The Dales of Arcady

by Dorothy Una Ratcliffe

THE DALES OF ARCADY

FIRST DAY

Hearken! The South Wind's voice.
My lover returns, and the valleys rejoice.
The bees fly upward to watch his flight,
The butterflies quiver with glad delight,
As he teasingly touches their jewelled wings.
O! at his bidding the whitethroat swings
In thrillant blue. A thrush's call
Blends with a blackbird's madrigal.

I steadily gazed at my silent pen,
Attempting to keep from my straying ken
An Eden of woods, of bosoming hills,
Of verdant hedges, of wandering rills.
How can one work
When a Lover amid the flowers will lurk?
He tip-toes in thro' the window-door,
And whisks my papers on to the floor;
With flower-steeped hands he caresses my hair,
And whispers alluringly,

"Fair, most Fair,
Slip your slender hand in mine, my Sweeting,
Hear! the skylarks cleave the blue with greeting,
Hear the blackcap on the thorn at even
Trill truths that echo to the highest heaven,
Leave your world of carking care, time-haunted,
For a country ever spring-enchaunted."

He leads me on to the dewy grass,
Where maiden primroses troop and pass;
With a gleesome kiss in his arms he swings
Me up 'twixt his eagle-wide rainbow wings:
Over a willowy coppice he goes
Flicking the hedges of milk-white sloes,
Over the blazon of heralding gorse,
Deftly he steers his ethereal course
Over anemone hillocks, o'er leas,
Hyacinth-dimpled, o'er buttercupped leas,
Over the ings where forget-me-not eyes
Borrow the blue of azureal skies;
Over the meadow-flats, higher and higher,
Sweeping the strings of the cloud-strung lyre.
The lilt of the planets is in mine ear,
Crystal dropping on crystal clear:
"O Wind, my Lover,
My mortal eyes must you surely cover:
Such beauty will make me beauty-blind,
Protect mine eyes, O my Lover Wind."
Then, as I lost my indrawn breath,
He swirled me down to the earth beneath,
Down thro' the depths of a forest of pine,
On to a carpet of celandine.
The goldcrests twittered, the squirrels chased,
While the lofty pines, brown arms enlaced,
Lisped a dryad-taught melody, sung by the sea.
Known in the valleys of Arcady.

For a little space did my Lover sleep,
While the gold-mailed sun with me did keep
A radiant watch; but when Eventide
In saffron-rose wrapped the woodland side,
He started up, and he kissed my neck,
Then, bidding me rise at his instant beck,
We passed where the sovran oak-trees nod,
Where never a human foot has trod,
Where birches sway in slenderest grace,
That never have seen a mortal's face;
Where rivulets hasten in sweet surprise,
A wonder beneath my wond'ring eyes;
A lakelet trembled beneath my glance,
The lily-white elfins ceased their dance;
A cherry-tree flung confetti down,
And framed for my head a loving crown.
Soft-toned bells
Called to each other across the fells.
While music played on a reeded flute
Stilled the air, and the birds were mute.

"O leaf-loving Zephyr, whence cometh the mirth
Of this melody? Owns my mothering Earth
A piper who pipes so alluringly
Of beauty that is, of beauty to be?
Onward! o'er thousands of blushet-shy daisies,
To find this piper of beautiful phrases."

'Mong flocks of goats, and of leaping lambs,
The piper sat. Two fierce-horned rams
Made a fleecy cushion whereon he sat,
And a sleeping ewe made a creamy mat
For his hoofed feet. His music ceased.
Green were his eyes, and they seemed well pleased
As they lit on our forms:

"O! Pan, great Pan!
This mortal thy kingdom of beauty would span,
And she would learn of the singing seasons'
Wonderful featness; of all the reasons.
The hill and the wood and the rippling rill
The air with different melodies fill;
Where bonnibel April latest was sent,
When May filled the world with her wonderment!
Who teaches the cuckoo his twin-bell call?
The opening notes of a festival
To jubilate the reign of the summer
Beauteous, queenliest, rosy-robed comer.
O Pan! I bring
A mortal whose soul is afire to sing."

Pan smiled—a smile like a twisted oak—
Then beckoned to me, while the forest spoke,
"Evoë, great Pan," sang the lark on high,
"Evoë, great Pan," from the uttermost sky;
I drew near and stood beside his knee:
He handed his reeded flute to me,
And kept his eyes, of a forest green,
On my trembling hands. O! well, I ween,
He knew that my amateur hands were weak,
For the spirit of me was meek, so meek,
And his green eyes glimmered with rising glee.
My masterful Lover whispered to me,
"Put your lips to the flute with mine,
Heedless of self-hood, in song be divine."
And placing near mine his golden-sweet mouth,
A rondeau he sang of the forest's youth.

