Thou laughest at the mill, the whir and worry
    Of spindle and of loom,
And the great wheel that toils amid the hurry
    And rushing of the flame.

Born in the purple, born to joy and pleasance,
    Thou dost not toil nor spin,
But makest glad and radiant with thy presence
    The meadow and the lin.

The wind blows, and uplifts thy drooping banner,
    And round thee throng and run
The rushes, the green yeomen of thy manor,
    The outlaws of the sun.

The burnished dragon-fly is thine attendant,
    And tilts against the field,
And down the listed sunbeam rides resplendent
    With steel-blue mail and shield.

Thou art the Iris, fair among the fairest,
    Who, armed with golden rod
And winged with the celestial azure, bearest
    The message of some God.

Thou art the Muse, who far from crowded cities
    Hauntest the sylvan streams,
Playing on pipes of reed the artless ditties
    That come to us as dreams.

O flower-de-luce, bloom on, and let the river
    Linger to kiss thy feet! 
O flower of song, bloom on, and make forever
    The world more fair and sweet.

PALINGENESIS

I lay upon the headland-height, and listened
To the incessant sobbing of the sea
    In caverns under me,
And watched the waves, that tossed and fled and glistened,
Until the rolling meadows of amethyst
    Melted away in mist.

Then suddenly, as one from sleep, I started;
For round about me all the sunny capes
    Seemed peopled with the shapes
Of those whom I had known in days departed,
Apparelled in the loveliness which gleams
    On faces seen in dreams.

A moment only, and the light and glory
Faded away, and the disconsolate shore
    Stood lonely as before;
And the wild-roses of the promontory
Around me shuddered in the wind, and shed
    Their petals of pale red.

There was an old belief that in the embers
Of all things their primordial form exists,
    And cunning alchemists
Could re-create the rose with all its members
From its own ashes, but without the bloom,
    Without the lost perfume.

Ah me! what wonder-working, occult science
Can from the ashes in our hearts once more
    The rose of youth restore? 
What craft of alchemy can bid defiance
To time and change, and for a single hour
    Renew this phantom-flower?

“O, give me back,” I cried, “the vanished splendors,
The breath of morn, and the exultant strife,
    When the swift stream of life
Bounds o’er its rocky channel, and surrenders
The pond, with all its lilies, for the leap
    Into the unknown deep!”

And the sea answered, with a lamentation,
Like some old prophet wailing, and it said,
    “Alas! thy youth is dead! 
It breathes no more, its heart has no pulsation;
In the dark places with the dead of old
    It lies forever cold!”