I can not say how much I love thee, words,
Like wearied petrels, fall on shoreless seas.
But O! I love thee! Simple words of these
Float on the stormy soul, like halcyon birds,
With speechless calm. A golden zone engirds
The thee and me in worlds of nameless ease,
And promise fairer far than Æetes'.
No clouds there tempest tost, but phantom herds
Of golden fleece feed in the fields of blue,
And sunny harbors lull the freighted ships
Of tender song, the while thine hero woo,
For aye sweet message from thine honeyed lips;
Or catch some music from thy spheres above thee,—
A song of songs to tell how dear I love thee.

THE STORM KING

The storm-king playeth his organ tonight—
O! weep for the mortals that heareth at sea!
The King of the storm! What god in his might,
May still the dread music, or silence the key?
The lightning, the thunder, the rain, and the blast—
How he driveth each note to its ultimate goal!
And the roll of dead worlds in the infinite vast,
How they roll in his soul, in his madness of soul!
The lightning, the thunder, the blast, and the rain—
How he playeth each note for its ultimate soul!
'Til his caverns great center grows blacker again,
With the deep where his musics great nebulas roll!
And grandeur, mad grandeur, the sweep of his song,
The raging and lurid storm grandeur of night,
Till the Souls of the Ages, to him but a throng,
Of beetling black nebula, crash in their flight.
How he laugheth, and laugheth, this maddest of Kings!
How he rageth, and rendeth his organ assunder!
Now soaring, now crashing to nethermost springs—
The maddest of music but never a blunder.
For he smiteth the sea, and he teareth the land,
And never a prayer but he laugheth to scorn!
A King and a God—should he render less grand
For sake of the ghoul haunted beeches of morn?

THE BIRTH OF FANCY

I dreamed, and ah! the dream was sweeter far,
Than any dream of cloud-born poet ever;
Or love-lorn maiden praying to a star
On Agne's Eve. I thought a glorious quiver,
Of ecstasy was trembling, full with tears,
Deep in the eyes of a maternal thought,
And Time, beyond the outposts of the years,
Was hushed expectant, all of wonder fraught.
For Fancy cradled in a golden cloud
Had risen in a dream of boundless glory,—
While on his brow his soul had overflowed,
And swiftly scaled a purple promontory.
Then back again, in speed as dreamy fleet,
And laid a snow-white feather at my feet.