The Triumph of Music, and Other Lyrics. Madison Julius Cawein

And one's mouth with wild honey was lipped.

IN THE SOUTH.

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[Serenade.]

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      The dim verbena drugs the dusk

       With heavy lemon odors rare;

       Wan heliotropes Arabian musk

       Exhale into the dreamy air;

       A sad wind with long wooing husk

       Swoons in the roses there.

      The jasmine at thy casement flings

       Star-censers oozing rich perfumes;

       The clematis, long petaled, swings

       Deep clusters of dark purple blooms;

       With flowers like moons or sylphide wings

       Magnolias light the glooms.

      Awake, awake from sleep!

       Thy balmy hair,

       Unbounden deep on deep,

       Than blossoms fair,

       Who sweetest fragrance weep,

       Will fill the night with prayer.

       Awake, awake from sleep!

      And dreaming here it seems to me

       Some dryad's bosoms grow confessed

       Nude in the dark magnolia tree,

       That rustles with the murmurous West—

       Or is it but a dream of thee

       That thy white beauty guessed?

      In southern heavens above are rolled

       A million feverish gems, which burst

       From night's deep ebon caskets old,

       With inner fires that seem to thirst;

       Tall oleanders to their gold

       Drift buds where dews are nursed.

      Unseal, unseal thine eyes,

       Where long her rod

       Queen Mab sways o'er their skies

       In realms of Nod!

       Confessed, such majesties

       Will fill the night with God.

       Unseal, unseal thine eyes!

PAN.

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      Haunter of green intricacies,

       Where the sunlight's amber laces

       Deeps of darkest violet;

       Where the ugly Satyr chases

       Shining Dryads, fair as Graces,

       Whose lithe limbs with dew are wet;

       Piper in hid mountain places,

       Where the blue-eyed Oread braces

       Winds which in her sweet cheeks set

       Of Aurora rosy traces,

       Whiles the Faun from myrtle mazes

       Watcheth with an eye of jet:

       What art thou and these dim races,

       Thou, O Pan! of many faces,

       Who art ruler yet?

      2

      Tell me, piper, have I ever

       Heard thy hollow syrinx quiver

       Trickling music in the trees?

       Where dark hazel copses shiver,

       Have I heard its dronings sever

       The warm silence, or the bees?

       Ripple murmurings, that never

       Could be born of fall or river,

       Whisperings and subtleties,

       Melodies so very clever,

       None can doubt that thou, the giver,

       Master Nature's keys.

      3

      What glad awes of storm are given

       Thy mad power, which has striven—

       Where the craggy forests glare—

       In wild mockery, when Heaven

       Splits with thunder wedges driven

       Red through night and rainy air!

       What art thou, whose presence, even

       While its fear the heart hath riven,

       Heals it with a prayer?

PAX VOBISCUM.

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      Her violets in thine eyes

       The Springtide stained I know,

       Two bits of mystic skies

       On which the green turf lies,

       Whereon the violets blow.

      2

      I know the Summer wrought

       From thy sweet heart that rose,

       With that faint fragrance fraught,

       Its sad poetic thought

       Of peace and deep repose.

      3

      That Autumn, like some god,

       From thy delicious hair—

       Lost sunlight 'neath the sod

       Shot up this golden-rod

       To toss it everywhere.

      4

      That Winter from thy breast

       The snowdrop's whiteness stole—

       Much kinder than the rest—

       Thy innocence confessed,

       The pureness of thy soul.

MIRABILE DICTU.

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      There lives a goddess in the West,

       An island in death-lonesome seas;

       No towered towns are hers confessed,

       No castled forts and palaces.

       Hers, simple worshipers at best,

       The buds, the birds, the bees.

      And she hath wonder-worlds of song

       So heavenly beautiful, and shed

       So sweetly from her honeyed tongue,

       The savage creatures, it is said,

       Hark marble-still their wilds among,

       And nightingales fall dead.

      I know her not, nor have I known;