DREAMS.
Midst pastoral lands and purling recluse streams
There dwells the maiden queen of recreant dreams,
Gentian by name, a maid most wondrous fair,
With eyes like astral and her glorious hair,
Tangled with moonbeams, disputes the right
Of other garb to veil the beauteous sight.
Her skin, as white as Ida’s Cretean snow,
Outlines a form of soft voluptuous flow
Of grace majestic, contours fair to see,
Exquisite in their matchless symmetry;
While, crowning all, a sweet and noble grace
Marks every movement and o’erspreads her face.
And having this described this noctal flower,
The Muse will now define sweet Gentian’s power.
From out her bower of amaranthine hue
She peers with eyes of soft, exquisite blue,
And breathing gently, like a zephyr’s kiss,
Enjoys alone the core of perfect bliss.
Queen of a land, to every mortal given
A glimpse, at least, of what perchance is heaven;
Queen of a land of terror, shame and crime,
From life to death, and all that marketh time.
Queen of a land more wondrous than our own
Sweet Gentian reigns, and sways the realm alone.
Mistress of nations, every soul on earth
Becomes her vassal at the hour of birth.
Kings are her subjects, as the peasant boy,
And brilliant minds with her a fancy toy.
Once steeped in sleep, all minds become as one,
For Gentian’s spell o’er man has then begun.
No longer cares of base terrestrial clay
Torment the soul with visions of the day.
Earth is no more, the river crossed is deep,
Man dies each time his head is bowed in sleep,
And Gentian paints the sphere to suit her mind
Capricious as the sex of womankind.
Now steeped in bliss she leads the love-sick swain
And gives the kiss for which he sighed in vain.
The maid who but that morn his glances fled
Caresses lovingly his restless head.
The hapless poet who is lost to fame
Hears in his sleep his own illustrious name,
And, laurel crowned, looks back with scornful eye
Into a past of mean obscurity.
The ship-wrecked boy on some far distant shore
In happy dreamland sees his home once more,
His mother’s face aglow with pride and joy
As to her breast she clasps her sailor boy,
And summer seas beat on the golden sand
That forms the shore of Gentian’s wonderland.
The ruined merchant’s heart again grows light,
As fortune smiles on him at dead of night,
And sheriff’s sales and judgment notes confessed
No longer break the weary toiler’s rest.
Proudly he says, “My word is now my bond,”
And coins the yellow dross with Gentian’s wand.
The holy man, by church ordained a priest,
In dreams partaketh of the merry feast,
And sparkling glances when the hour is late
Make roguish havoc with the celibate.
“Avaunt!” he cries, “such joys are not for me.”
And wakes in prayer upon his bended knee.
The scientist retires with addled brain
To dream his fretful genius o’er again,
When from Cimmerian darkness breaks a light
The Atlantic bridged bursts on his ’stonished sight.
And then his mind is turned to stranger things,
As up he soars on his invented wings.
Begrimed with coal, the miner goes to rest
And sharp-drawn breaths inflate his manly chest.
Sudden, the clothes are rudely thrust aside,
His eyes with terror now stand open wide;
The roof is falling, God! the whole mine shakes!
A loud explosion, ’tis a dream, he wakes.
A little elf, a girl, a tiny tot,
With waxen face, indents the baby cot,
And visions fair regale her infant sight
Of cakes and candy through the silent night.
Sleep, little angel, Gentian marks thy worth,
A sleeping child, the sweetest thing on earth.
’Midst dirt and filth, at night the city gloom
Steals weird and sickly to a garret room,
Where, breathing hard upon a mattress bare,
A girlish form is outlined sleeping there.
One of the lost, polluted, base, defiled,
Yet once she slept, a little angel child.
And now she moves, sweet Gentian enters in,
And she is pure again and free from sin.
The dry, parched lips with innocence now speak,
And balmy breezes fan the fevered cheek.
The little white-washed cottage standeth near
And mother’s voice sounds sweetly on her ear,
While from the fields the scent of new mown hay
Comes strong and lusty at the close of day.
Her little sisters and her brothers wait
For her to join them at the garden gate,
And in her sleep her laugh is undefiled,
For she is once again a little child.
The anxious farmer sees his fallow land
Yield heavy crops beneath the reaper’s hand,
And barren orchards bend beneath the weight
Of golden fruit, ’twas joy to cultivate.
No landlord’s agent doth his peace invade.
He dreams of ownership, and taxes paid.
The country parson turns and twists in bed,
As mighty thoughts run rampant through his head.
He mounts the village pulpit wreathed in smiles,
And proudly gazes down the crowded aisles.
Forgot is life, with its unvarnished views
And vault-like echoes from the empty pews,
The church is filled, his lips now move in prayer,
And touched is every heart that’s gathered there.
Not satisfied, his sermon follows next,
And from a flower he takes his simple text.
Now thrills his audience with his eloquence,
And marvels greatly at his common sense;
And as he speaks with love of our dear Lord,
He sees ahead his well-earned, just reward.
A scholar, preacher, helper of the sick,
He gets at last a lawn-sleeved bishopric,
But soon as he the pastoral crosier takes,
The country parson to himself awakes.
The hapless monarch on his bed of down
No longer sinks beneath the jeweled crown;
His mind expands with liberty of thought,
And heart proclaims his king-ship dearly bought.
In sleep alone, his deep-drawn sighs confess
His heart’s desire, domestic happiness.
“Domestic happiness,” sweet Gentian sings,
“Belongs to laborers, and not to kings.”
And so she bids us with a graceful ease
Assume a virtue of some dread disease,
Which pleases best the tricky fairy’s mind,
Who hurts so much and yet can be so kind.
Well do we know how perfect is her will
Who makes us love the rival we would kill,
Or vice versa, which more awful seems
She makes us kill our rival in our dreams.
Ah! gentle Gentian, what a power is thine,
To be so cruel and yet so divine.