endless well.

XVII.

So bright of late the unsetting sun hath played,
Its evening must be near,
When Hope shall win fresh loveliness from fear,
And Memory from the shade.

XVIII.

Still by old hills or abbey's ruined shrine
Shall love my footsteps bring —
Dear homes, where friendship set me gathering
These wild-flower thoughts of mine.