Fairy Land [II]

Sit down beside me, Isabel, 

Here, dearest, where the moonbeam fell 

Just now so fairy-like and well. 

Now thou art dress’d for paradise! 

I am star-stricken with thine eyes! 

My soul is lolling on thy sighs! 

Thy hair is lifted by the moon 

Like flowers by the low breath of June! 

Sit down, sit down — how came we here? 

Or is it all but a dream, my dear? 

  

You know that most enormous flower — 

That rose — that what d’ye call it — that hung 

Up like a dog-star in this bower — 

To-day (the wind blew, and) it swung 

So impudently in my face, 

So like a thing alive you know, 

I tore it from its pride of place 

And shook it into pieces — so 

Be all ingratitude requited. 

The winds ran off with it delighted, 

And, thro’ the opening left, as soon 

As she threw off her cloak, yon moon 

Has sent a ray down with a tune. 

  

And this ray is a fairy ray — 

Did you not say so, Isabel? 

How fantastically it fell 

With a spiral twist and a swell, 

And over the wet grass rippled away 

With a tinkling like a bell! 

In my own country all the way 

We can discover a moon ray 

Which thro’ some tatter’d curtain pries 

Into the darkness of a room, 

Is by (the very source of gloom) 

The motes, and dust, and flies, 

On which it trembles and lies 

Like joy upon sorrow! 

O, when will come the morrow? 

Isabel! do you not fear 

The night and the wonders here? 

Dim vales! and shadowy floods! 

And cloudy-looking woods 

Whose forms we can’t discover 

For the tears that drip all over! 

  

Huge moons — see! wax and wane 

Again — again — again — 

Every moment of the night — 

Forever changing places! 

How they put out the starlight 

With the breath from their pale faces! 

  

Lo! one is coming down 

With its centre on the crown 

Of a mountain’s eminence! 

Down — still down — and down — 

Now deep shall be — O deep! 

The passion of our sleep! 

For that wide circumference 

In easy drapery falls 

Drowsily over halls —  

Over ruin’d walls — 

Over waterfalls, 

(Silent waterfalls!) 

O’er the strange woods — o’er the sea — 

Alas! over the sea!