Читать книгу The Sylphs of the Season with Other Poems - Washington Allston - Страница 5

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Long has it been my fate to hear

The slave of Mammon, with a sneer,

My indolence reprove.

Ah, little knows he of the care,

The toil, the hardship that I bear,

While lolling in my elbow-chair,

And seeming scarce to move:

For, mounted on the Poet's steed,

I there my ceaseless journey speed O'er mountain, wood, and stream: And oft within a little day 'Mid comets fierce 'tis mine to stray, And wander o'er the Milky-way To catch a Poet's dream.

But would the Man of Lucre know

What riches from my labours flow?--

A DREAM is my reply.

And who for wealth has ever pin'd,

That had a World within his mind,

Where every treasure he may find,

And joys that never die!

One night, my task diurnal done,

(For I had travell'd with the Sun

O'er burning sands, o'er snows)

Fatigued, I sought the couch of rest;

My wonted pray'r to Heaven address'd;

But scarce had I my pillow press'd

When thus a vision rose.

Methought within a desert cave,

Cold, dark, and solemn as the grave,

I suddenly awoke.

It seem'd of sable Night the cell,

Where, save when from the ceiling fell

An oozing drop, her silent spell

No sound had ever broke.

There motionless I stood alone,

Like some strange monument of stone

Upon a barren wild;

Or like, (so solid and profound

The darkness seem'd that wall'd me round)

A man that's buried under ground,

Where pyramids are pil'd.

Thus fix'd, a dreadful hour I past,

And now I heard, as from a blast,

A voice pronounce my name:

Nor long upon my ear it dwelt,

When round me 'gan the air to melt.

And motion once again I felt

Quick circling o'er my frame.

Again it call'd; and then a ray,

That seem'd a gushing fount of day,

Across the cavern stream'd.

Half struck with terror and delight,

I hail'd the little blessed light,

And follow'd 'till my aching sight

An orb of darkness seem'd.

Nor long I felt the blinding pain;

For soon upon a mountain plain

I gaz'd with wonder new.

There high a castle rear'd its head;

And far below a region spread,

Where every Season seem'd to shed

Its own peculiar hue.

Now at the castle's massy gate,

Like one that's blindly urged by fate,

A bugle-horn I blew.

The mountain-plain it shook around,

The vales return'd a hollow sound,

And, moving with a sigh profound.

The portals open flew.

Then ent'ring, from a glittering hall

I heard a voice seraphic call,

That bade me "ever reign,

All hail!" it said in accent wild,

"For thou art Nature's chosen child,

Whom wealth nor blood has e'er defil'd,

Hail, Lord of this Domain!"

And now I paced a bright saloon,

That seem'd illumin'd by the moon,

So mellow was the light.

The walls with jetty darkness teem'd,

While down them chrystal columns streamed,

And each a mountain torrent seem'd.

High-flashing through the night.

Rear'd in the midst, a double throne.

Like burnish'd cloud of evening shone;

While, group'd the base around,

Four Damsels stood of Faery race;

Who, turning each with heavenly grace

Upon me her immortal face,

Transfix'd me to the ground.

And thus the foremost of the tram: Be thine the throne, and thine to reign O'er all the varying year! But ere thou rulest the Fates command; That of our chosen rival band A Sylph shall win thy heart and hand, Thy sovereignty to share.

For we, the sisters of a birth,

Do rule by turns the subject earth

To serve ungrateful man;

But since our varied toils impart

No joy to his capricious heart,

'Tis now ordain'd that human art

Shall rectify the plan.

Then spake the Sylph of Spring serene,

'Tis I thy joyous heart I ween, With sympathy shall move: For I with living melody Of birds in choral symphony, First wak'd thy soul to poesy, To piety and love.

When thou, at call of vernal breeze,

And beck'ning bough of budding trees,

Hast left thy sullen fire;

And stretch'd thee in some mossy dell.

