For such a call. Let the wild word be cried
As though she whom you fear had crossed the wide
Swift lake.
Enchantress. A very little thing that is,
And shall be done, if you will deign to kiss
My lips, fair youth.
Naschina.It shall be as you ask.
Enchantress. Forth! forth! O spirits, ye have heard your task!
Voices. We are gone!
Enchantress [sitting down by Naschina].
Fair shepherd, as we wandered hither,
My words were all: 'Here no loves wane and wither,
Where dream-fed passion is and peace encloses,
Where revel of fox-glove is and revel of roses.'
My words were all: 'O whither, whither, whither
Wilt roam away from this rich island rest?
I bid thee stay, renouncing thy mad quest.'
But thou wouldst not, for then thou wert unblest
And stony-hearted; now thou hast grown kind,
And thou wilt stay. All thought of what they find
In the far world will vanish from thy mind,
Till thou rememberest only how the sea
Has fenced us round for all eternity.
But why art thou so silent? Did'st thou hear
I laughed?
Naschina.And why is that a thing so dear?
Enchantress. From thee I snatched it; e'en the fay that trips
At morn, and with her feet each cobweb rends,
Laughs not. It dwells alone on mortal lips:
Thou'lt teach me laughing, and I'll teach thee peace,
Here where laburnum hangs her golden fleece;
For peace and laughter have been seldom friends.
But, for a boy, how long thine hair has grown!
Long citron coils that hang around thee, blown
In shadowy dimness. To be fair as thee
I'd give my faery fleetness, though I be
Far fleeter than the million-footed sea.
A Voice.By wood antique, by wave and waste,
Where cypress is and oozy pine,
Did I on quivering pinions haste,
And all was quiet round me spread,
As quiet as the clay-cold dead.
I cried the thing you bade me cry.
An owl, who in an alder tree
Had hooted for an hundred years,
Up-raised his voice, and hooted me.
E'en though his wings were plumeless stumps,
And all his veins had near run dry,
Forth from the hollow alder trunk
He hooted as I wandered by.
And so with wolf, and boar, and steer.
And one alone of all would hark,
A man who by a dead man stood.
A star-lit rapier, half blood-dark,
Was broken in his quivering hand.
As blossoms, when the winds of March
Hold festival across the land,
He shrank before my voice, and stood
Low bowed and dumb upon the sand.
A foolish word thou gavest me!
For each within himself hath all
The world, within his folded heart,
His temple and his banquet hall;
And who will throw his mansion down
Thus for another's bugle call!
Enchantress. But why this whim of thine? A strange unrest,
As alien as a cuckoo in a robin's nest,
Is in thy face, and lips together pressed;
And why so silent? I would have thee speak.
Soon wilt thou smile, for here the winds are weak
As moths with broken wings, and as we sit
The heavens all star-throbbing are a-lit.
Naschina. But art thou happy?
Enchantress.Let me gaze on thee
At arm's length, thus till dumb eternity
Has rolled away the stars and dried the sea
I could gaze, gaze upon thine eyes' clear grey;
Gaze on till ragged time himself decay.
Ah! you are weeping; here should all grief cease.
Naschina. But art thou happy?
Enchantress.Youth, I am at peace.
Naschina. But art thou happy?
Enchantress.Those grey eyes of thine
Have they ne'er seen the eyes of lynx or kine,
Or aught remote; or hast thou never heard
Mid bubbling leaves a wandering song-rapt bird
Going the forest through, with flutings weak;
Or hast thou never seen, with visage meek,
A hoary hunter leaning on his bow,
To watch thee pass? Yet deeper than men know
These are at peace.
A Voice.Sad lady, cease!
I rose, I rose
From the dim wood's foundation—
I rose, I rose
Where in white exultation
The long lily blows,
And the wan wave that lingers
From flood-time encloses
With infantine fingers
