It came to him in rainbow dreams,
Blent with the wisdom of the sages,
Of spirit and of passion born;
In words as lucent as the morn
He prisoned it, and now it gleams
A jewel shining through the ages.
There was strength in him and the weak won freely from it,
There was an infinite pity, and hard hearts grew soft thereby,
There was truth so unshrinking and starry-shining,
Men read clear by its light and learned to scorn a lie.
His were songs so full of a wholesome laughter
Those whose courage was ashen found it once more aflame,
His was a child-like faith and wandering feet were guided,
His was a hope so joyous despair was put to shame.
His was the delicate insight and his the poignant vision
O Blest unfabled Incense Tree,
That burns in glorious Araby,
With red scent chalicing the air,
Till earth-life grow Elysian there!
Half buried to her flaming breast
In this bright tree, she makes her nest,
Hundred sunn'd Phoenix! When she must
Crumble at length to hoary dust!
Her gorgous death-bed! Her rich pyre
Burnt up with aromatic fire!
Her urn, sight high from spoiler men!
Her birthplace when self-born again!
The mountainless green wilds among,
Here ends she her unechoing song!
Out of the darkness, fretted sometimes in its sleeping,
Jets of sparks in fountains of blue come leaping
To sight, revealing a secret, numberless secrets keeping.
Sometimes the darkness trapped within a wheel
Runs into speed like a dream, the blue of the steel
Showing the rocking darkness now a-reel.
And out of the invisible, streams of bright blue drops
Rain from the showery heavens, and bright blue crops
Surge from the under-dark to their ladder-tops.
And all the manifold blue and joyous eyes,
So we settled it all when the storm was done
As comfy as comfy could be;
And I was to wait in the barn, my dears,
Because I was only three.
And Teddy would run to the rainbow's foot
Because he was five and a man--
And that's how it all began, my dears,
And that's how it all began!
Then we brought the lances down--then the trumpets blew--
When we went to Kandahar, ridin' two an' two.
Ridin'--ridin'--ridin' two an' two!
Ta-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-a!
All the way to Kandahar,
[Dedicated to K.M.Ward]
"I will arise and go unto my father"
MALKUTH
Dark, dark all dark! I cower, I cringe.
Only ablove me is a citron tinge
As if some echo of red, gold and lue
Chimed on the night and let its shadow through.
Yet I who am thus prisoned and exiled
Am the right heir of glory, the crowned child.
I match my might against my Fate's
I gird myself to reach the ultimate shores,
I arm myself the war to win:-
Lift up your heads, O mighty gates!
It was the Rainbow gave thee birth,
And left thee all her lovely hues;
And, as her mother’s name was Tears,
So runs it in my blood to choose
For haunts the lonely pools, and keep
In company with trees that weep.
Go you and, with such glorious hues,
Live with proud peacocks in green parks;
On lawns as smooth as shining glass,
Let every feather show its marks;
Get thee on boughs and clap thy wings
Before the windows of proud kings.
Nay, lovely Bird, thou art not vain;
Thou hast no proud, ambitious mind;
'Tis eve, the sun is sinking in the lake—
The lake, all glorious with his golden beams,
Whose calm clear breast reflects the mountains back
That raise their huge heads to the varied clouds.
The trees and flowers that grow along its banks
Smile in the lucid mirror. Every bough
Is vocal with the song of glittering birds,
Whose plumes are borrow'd from the rainbow's hues;
No other sound disturbs the silent air,
Although a prostrate nation is around,
Forever fair, forever calm and bright,
Life flies on plumage, zephyr-light,
For those who on the Olympian hill rejoice--
Moons wane, and races wither to the tomb,
And 'mid the universal ruin, bloom
The rosy days of Gods--With man, the choice,
Timid and anxious, hesitates between
The sense's pleasure and the soul's content;
While on celestial brows, aloft and sheen,
The beams of both are blent.
Seekest thou on earth the life of gods to share,
Safe in the realm of death?--beware
It was the winter wild,
While the heaven-born Child
All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies;
Nature in awe to Him
Had doffed her gaudy trim,
With her great Master so to sympathize:
It was no season then for her
To wanton with the sun, her lusty paramour.
Only with speeches fair
She woos the gentle air
To hide her guilty front with innocent snow,
And on her naked shame,
Pollute with sinful blame,
The saintly veil of maiden white to throw,
Confounded that her Maker's eyes
