THE SPRING NIGHT
The night sang softly, and the sound of early grass and spring-tide rains
In harmony was blended with her melancholy strains;
On high, the stars, bright chalices unbounded,
Breathed the heavy scent of plants, that grow upon no earthly soil,
And my brothers' hands, as if in death, lay crossed upon their breast,
Lay in silence and delusion, e'en as they were stone-oppressed,
Asunder cleft by toil.
But their spirit hands unto the stars were clasped,
A myriad souls upon the earth and all the worlds they grasped,
And a long sigh of glad awakenings.
The festive surging of the town that ne'er shall die,
The rustle of spirit pinions, the play of the winds in a mystic lea,
The opening strains of orchestras, that none may see,
To the rhythm of their secret gesture rose on high.