Pan spoke at last: "Child! wander and learn
The lilt of the bird and the song of the burn:
And when thou hast learned from the burn and the bird
Thou'lt find me again" (the forest heart stirred).
"Hail! child from the plaintful Kingdom of Man."
The mountain-tops shouted, "Evoë, great Pan!"
The rivers sang deeply, "Evoë, great Pan!"
And whisperingly I, "Evoë, great Pan!"

SECOND DAY

The rose-trees show but a tuft of green
Where a stern, cold pruning-knife has been,
But they promise a summer of fragrant wealth:
How the small buds come to the light by stealth
Like pixies shy; yet a pruning knife
Leads every browny-bare branch to life.
Slowly I passed thro' the rustic gate,
Where wine-red roses will hold June fête;
The wind stole out from the blossoming row
Of the cherry-trees, and he whispered low:

"Are you content to be bound by a wall,
E'en tho' it boundeth things beautiful?
Tho' cherry and apple bloom over it fall,
Always it is, and it hath been, a wall.
'Tis true that thro' it there is a wicket,
But what can it know of the wild grown thicket
That grows where its pathway may never wander:
Out of this garden—the blue land yonder?"

And a cuckoo called; and the echo ran,
"Evoë, Evoë, Evoë, great Pan!"

Then my Lover lifted me up in his arms,
And swiftly arose. How the grey-roofed farms
Receded into the cup-like earth!
And I chanted a canzone of Springtime and Birth,
Which called o'er the sea to the firstling swallow,
Who flew beside us o'er height and hollow,
Till others came from their home of the Sun,
And the farm-folk cried, "Dear Summer's begun."
Hundreds and thousands followed our flight—
ALL ENGLAND WILL HAVE A SWALLOW TO-NIGHT.

By the old elm's portal of Arcady
My Lover alighted and whispered to me,
"O lily of laughter! O sister of flowers!
Wander alone in Arcadian bowers,
And I will return when the sun goes down,
And wing you home to your grey, grey town.
I kiss your little white hands and feet:
Farewell!" And he rose, on wings so fleet
Over the nests in the cradling larch,
Over the bow of the rainbow's arch.

Where conifers grow in fine profusion,
And birches quiver in sweet confusion,
Where hawthorn waits with a danseuse grace
To burst on the scene with her milk-white face,
And pirouette near some stately spruce,
Scattering around him pearly dews,
Where rabbits scamper thro' grasses lush,
And a pheasant's screech breaks the noon-day hush,
I journeyed on, till the sun began
His westering course.

"Evoë, great Pan!
Never a note of your pipings to-day
Has guided my steps thro' the sylvan way.
O! where must I seek in this Paradise?"
"Evoë, Evoë," a linnet sighs,
"Seek where the sisterly marshes are,
Where the marigold twinkles, a golden star,
Where willow and alder hide the river,
Where timid reed-warblers tremble and shiver."
The sky showed pink thro' the branches grey,
And then I heard, as if far away,
A tremulous song, a music of fears
That was strung together by trills of tears,
A quivering star glowed, curtained by leaves,
And the hullets called from some distant eaves.

I found Pan crouched by the river's edge,
His hoofed feet hid by the rushy sedge,
And I listened his plaint.

"O great god Pan,
You sing with the broken heart of a man!
Your song is of Syrinx, who, æons ago,
Escaped from your loving. Alas! that you know
The music of love, and the music of lack,
And you mourn for the hours that cannot come back,—
But I would learn of merrier things:
The melody murmurs of fluttering wings,
The secrets that fill the nightingaled glades,
The music that stirs in the leaf-colonnades."

He piped for a minute, then, turning to me,
With a wry, queer smile, said: "In Arcady
No song goes forth to the listening earth
That comes not thro' travail and tears to birth:
The river weeps as it leaves the fell,
And the note cries out as it mourns the bell;
The bird that praises the young, fair dawn,
Sings of his loss on the twilit lawn,
And those that hymn of the coming spring
Lament for her too, when she taketh wing.
The song of songs is of Death and of Love—
I sing of Syrinx, my own ... lost ... love."
He piped again, and the blue mists frail
Swayed in the dusk to the tender wail,
And I dreamed—till I felt on my damp, moist hair,
My Love's cool hand, and his whisper, "Fair,"
Then I felt his arms, and I knew the skies,
Whilst over the mountains I saw Dawn arise,
And another sweet day its course began,
While the hidden stars sang, "Evoë, great Pan!"
And the lark in the blue, "Evoë, great Pan!"
And wistfully I, "Evoë, great Pan!"