The Poetical Works of William Motherwell/Spirits of Light! Spirits of Shade!
Spirits of Light!—Spirits of Shade!
Spirits of Light! Spirits of Shade!
Hark to the voice of your love-craz'd maid,
Who singeth all night so merrily,
Under the cope of the huge elm tree.
The snow may fall, and the bitter wind blow,
But still with love must her heart overflow.
The great elm tree is leafy and high,
And its topmost branch wanders far up in the sky;
It is clothed with leaves from top to toe;
For it loveth to hear the wild winds blow,—
The winds that travel so fast and free,
Over the land, and over the sea,
Singing of marvels continuously.
The moon on these leaves is shining ever,
And they dance like the waves of a gleaming river.
But, oft in the night,
When her smile shines bright,
With the cold, cold dew they shiver.
Oh, woe is me, for the suffering tree,
And the little green leaves that shiver and dream
In the icy moonbeam.
Oh, woe is me!
I would I were clad with leaves so green,
And grew like this elm, a fair forest queen;
Could shoot up ten fingers like branches tall,
Till the cold—cold dews would on me fall;
For to shiver is sweet when winds blow keen,
Or hoar frost powders the dreary scene.
And oh! I would like that my flesh could creep
With cold, as it was wont to do;
And that my heart, like a flower went to sleep,
When Winter his icy trumpet blew,
And shook o'er the wolds and moorland fells,
His crisping beard of bright icicles,
While his breath, as it swept adown the strath,
Smote with death the burn as it brawled on its path,
Stilled its tongue, and laid it forth
In a lily-white smock from the freezing north.
But woe, deep woe,
It is not so.
Spirits of Light! Spirits of Shade!
Hearken once more to your love-stricken maid
For, oh, she is sad as sad may be,
Pining all night underneath this tree,
Yet lacking thy goodly company.
She is left self-alone,
While the old forests groan,
As they hear, down rushing from the skies,
The embattled squadrons of the air,
Pealing o'er ridgy hills their cries
Of battle, and of fierce despair.
Through sunless valleys, deep and drear,
Hark, to their trumpets' brassy blare,
The tramp of steed, and crash of spear!
Nearer yet the strife sweeps on,
And I am left thus self-alone,
With never a guardian spirit near,
To couch for me a generous lance,
When the Storm-fiends madly prance
On their steeds of cloud and flame,
To work a gentle maiden shame,
Oh, misery!
I die; and yet I scorn to blame
Inconstancy.
All in this old wood,
They may shed my blood,
But false to my true love
I never can be.
Peace, breaking heart! it is not so,
For sweetly I hear your voices flow—
All your sad soft voices flow
Like the murmurs of the ocean,
Kissed by Zephyrs into motion;
And when shells have found a tongue
To sing, as they were wont to sing,
When this noble world was young;
And the sea formed love's bright ring,
And hearts found hearts in every thing.
Now the trees find apt replying,
To your music, with a sighing
That doth witch the owl to sleep;
And, waving their great arms to and fro,
They feel ye walk, and their heads they bow
In adoration deep.
And I, with very joy could now,
Like weakest infant weep,
That hath its humour, and doth go
With joy-wrung tears to sleep.
And now all the leaves that are sere and dry,
Noiselessly fall, like stars from the sky;
They are showering down on either hand,
A brown, brown burden upon the land.
And thus it will be with the love-stricken maid,
That loveth the Spirits of Light and Shade,
And whose thoughts commune with the spirits that write
The blue book of heaven with words of light.
And who bend down in love for her,
From their stately domes on high,
To teach her each bright character
That gleameth in her eye,
When the solemn night unrols
The vast map of the world of souls.
Oh, extacy! rapt extacy!
For a poor maiden of earth like me;
To have and hold
The spirits who shine like molten gold,
Eternally.
Beautiful Spirits! flee me not;
For this is the hour, and this is the spot,
Where we were wont of old to spell
The language of the star-filled sky;
And walk through heaven's own citadel,
With stately step and upcast eye,
And brows, on which were deeply wrought,
The fadeless prints of glorious thought.
Ye melt fast away in the dewy chill
O' the moonbeam, but yield to a maiden's will;
Take, ere ye vanish, this guerdon fair,
A long lock of her sun-bright hair;
It was shorn from temples that throbbed with pain,
As the fearful thought wandered through the brain.
That never again, as in days of yore,
It might be her hap to gather lore
From the dropping richness of liquid tones,
That fall from the lips of spiritual ones.
Scorn not my gift—Oh, it is fair,
As, streaming, it follows your course high in air;
And here is a brave and flaunting thing:—
A jolly green garland, braided well
With roses wild, and foxglove bell—
With sage, and rue, and eglantine—
With ivy leaf and holly green.
Three times it was dipped in a faery spring,
And three times spread forth in a faery ring,
When the dews fell thick and the moon was full;
And three times it clipped a dead man's skull—
And three times it lay pillowed under this cheek,
And lips that would, but could not speak,
Where its bloom was preserved, by tears freshly shed,
From a bursting heart's fond fountain head.
Take these gifts, then, ere ye go,
Or my heart will break with its weight of woe,
Oh, misery!
To love, and yet to be slighted so,
Sad misery.
Spirits of Light! Spirits of Shade!
Once more thus prays your love-stricken maid:
Dig out, and spread in the white moonshine,
A goodly couch for these limbs of mine;
Fast by the roots of this stately tree,
And three fathoms deep that couch must be.
And lightly strew o'er her the withered leaf;
Meet shroud for maiden mild 'twill prove;
And as it falls it will lull her grief,
With gentlest rustlings, breathing love.
Then choose a turf that is wondrous light,
And lap it softly o'er this breast;
And charge the dew-drops, large and bright,
On its green grass for ever to rest.
So that, like a queen, clad in gems, she may lie,
Right holily,
With hands crossed in prayer, gazing up to the sky,
Tranquilly,
Eternally.