Page:Poems Barrett.djvu/233

      In a child-abstraction lifted,
      Straightway from the bower I past;
      Foot and soul being dimly drifted
      Through the greenwood, till, at last,
In the hill-top's open sunshine, I all consciously was cast.

      Face to face with the true mountains,
      I stood silently and still;
      Drawing strength for fancy's dauntings,
      From the air about the hill,
And from Nature's open mercies, and most debonaire goodwill.

      Oh! the golden-hearted daisies
      Witnessed there, before my youth,
      To the truth of things, with praises
      To the beauty of the truth;
And I woke to Nature's real, laughing joyfully for both.

      And I said within me, laughing,
      I have found a bower to-day,
      A green lusus—fashioned half in
      Chance, and half in Nature's play—
And a little bird sings nigh it, I will never more missay.

      Henceforth, I will be the fairy
      Of this bower, not built by one;
      I will go there, sad or merry,
      With each morning's benison;
And the bird shall be my harper in the dream-hall I have won.

      So I said. But the next morning,
      (—Child, look up into my face—
      'Ware, O sceptic, of your scorning!
      This is truth in its pure grace;)
The next morning, all had vanished, or my wandering missed the place.