te and pearl moonstone,
On fluffy bird with wing aweary,--
Soft, dreaming child! 'tis her silver blown.

{59}

With lathe of viewless hyaline,
She shapes the shell and scale and fin,
Dropping unseen her pearls of moonlight,
And blushes all as her kith and kin.

Distaff of light is in her hand,
From which she spins the lily, and
The sendal robes of field and forest,
With dewy odors in every strand.

And from her snow-white palette's dyes
She paints the peacock's hundred eyes,
The robin's egg, the apple blossom,
And domes the world with her sapphire skies.

{60}

Her steps fall sweet as summer rain,
And lull to dream the thoughts of pain,--
O glowing grass, O violet skyey,
Ye hint of something of fairer grain!

She outruns sympathy of crowds;
Her dwelling is above the clouds;
She stoops to kiss the rose to crimson--
Her face no featureless mask enshrouds.

Her chatelaine's of amber fine;
No hue of coming autumn's wine
But she outpours from tawny beaker,
And fills each grape of the swelling vine.

{61}

Celestial sweetness swift outstrips
The light unleashed of its eclipse!--
A fire of dew burns in her bosom,
And steady glows through her eyes and lips.

She holds fair forms of ferns and seeds,
Lichens and fruits and burnished reeds,
And pours, in wake of mellow harvest,
Splendors of flame on the leaves and weeds.

O give, give me my own of that
Which sweeps and circles like the bat
Around me as I walk in ether,
O fair Divine, at whose feet I've sat!

{62}

Unnumbered traits shine in thy face,
Harmonious blent in Time and Space;
Ideal of form, of tone, of color,
Of thought, emotion, and deed, O Grace!

Ay me! I speak familiar words.
Thou art a presence of my Lord's!
Spirit of splendor, thou, O Beauty,
That lights His brow, and that crowns and girds.

O Christ, Thou bright Heaven's Morning Star,
In whom all live and move and are,
Thou Chiefest, altogether lovely,
Beauty in Time is Thy avatar!

{63}

The scarlet arch of evening fills
Heights o'er the vapor-laden hills
With brilliant samite robes that flutter
Something beneath that my spirit thrills.

O Infinite, and Whom I bless!
Glow of embodied perfectness!
O Sea of supersensuous Being,
Whose tides the unutterable express!

(This, this it was that Plato saw
O