He came from a land whose shadows
Were brighter than our day;
And he sang of the streams and meadows,
And then he went away.
Now I turn from the heart that ever
Will moan for the clay behind;
When the soul is such glorious liver
In the boundless realms of mind.
So at night when the shadows grow dreary,
And a sorrow is in my breast,
And the wings of life grow weary,
And flutter as if for rest:
Then I open my little book-case,
When the quiet is breathing low,
And I take from the shelf in silence
A volume of long ago.
And I read and read by the firelight,
Till quick and clear as chimes
The man himself is with me,
And is talking to me in rhymes:
Talking of waving meadows
And cunningly-hidden brooks,
With the quietest gush of eddies
That the flowers may see their looks:
Babbling of summer and sunshine,
And hills that reach the cloud;
And this—all this in whispers,
For he never speaks aloud.
Then betimes when I shut the volume
To walk in the quiet street,
When the stars, which are shadows of angels,
Have made the silence sweet:
He follows me still like a presence
That none but spirits see;
And at every pause of my footstep
His music is speaking to me:
Whispers and speaks till the night-time
So trembles with all its tone
That I cannot but let my being
Move into the clasp of his own.
So whenever I lift the volume,
Like summer-beams that glow,
That spirit comes out from the silence
And babbles of long ago.