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MYSTERIES: LYRICAL AND DRAMATIC
Tune my lesser lyre with other fingers,
Yet am not a whit the less belovéd.
Unto me the stars are never silent,
Nor do sea and storm-deny their music,
Nor do flower and breeze refuse their
kisses :
So my soul.is flooded with their magic;
So my love completes the joy of living. .
I am like the earth, to whom there gather
Rays of gold to bid the gray horizon
Melt, recede, and brighten into azure.
Let me sing, O holy one, Apollo!
Sing as Horace sang, and flood the ocean
With a living ecstasy of music
Till the whole creation echo, echo,
Echo till the tune dissolve the heavens?
Still song lingers; lamely from the lute-
string
Steals a breath of melody; the forest
Treasures in its glades the sighs I utter.
Yet may I be happy, storing honey
Lover’s lips hold, gathering the sunlight
Eyes and hair have kept for me, delighting
In the bells far-off, in yonder thrushes,
In the tawny songster of the forest,
In the stream’s song, all the words of passion,
Echoes of the deeper words unspoken
In thy breast and mine, O heart of silence !
Will they pierce one day to other nations
Clear and strong and triumphing?
It may be.
Then we shall not envy you, my Horace !