Coventry Patmore (Ковентри Патмор (Пэтмор))
A Dream
Amid the mystic fields of Love I wander'd, and beheld a grove. Breathlessly still was part, and part Was breathing with an easy heart; And there below, in lamblike game, Were virgins, all so much the same, That each was all. A youth drew nigh, And on them gazed with wandering eye, And would have pass'd, but that a maid, Clapping her hands above her, said, ‘My time is now!’ and laughing ran After the dull and strange young man, And bade him stop and look at her. And so he call'd her lovelier Than any else, only because She only then before him was. And, while they stood and gazed, a change Was seen in both, diversely strange: The youth was ever more and more That good which he had been before; But the glad maiden grew and grew Such that the rest no longer knew Their sister, who was now to sight The young man's self, yet opposite, As the outer rainbow is the first, But weaker, and the hues reversed. And whereas, in the abandon'd grove, The virgin round the Central Love Had blindly circled in her play, Now danced she round her partner's way; And, as the earth the moon's, so he Had the responsibility Of her diviner motion. ‘Lo,’ He sang, and the heavens began to glow, ‘The pride of personality, Seeking its highest, aspires to die, And in unspeakably profound Humiliation Love is crown'd! And from his exaltation still Into his ocean of good-will He curiously casts the lead To find strange depths of lowlihead.’ To one same tune, but higher, ‘Bold,’ The maiden sang, ‘is Love! For cold On Earth are blushes, and for shame Of such an ineffectual flame As ill consumes the sacrifice!’
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Poems of other poets with the same name (Стихотворения других поэтов с таким же названием):
