PERCHANCE our inward world may partly be
But outward Nature's fine epitome;
Now, o'er it floats some cloud of tender pain
Too frail to hold the sad reserves of rain;
And now behold some breezy impulse run
O'er Thought's bright surface, glittering in the sun;
Whereon, like birds, the flocks of fancy throng,
And all is peace and sweetness, light and song:
Anon, dim moods like shadowy woodlands rise
As 'twere between the spirit's earth and skies:
All fair suggestions, hints of twilight grace,
Safe harborage seek within the spellbound space;
Music is there, low laughter, and the sound
Of fairy voices, echoing gently round
The cool recesses of the veilèd mind:
While on the surge of memory's phantom wind,
Ghosts of dead loves, swathed in a silvery mist
Pass by us; and the lips our lips had kissed,
In youth's glad prime, unutterable things
Whisper, through wafts of visionary wings.
Ah, yes! our inward world but mirrors true,
This outward world of sense;--it hath its dew,
Its sunshine, and fresh roses, white and red;
It holds a tender moonlight over head;
The dews of yearning, mild, or fiery-bright,
The flowers of peace, or passion; the calm light
Of reasoning thought, and retrospection fine,
All merged in subtlest beauty--half divine!
It hath its mounts of vision, and its vales
Of contemplation, where fond nightingales,
Born of the brain, and 'gainst some thorns of woe,
Setting their breasts--but sing more sweetly so:
Fountains it owns of shyest fantasie;
Glad streams of inspiration, swift and free,
Rolling toward Thought's central ocean vast
Wherein all lesser forms of thought, at last
Sink, as the rivulets perish in a sea;--
Thus, rounded, whole, our spirit-landscapes be,
Our spirit-world thus perfect; over all,
No clouds of doubt hang, stiffing as a pall;
But if the soul be healthful, noble, high,
God's promise lights it, like a sleepless eye!
