Of elfin chivalry, that, helmed with gold, Invisible march, making a twinkling sound.-- What brought thee here?--this wind, that steals the old Gray legends from the forests and around Whispers them now? Or, in those purple weeds The hermit brook so busy with his beads?-- Lulling the silence with his prayers all day, Droning soft _Aves_ on his rosary Of bubbles.--Or, that butterfly didst mark On yon hag-taper, towering by the way, A witch's yellow torch?--Or didst, like me, Watch, drifting by, these curled, brown bits of bark?
Or con the slender gold of this dim, still Unmoving minnow 'neath these twisted roots, Thrust o'er the smoky topaz of this rill?-- Or, in this sunlight, did those insect flutes, Sleepy with summer, drowsily forlorn, Remind thee of Tithonos and the Morn? Until thine eyes dropped dew, the dimpled stream Crinkling with crystal o'er the winking grail?-- Or didst perplex thee with some poet plan To drug this air with beauty to make dream,-- Presence unseen, still watching in yon vale!-- Me, wildwood-wandered from the haunts of man!
Now let us forth to find the young witch Spring, Seated amid her bow'rs and birds and buds, Busy with loveliness.--And, wandering Among old forests that the sunlight floods, Or vales of hermit-holy solitudes, Dryads shall beckon us from where they cling, Their limbs an oak-bark brown; their hair--wild woods Have perfumed--wreathed with earliest leaves: and they, Regarding us with a dew-sparkling eye, Shall whispering greet us, as the rain the rye, Or from wild lips melodious welcome fling, Like hidden waterfalls with winds at play.
Let us surprise the Naiad ere she slips-- Nude at her toilette--in her fountain's glass; With damp locks dewy and evasive hips, Cool-dripping, but an instant seen, alas! When from indented moss and plushy grass-- Fear in her great eyes' rainbow-blue--she dips, Irised, the cloven water; as we pass Making a rippled circle that shall hide, From our exploring eyes, what watery path She gleaming took; what crystal haunt she hath In minnowy freshness, where her murmurous lips, Bubbling, make merry 'neath the rocky tide.
Then we may meet the Oread, whose eyes Are dewdrops where twin heavens shine confessed: She, all the maiden modesty's surprise Rosying her temples,--to slim loins and breast Tempestuous, brown, bewildering tresses pressed,-- Shall stand a moment's moiety in wise Of some delicious dream, then shrink, distressed, Like some wild mist that, hardly seen, is gone, Footing the ferny hillside without sound; Or, like storm sunlight, her white limbs shall bound, A thistle's instant, towards a woody rise, A flying glimmer o'er the dew-drenched lawn.