Even at their fairest still I love the less
The blossoms of the garden than the blooms
Won by the mountain climber: theirs the tints
And forms that most delight me,—theirs the charm
That lends an aureole to the azure heights
Whereon they flourish, children of the dews
And mountain streamlets.
But in sleep sometimes
...
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Olympian sunlight is the Poet’s sphere;
Yet of his rapt unconscious thought at play
The wintry stream gave image but to-day,
When first the frost his magic made appear;
The darkling water dreamed, and mirrored clear,
A thousand miles adown, the clouds’ array,
Nor any gleam or stirring did betray
The secret of the transformation near—... -
In the loud waking world I come and go,
And yet the twofold gates of dreams are mine;
I have seen the battle-lightnings round me shine,
And won the stillness of Hawaiian snow;
The votary’s sad surrender do I know;
Joy have I had of passion and of wine;
Nor shines the light of poesy less divine
Though science’s white cressets round me glow...