Classic Poem

Now like a pageant of the Golden Year
In rich memorial pomp the hours go by,
With rose-embroidered flags unfurled
And tasselled bugles calling through the world
Wake, for your hope draws near!
Wake, for in each soft porch of azure sky,
Seen through each arch of pale green leaves, the Gate
Of Eden swings apart for Summer's royal state.

Ah, when the Spirit of the moving scene
Has entered in, the splendour will be spent!
The flutes will cease, the gates will close;
Only the scattered crimson of the rose,
The wild wood's hapless queen,
Dis-kingdomed, will declare the way he went;
And, in a little while, her court will go,
Pass like a cloud and leave no trace on earth below.

Tell us no more of Autumn, the slow gold
Of fruitage ripening in a world's decay,
The falling leaves, the moist rich breath
Of woods that swoon and crumble into death
Over the gorgeous mould:
Give us the flash and scent of keen-edged May
Where wastes that bear no harvest yield their bloom,
Rude crofts of flowering nettle, bents of yellow broom.

The very reeds and sedges of the fen
Open their hearts and blossom to the sky;
The wild thyme on the mountain's knees
Unrolls its purple market to the bees;
Unharvested of men
The Traveller's Joy can only smile and die.
Joy, joy alone the throbbing whitethroats bring,
Joy to themselves and heaven! They were but born to sing!

And see, between the northern-scented pines,
The whole sweet summer sharpens to a glow!
See, as the well-spring plashes cool
Over a shadowy green fern-fretted pool
The mystic sunbeam shines
For one mad moment on a breast of snow
A warm white shoulder and a glowing arm
Up-flung, where some swift Undine sinks in shy alarm.

And if she were not all a dream, and lent
Life for a little to your own desire,
Oh, lover in the hawthorn lane,
Dream not you hold her, or you dream in vain!
The violet, spray-besprent
When from that plunge the rainbows flashed like fire,
Will scarce more swiftly lose its happy dew
Than eyes which Undine haunts will cease to shine on you.

What though the throstle pour his heart away,
A happy spendthrift of uncounted gold,
Swinging upon a blossomed briar
With soft throat lifted in a wild desire
To make the world his may.
Ever the pageant through the gates is rolled
Further away; in vain the rich notes throng
Flooding the mellow noon with wave on wave of song.

The feathery meadows like a lilac sea,
Knee-deep, with honeyed clover, red and white,
Roll billowing: the crisp clouds pass
Trailing their soft blue shadows o'er the grass;
The skylark, mad with glee,
Quivers, up, up, to lose himself in light;
And, through the forest, like a fairy dream
Through some dark mind, the ferns in branching beauty stream.

Enough of joy! A little respite lend,
Summer, fair god that hast so little heed
Of these that serve thee but to die,
Mere trappings of thy tragic pageantry!
Show us the end, the end!
We too, with human hearts that break and bleed,
March to the night that rounds their fleeting hour,
And feel we, too, perchance but serve some loftier Power.

O that our hearts might pass away with thee,
Burning and pierced and full of thy sweet pain,
Burst through the gates with thy swift soul,
Hunt thy most white perfection to the goal,
Nor wait, once more to see
Thy chaliced lilies rotting in the rain,
Thy ragged yellowing banners idly hung
In woods that have forgotten all the songs we sung!

Peace! Like a pageant of the Golden Year
In rich memorial pomp the hours go by,
With rose-embroidered flags unfurled
And tasselled bugles calling through the world
Wake, for your hope draws near!
Wake, for in each soft porch of azure sky,
Seen through each arch of pale green leaves, the Gate
Of Eden swings apart for Summer's royal state.

Not wait! Forgive, forgive that feeble cry
Of blinded passion all unworthy thee!
For here the spirit of man may claim
A loftier vision and a nobler aim
Than e'er was born to die:
Man only, of earth, throned on Eternity,
From his own sure abiding-place can mark
How earth's great golden dreams go past into the dark.