Collected Poems

Perigone Prologuises

Cool may you find the youngling grass, my herd,
Cool with delicious dew, while I here dream
And listen to the sweet and garrulous bird
That matches its cool note with Thea's stream.
Boon Zephyr now with waist ungirdled runs
And you, O luminous nurslings, wider blow,
O nurslings of light rain and vernal suns,

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When bounteous winds about the garden go.
Apt to my soul art thou, blithe honeyed moon,
O lovely mother of the rose-red June.
Zephyr that all things soothes, enhances all,
Dwells with thee softly, the near cuckoo drawn
To farther groves with sweet inviting call
And dewy buds upon the blossoming lawn.
But ah, today some happy soft unrest
Aspires and pants in my unquiet breast,
As if some light were from the day withdrawn,
As if the flitting Zephyr knew a lovelier word
Than it had spoken yet, and flower and bird
Kept still some grace that yet is left to bloom,
Had still a note I never yet have heard,
That, blossoming, would the wide air more illume,
That, spoken, would advance the sweet Spring's bounds
With large serener lights and joy of exquisite sounds.

Nor have I any in whose ears to tell
This gracious grief and so by words have peace,
Save the cold hyacinth in the breezy dell
And the sweet cuckoo in the sunlit trees
Since the sharp autumn days when with increase
Of rosy-lighted cheeks attained the ground
Weary of waiting and by wasps hung round
The bough's fair hangings and Thea fell with these,
My mother, with twelve matron summers crowned.
Four times since then the visits of green spring
Have blessed the hillsides with fresh blossoming
And four times has the winter chilled the brooks,
Since sole I dwell with my rude father cheered
By no low-worded speech or sunny looks.
Yet are we rich enough, fruitful our herd
And yields us brimming pails, and store we still
Numberless baskets with white cheese and fill
Our cave with fruits for winter, and since wide-feared
My father Sinnis, none have care our wealth to spoil.

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Therefore I pass sweet days with easy toil,
Nor other care have much but milk the kine
And call them out to graze in soft sunshine
And stall them when the evening-star grows large.
All else is pleasure, budded wreaths to twine
And please my soul beside my horned charge
And bathe in the delicious brook that speeds,
Iris and water-lily capped and green with reeds.

Nor need we flocks for clothing nor the shears;
For when the echoes in the mountain rocks
Mimic the groaning wain that moving peers
Between thick trees or under granite blocks,
Our needs my father takes, nor any yet
Scaped him who breaks the wrestler as these twines
Of bloom I break, so he with little sweat,
And tears the women with dividing pines.
Therefore thin gleaming robes and ruddy wines
We garner, flickering swords in jewelled case
And burning jewels and the beautiful gold
Whereof bright plenty now our caverns hold
And ornaments of utter exquisiteness.
But if these brilliants of their pleasure fail,
The lily blooms from vale to scented vale
And crocus lifts in Spring its golden fire.
Our midnight hears the warbling nightingale,
The cuckoo calls as he would never tire;
Along our hills we pluck the purple grapes,
And in the night a million stars arise
To watch us with their ancient friendly eyes.
Such flowering ease I have and earth's sweet shapes,
And riches, and the green and hived springs.
Ah then what longing wakes for new and lovelier things.

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