Phantasies
(After Robert Schumann) I. Evening. Rest, beauty, stillness: not a waif of a cloud From gray-blue east sheer to the yellow west— No film of mist the utmost slopes to shroud. The earth lies grace, by quiet airs caressed, And shepherdeth her shadows, but each stream, Free to the sky, is by that glow possessed, And traileth with the splendors of a dream Athwart the dusky land. Uplift thine eyes! Unbroken by a vapor or a gleam, The vast clear reach of mild, wan twilight skies. But look again, and lo, the evening star! Against the pale tints black the slim elms rise, The earth exhales sweet odors nigh and far, And from the heavens fine influences fall. Familiar things stand not for what they are: What they suggest, foreshadow, or recall The spirit is alert to apprehend, Imparting somewhat of herself to all. Labor and thought and care are at an end: The soul is filled with gracious reveries, And with her mood soft sounds and colors blend; For simplest sounds ring forth like melodies In this weird-lighted air—the monotone Of some far bell, the distant farmyard cries, A barking dog, the thin, persistent drone Of crickets, and the lessening call of birds. The apparition of yon star alone Breaks on the sense like music. Beyond word The peace that floods the soul, for night is here, And Beauty still is guide and harbinger. II. Aspiration. Dark lies the earth, and bright with worlds the sky: That soft, large, lustrous star, that first outshone, Still holds us spelled with potent sorcery. Dilating, shrinking, lightening, it hath won Our spirit with its strange strong influence, And sways it as the tides beneath the moon. What impulse this, o'ermastering heart and sense? Exalted, thrilled, the freed soul fain would soar Unto that point of shining prominence, Craving new fields and some unheard-of shore, Yea, all the heavens, for her activity, To mount with daring flight, to hover o'er Low hills of earth, flat meadows, level sea, And earthly joy and trouble. In this hour Of waning light and sound, of mystery, Of shadowed love and beauty-veiled power, She feels her wings: she yearns to grasp her own, Knowing the utmost good to be her dower. A dream! a dream! for at a touch 't is gone. O mocking spirit! thy mere fools are we, Unto the depths from heights celestial thrown. From these blind gropings toward reality, This thirst for truth, this most pathetic need Of something to uplift, to justify, To help and comfort while we faint and bleed, May we not draw, wrung from the last despair, Some argument of hope, some blessed creed, That we can trust the faith which whispers prayer, The vanishings, the ecstasy, the gleam, The nameless aspiration, and the dream? III. Wherefore? Deep languor overcometh mind and frame: A listless, drowsy, utter weariness, A trance wherein no thought finds speech or name, The overstrained spirit doth possess. She sinks with drooping wing—poor unfledged bird, That fain had flown!—in fluttering breathlessness. To what end those high hopes that wildly stirred The beating heart with aspirations vain? Why proffer prayers unanswered and unheard To blank, deaf heavens that will not heed her pain? Where lead these lofty, soaring tendencies, That leap and fly and poise, to fall again, Yet seem to link her with the utmost skies? What mean these clinging loves that bind to earth, And claim her with beseeching, wistful eyes? This little resting-place 'twixt death and birth, Why is it fretted with the ceaseless flow Of flood and ebb, with overgrowth and dearth, And vext with dreams, and clouded with strange woe? Ah! she is tired of thought, she yearns for peace, Seeing all things one equal end must know. Wherefore this tangle of perplexities, The trouble or the joy? the weary maze Of narrow fears and hopes that may not cease? A chill falls on her from the skyey ways, Black with the night-tide, where is none to hear The ancient cry, the Wherefore of our days. IV. Fancies. The ceaseless whirr of crickets fills the ear From underneath each hedge and bush and tree, Deep in the dew-drenched grasses everywhere. The simple sound dispels the fantasy Of gloom and terror gathering round the mind. It seems a pleasant thing to breathe, to be, To hear the many-voiced, soft summer wind Lisp through the dark thick leafage overhead— To see