And heard the browsing wether's bell,

Blythe echoes rousing from their cell

To swell the tinkling quire:

Or heard from branch of flow'ring thorn

The song of friendly cuckoo warn

The tardy-moving swain;

Hast bid the purple swallow hail;

And seen him now through ether sail,

Now sweeping downward o'er the vale.

And skimming now the plain;

Then, catching with a sudden glance

The bright and silver-clear expanse

Of some broad river's stream.

Beheld the boats adown it glide,

And motion wind again the tide,

Where, chain'd in ice by Winter's pride,

Late roll'd the heavy team:

Or, lur'd by some fresh-scented gale,

That woo'd the moored fisher's sail

To tempt the mighty main,

Hast watch'd the dim receding shore,

Now faintly seen the ocean o'er,

Like hanging cloud, and now no more

To bound the sapphire plain;

Then, wrapt in night the scudding bark,

(That seem'd, self-pois'd amid the dark,

Through upper air to leap,)

Beheld, from thy most fearful height,

Beneath the dolphin's azure light

Cleave, like a living meteor bright,

The darkness of the deep:

'Twas mine the warm, awak'ning hand

That made thy grateful heart expand,

And feel the high control

Of Him, the mighty Power, that moves

Amid the waters and the groves,

And through his vast creation proves

His omnipresent soul.

Or, brooding o'er some forest rill,

Fring'd with the early daffodil,

And quiv'ring maiden-hair,

When thou hast mark'd the dusky bed,

With leaves and water-rust o'erspread,

That seem'd an amber light to shed

On all was shadow'd there;

And thence, as by its murmur call'd,

The current traced to where it brawl'd

Beneath the noontide ray;

And there beheld the checquer'd shade

Of waves, in many a sinuous braid,

That o'er the sunny channel play'd,

With motion ever gay:

'Twas I to these the magick gave,

That made thy heart, a willing slave,

To gentle Nature bend;

And taught thee how with tree and flower,

And whispering gale, and dropping shower,

In converse sweet to pass the hour,

As with an early friend:

That mid the noontide sunny haze

Did in thy languid bosom raise

The raptures of the boy;

When, wak'd as if to second birth,

Thy soul through every pore look'd forth,

And gaz'd upon the beauteous Earth

With myriad eyes of joy:

That made thy heart, like HIS above,

To flow with universal love

For every living thing.

And, oh! if I, with ray divine,

Thus tempering, did thy soul refine,

Then let thy gentle heart be mine,

And bless the Sylph of Spring.

And next the Sylph of Summer fair;

The while her crisped, golden hair

Half veil'd her sunny eyes:

Nor less may I thy homage claim, At touch of whose exhaling flame The fog of Spring that chill'd thy frame In genial vapour flies.

Oft by the heat of noon opprest,

With flowing hair and open vest,

Thy footsteps have I won

To mossy couch of welling grot,

Where thou hast bless'd thy happy lot.

That thou in that delicious spot

May'st see, not feel, the sun:

Thence tracing from the body's change,

In curious philosophic range,

The motion of the mind;

And how from thought to thought it flew,

Still hoping in each vision new

The faery land of bliss to view,

But ne'er that land to find.

And then, as grew thy languid mood,

To some embow'ring silent wood

I led thy careless way;

Where high from tree to tree in air

Thou saw'st the spider swing her snare.

So bright!--as if, entangled there,

The sun had left a ray:

Or lur'd thee to some beetling steep

To mark the deep and quiet sleep

That wrapt the tarn below;

And mountain blue and forest green

Inverted on its plane serene,

Dim gleaming through the filmy sheen

That glaz'd the painted show;

Perchance, to mark the fisher's skiff

Swift from beneath some shadowy cliff

Dart, like a gust of wind;

And, as she skimm'd the sunny lake,

In many a playful wreath her wake

Far-trailing, like a silvery snake,

With sinuous length behind.

Nor less when hill and dale and heath

Still Evening wrapt in mimic death.

Thy spirit true I prov'd:

Around thee, as the darkness stole,

Before thy wild, creative soul

I bade each faery vision roll,

Thine infancy had lov'd.

