Jewel or shell, or starry ore, Or the yellow-banded bees, Fed thee, a child, lying alone, With whitest honey in fairy gardens culled A glorious child, dreaming alone, In silk-soft folds, upon yielding down, With the hum of swarming bees Into dreamful slumber lulled. Who may minister to thee? To thee, with fruitage golden-rinded Grape-thickened from the light, and blinded Of fragrant trailers, when the air Sleepeth over all the heaven, And the crag that fronts the Even, Crimsons over an inland mere, How may full-sailed verse express, Of thy swan-like stateliness, The luxuriant symmetry Every turn and glance of thine, And the steady sunset glow, That stays upon thee? For in thee From one censer, in one shrine, Mingle ever. Motions flow To an unheard melody, Which lives about thee, and a sweep I stand before thee, Eleänore; I see thy beauty gradually unfold, Slowly, as from a cloud of gold, The languors of thy love-deep eyes Float on to me. I would I were So tranced, so rapt in ecstasies, Sometimes, with most intensity Thought folded over thought, smiling asleep, But am as nothing in its light: As though a star, in inmost heaven set, Should slowly round his orb, and slowly grow To a full face, there like a sun remain Fixed-then as slowly fade again, And draw itself to what it was before; As thunderclouds that, hung on high, Roofed the world with doubt and fear, In thee all passion becomes passionless, Falling into a still delight, And luxury of contemplation: As waves that up a quiet cove Shadow forth the banks at will And the selfsame influence But when I see thee roam, with tresses unconfined, Breathes low between the sunset and the moon; On silken cushions half reclined; I watch thy grace; and in its place And a languid fire creeps Through my veins to all my frame, Dissolvingly and slowly soon, From thy rose-red lips My name Floweth; and then, as in a swoon, With dinning sound my ears are rife, I lose my color, I lose my breath, I drink the cup of a costly death, Brimmed with delirious draughts of warmest life I die with my delight, before I hear what I would hear from thee; Yet tell my name again to me. So dying ever, Eleänore. THE MILLER'S DAUGHTER. I SEE the wealthy miller yet, In yonder chair I see him sit, Three fingers round the old silver cup- At his own jest-gray eyes lit up So full of summer warmth, so glad, Yet fill my glass: give me one kiss: There's somewhat in this world amiss Have I not found a happy earth? Across the walnuts and the wine To be the long and listless boy Late left an orphan of the squire, Where this old mansion mounted high Looks down upon the village spire: For even here, where I and you Have lived and loved alone so long, Each morn my sleep was broken through By some wild skylark's matin song. And oft I heard the tender dove Still hither thither idly swayed Like those long mosses in the stream. Or from the bridge I leaned to hear |