the rosy half-moon soar behind The black slim-branching elms. Sad thoughts have fled, Trouble and doubt, and now strange reveries And odd caprices fill us in their stead. From yonder broken disk the redness dies, Like gold fruit through the leaves the half-sphere gleams, Then over the hoar tree-tops climbs the skies, Blanched ever more and more, until it beams Whiter than crystal. Like a scroll unfurled, And shadowy as a landscape seen in dreams, Reveals itself the sleeping, quiet world, Painted in tender grays and whites subdued— The speckled stream with flakes of light impearled, The wide, soft meadow and the massive wood. Naught is too wild for our credulity In this weird hour: our finest dreams hold good. Quaint elves and frolic flower-sprites we see, And fairies weaving rings of gossamer, And angels floating through the filmy air. V. In the Night. Let us go in: the air is dank and chill With dewy midnight, and the moon rides high O'er ghostly fields, pale stream, and spectral hill. This hour the dawn seems farthest from the sky So weary long the space that lies between That sacred joy and this dark mystery Of earth and heaven: no glimmering is seen, In the star-sprinkled east, of coming day, Nor, westward, of the splendor that hath been. Strange fears beset us, nameless terrors sway The brooding soul, that hungers for her rest, Out worn with changing moods, vain hopes' delay, With conscious thought o'erburdened and oppressed. The mystery and the shadow wax too deep; She longs to merge both sense and thought in sleep. VI. Faerie. From the oped lattice glance once more abroad While the ethereal moontide bathes with light Hill, stream, and garden, and white-winding road. All gracious myths born of the shadowy night Recur, and hover in fantastic guise, Airy and vague, before the drowsy sight. On yonder soft gray hill Endymion lies In rosy slumber, and the moonlit air Breathes kisses on his cheeks and lips and eyes. 'Twixt bush and bush gleam flower-white limbs, left bare, Of huntress-nymphs, and flying raiment thin, Vanishing faces, and bright floating hair. The quaint midsummer fairies and their kin, Gnomes, elves, and trolls, on blossom, branch, and grass Gambol and dance, and winding out and in Leave circles of spun dew where'er they pass. Through the blue ether the freed Ariel flies; Enchantment holds the air; a swarming mass Of myriad dusky, gold-winged dreams arise, Throng toward the gates of sense, and so possess The soul, and lull it to forgetfulness. VII. Confused Dreams. O strange, dim other-world revealed to us, Beginning there where ends reality, Lying 'twixt life and death, and populous With souls from either sphere! now enter we Thy twisted paths. Barred is the silver gate, But the wild-carven doors of ivory Spring noiselessly apart: between them straight Flies forth a cloud of nameless shadowy things, With harpies, imps, and monsters, small and great, Blurring the thick air with darkening wings. All humors of the blood and brain take shape, And fright us with our own imaginings. A trouble weighs upon us: no escape From this unnatural region can there be. Fixed eyes stare on us, wide mouths grin and gape, Familiar faces out of reach we see. Fain would we scream, to shatter with a cry The tangled woof of hideous fantasy, When, lo! the air grows clear, a soft fair sky Shines over head: sharp pain dissolves in peace; Beneath the silver archway quietly We float away: all troublous visions cease. By a strange sense of joy we are possessed, Body and spirit soothed in perfect rest. VIII. The End of the Song. What dainty note of long-drawn melody Athwart our dreamless sleep rings sweet and clear, Till all the fumes of slumber are brushed by, And with awakened consciousness we hear The pipe of birds? Look forth! The sane, white day Blesses the hilltops, and the sun is near. All misty phantoms slowly roll away With the night's vapors toward the western sky. The Real enchants us, the fresh breath of hay Blows toward us; soft the meadow-grasses lie, Bearded with dew; the air is a caress; The sudden sun o'ertops the boundary Of eastern hills, the morning joyousness Thrills tingling through the frame; life's pulse beats strong; Night's fancies melt like dew. So ends the song!
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