Then o'er the silent sleeping land,

Thy fancy, like a magick wand,

Forth caird the Elfin race:

And now around the fountain's brim

In circling dance they gaily skim;

And now upon its surface swim,

And water-spiders chase;

Each circumstance of sight or sound

Peopling the vacant air around

With visionary life:

For if amid a thicket stirr'd,

Or flitting bat, or wakeful bird,

Then straight thy eager fancy heard

The din of Faery strife;

Now, in the passing beetle's hum

The Elfin army's goblin drum

To pigmy battle sound;

And now, where dripping dew-drops plash

On waving grass, their bucklers clash,

And now their quivering lances flash,

Wide-dealing death around:

Or if the moon's effulgent form

The passing clouds of sudden storm

In quick succession veil;

Vast serpents now, their shadows glide,

And, coursing now the mountain's side,

A band of giants huge, they stride

O'er hill, and wood, and dale.

And still on many a service rare

Could I descant, if need there were,

My firmer claim to bind.

But rest I most my high pretence

On that my genial influence,

Which made the body's indolence

The vigour of the mind.

And now, in accents deep and low,

Like voice of fondly-cherish'd woe,

The Sylph of Autumn sad:

Though I may not of raptures sing,

That grac'd the gentle song of Spring,

Like Summer, playful pleasures bring,

Thy youthful heart to glad;

Yet still may I in hope aspire

Thy heart to touch with chaster fire,

And purifying love:

For I with vision high and holy,

And spell of quick'ning melancholy,

Thy soul from sublunary folly

First rais'd to worlds above.

What though be mine the treasures fair

Of purple grape and yellow pear,

And fruits of various hue,

And harvests rich of golden grain,

That dance in waves along the plain

To merry song of reaping swain,

Beneath the welkin blue;

With these I may not urge my suit,

Of Summer's patient toil the fruit,

For mortal purpose given:

Nor may it fit my sober mood

To sing of sweetly murmuring flood,

Or dies of many-colour'd wood,

That mock the bow of heaven.

But, know, 'twas mine the secret power

That wak'd thee at the midnight hour,

In bleak November's reign:

'Twas I the spell around thee cast,

When thou didst hear the hollow blast

In murmurs tell of pleasures past,

That ne'er would come again:

And led thee, when the storm was o'er,

To hear the sullen ocean roar,

By dreadful calm opprest;

Which still, though not a breeze was there,

Its mountain-billows heav'd in air,

As if a living thing it were,

That strove in vain for rest.

'Twas I, when thou, subdued by woe,

Didst watch the leaves descending slow,

To each a moral gave;

And as they mov'd in mournful train,

With rustling sound, along the plain,

Taught them to sing a seraph's strain

Of peace within the grave.

And then uprais'd thy streaming eye,

I met thee in the western sky

In pomp of evening cloud;

That, while with varying form it roll'd;

Some wizard's castle seem'd of gold,

And now a crimson'd knight of old,

Or king in purple proud.

And last, as sunk the setting sun,

And Evening with her shadows dun,

The gorgeous pageant past,

'Twas then of life a mimic shew,

Of human grandeur here below,

Which thus beneath the fatal blow

Of Death must fall at last.

Oh, then with what aspiring gaze

Didst thou thy tranced vision raise

To yonder orbs on high,

And think how wondrous, how sublime

'Twere upwards to their spheres to climb,

And live, beyond the reach of Time,

Child of Eternity!

And last the Sylph of Winter spake;

The while her piercing voice did shake

The castle-vaults below.

