White artist he, who, breezeless nights,
From tingling stars jocosely whirls,
A harlequin in spangled tights,
His wand a pot of pounded pearls.
The field a hasty pallet; for,
In thin or thick, with daub and streak,
It stretches from the barn-gate's bar
To the bleached ribbon of the creek.
A great geometer is he;
For, on the creek's diaphanous silk,
Sphere, cone, and star exquisitely
He's drawn in crystal lines of milk.
Most delicate, his talent keen
On casement panes he lavishes,
In many a Lilliputian scene
Of vague white hives and milky bees,
That sparkling in still swarms delight,
Or bow the jeweled bells of flowers;--
Of dim, deep landscapes of the night,
Hanging down limpid domes quaint showers
Of feathery stars and meteors
Above an upland's glimmering ways,
Where gambol 'neath the feverish stars
The erl-king and the fleecy fays.
Or last, one arabesque of ferns,
Chrysanthemums and mistletoe,
And death-pale roses bunched in urns
That with an innate glory glow.
In leafless woodlands saturnine,
Where reckless winds, like goblins mad,
Screech swinging in each barren vine,
His wagship shapes a lesson sad:
When slyly touched by his white hand
Of Midas-magic, forests old
Dariuses of pomp then stand
Barbaric-crowned with living gold....
Patrician state, plebeian blood
Soon foster sybarites, and they,
Squand'ring their riches, wood by wood,
Die palsied wrecks debauched and gray.
