THE MOON AND THE EARTH.

THE MOON.

BROTHER mine, calm wanderer,

Happy globe of land and air,
Some spirit is darted like a beam from thee,
Which penetrates my frozen frame,
And passes with the warmth of flame
With love, odour, and deep melody
Through me, through me.

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THE snow upon my lifeless mountains
Is loosened into living fountains,
My solid oceans flow, and sing, and shine:
A spirit from my heart bursts forth,
It clothes with unexpected birth
My cold bare bosom: Oh! it must be thine
On mine, on mine!

Gazing on thee I feel, I know

Green stalks burst forth, and bright flowers grow, And living shapes upon my bosom move:

Music is in the sea and air,

Winged clouds soar here and there,

Dark with the rain new buds are dreaming of: 'Tis Love, all Love!

THE EARTH.

It interpenetrates my granite mass,

Through tangled roots and trodden clay doth

pass,

Into the utmost leaves and delicatest flowers;

Upon the winds, among the clouds 'tis spread,
It wakes a life in the forgotten dead,

They breathe a spirit up from their obscurest bowers.

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THE MOON.

The shadow of white death has past
From my path in heaven at last,
A clinging shroud of solid frost and sleep;
And through my newly-woven bowers,
Wander happy paramours,

Less mighty, but as mild as those who keep
Thy vales more deep.

THE EARTH.

As the dissolving warmth of dawn may fold A half unfrozen dew-globe, green, and gold, And crystalline, till it becomes a wingèd mist,

And wanders up the vault of the blue day, Outlives the noon, and on the sun's last ray Hangs o'er the sea, a fleece of fire and amethyst—

THE MOON.

Thou art folded, thou art lying
In the light which is undying

Of thine own joy, and heaven's smile divine;
All suns and constellations shower

On thee a light, a life, a power

Which doth array thy sphere; thou pourest thine
On mine, on mine!

THE EARTH.

I spin beneath my pyramid of night,
Which points into the heavens dreaming delight,
Murmuring victorious joy in my enchanted sleep;

As a youth lulled in love-dreams faintly sighing,
Under the shadow of his beauty lying,

Which round his rest a watch of light and warmth doth keep.

THE MOON.

As in the soft and sweet eclipse, When soul meets soul on lovers' lips, High hearts are calm, and brightest eyes are dull; So when thy shadow falls on me,

Then am I mute and still, by thee Covered; of thy love, Orb most beautiful, Full, oh, too full !

Thou art speeding round the sun
Brightest world of many a one;

Green and azure sphere which shinest

With a light which is divinest
Among all the lamps of Heaven
To whom life and light is given;
I, thy crystal paramour
Borne beside thee by a power
Like the Polar Paradise,
Magnet-like of lovers' eyes;
I, a most enamoured maiden
Whose weak brain is overladen
With the pleasure of her love,
Maniac-like around thee move
Gazing, an insatiate bride,
On thy form from every side
Like a Mænad, round the cup
Which Agave lifted up

In the weird Cadmæan forest.
Brother, wheresoe'er thou soarest
I must hurry, whirl and follow
Through the heavens wide and hollow,
Sheltered by the warm embrace
Of thy soul from hungry space,
Drinking from thy sense and sight
Beauty, majesty, and might,

As a lover or cameleon

Grows like what it looks upon,

As a violet's gentle eye

Gazes on the azure sky

Until its hue grows like what it beholds,

As a grey and watery mist
Glows like solid amethyst

Athwart the western mountains it enfolds,

When the sunset sleeps

Upon its snow

THE EARTH.

And the weak day weeps

That it should be so.

Oh, gentle Moon, the voice of thy delight
Falls on me like thy clear and tender light`
Soothing the seaman, borne the summer night,
Through isles for ever calm.

Prom. Unbound.