Oh, youth, if thou, with soul refin'd,

Hast felt the triumph pure of mind,

And learnt a secret joy to find

In deepest scenes of woe;

If e'er with fearful ear at eve

Hast heard the wailing tempest grieve

Through chink of shatter'd wall;

The while it conjur'd o'er thy brain

Of wandering ghosts a mournful train,

That low in fitful sobs complain,

Of Death's untimely call:

Or feeling, as the storm increas'd,

The love of terror nerve thy breast,

Didst venture to the coast;

To see the mighty war-ship leap

From wave to wave upon the deep,

Like chamoise goat from steep to steep,

'Till low in valleys lost;

Then, glancing to the angry sky,

Behold the clouds with fury fly

The lurid moon athwart;

Like armies huge in battle, throng,

And pour in vollying ranks along,

While piping winds in martial song

To rushing war exhort:

Oh, then to me thy heart be given,

To me, ordain'd by Him in heaven

Thy nobler powers to wake.

And oh! if thou with poet's soul,

High brooding o'er the frozen pole,

Hast felt beneath my stern control

The desert region quake;

Or from old Hecla's cloudy height,

When o'er the dismal, half-year's night

He pours his sulph'rous breath,

Hast known my petrifying wind

Wild ocean's curling billows bind,

Like bending sheaves by harvest hind,

Erect in icy-*death;

Or heard adown the mountain's steep

The northern blast with furious sweep

Some cliff dissever'd dash;

And seen it spring with dreadful bound

From rock to rock, to gulph profound,

While echoes fierce from caves resound

The never-ending crash:

If thus, with terror's mighty spell

Thy soul inspir'd, was wont to swell,

Thy heaving frame expand;

Oh, then to me thy heart incline;

For know, the wondrous charm was mine

That fear and joy did thus combine

In magick union bland.

Nor think confin'd my native sphere

To horrors gaunt, or ghastly fear,

Or desolation wild:

For I of pleasures fair could sing,

That steal from life its sharpest sting,

And man have made around it cling,

Like mother to her child.

When thou, beneath the clear blue sky,

So calm no cloud was seen to fly,

Hast gaz'd on snowy plain,

Where Nature slept so pure and sweet,

She seem'd a corse in winding-sheet,

Whose happy soul had gone to meet

The blest Angelic train;

Or mark'd the sun's declining ray

In thousand varying colours play

O'er ice-incrusted heath,

In gleams of orange now, and green,

And now in red and azure sheen,

Like hues on dying dolphins seen,

Most lovely when in death;

Or seen at dawn of eastern light

The frosty toil of Fays by night

On pane of casement clear,

Where bright the mimic glaciers shine,

And Alps, with many a mountain pine,

And armed knights from Palestine

In winding march appear:

'Twas I on each enchanting scene

The charm bestow'd that banished spleen

Thy bosom pure and light.

But still a nobler power I claim; That power allied to poets' fame, Which language vain has dar'd to name-- The soul's creative might.

Though Autumn grave, and Summer fair,

And joyous Spring demand a share

Of Fancy's hallow'd power,

Yet these I hold of humbler kind,

To grosser means of earth confin'd,

Through mortal sense to reach the mind, By mountain, stream, or flower.

But mine, of purer nature still,

Is that which to thy secret will Did minister unseen, Unfelt, unheard; when every sense Did sleep in drowsy indolence, And Silence deep and Night intense Enshrowded every scene;

That o'er thy teeming brain did raise

The spirits of departed days[1] Through all the varying year; And images of things remote, And sounds that long had ceas'd to float, With every hue, and every note, As living now they were:

And taught thee from the motley mass

Each harmonizing part to class,

(Like Nature's self employ'd;)

And then, as work'd thy wayward will,

From these with rare combining skill,

With new-created worlds to fill

Of space the mighty void.

Oh then to me thy heart incline;

To me whose plastick powers combine

The harvest of the mind;

To me, whose magic coffers bear

The spoils of all the toiling year,

That still in mental vision wear

A lustre more refin'd.

She ceas'd--And now in doubtful mood,

All motionless and mute I stood,

Like one by charm opprest:

By turns from each to each I rov'd,

And each by turns again I lov'd;

For ages ne'er could one have prov'd

More lovely than the rest.

"Oh blessed band, of birth divine,

What mortal task is like to mine!"--

And further had I spoke,

When, lo! there pour'd a flood of light

So fiercely on my aching sight,

I fell beneath the vision bright,

And with the pain I woke.