Classic Poem

I COME from woods enchaunted,
Starlit and pixey-haunted,
—Where 'twixt the bracken and the trees
—The goblins lie and take their ease
By winter moods undaunted.

There down the golden gravel
The laughing rivers travel;
—Elves wake at nights and whisper low
—Between the bracken and the snow
Their dreamings to unravel.

Twisted and lank and hairy,
With wanton eyes and wary,
—They stretch and chuckle in the wind,
—For one has found a mermaid kind,
And one has kissed a fairy.

They know no melancholy,
But fashion crowns of holly,
—And gather sleep within the brake
—To deck a kingdom when they wake,
And bless the dreamer's folly.

Ah! would that I might follow
The servants of Apollo!
—But it is sweet to heap the hours
—With quiet dreams and poppy-flowers,
Down in the pixies' hollow.