Wake, love; Aurora's breath has tinged the sky,
Mounting in faintly flushing shafts on high
To tell the world that Phœbus is at hand;
And all the hours in a glittering band
Cluster around in sweeping, circling flight
Like angels bathing in celestial light.
See, now with one great shaft of molten gold,
No longer vaporous haze around him rolled,
The King of Day mounts the ethereal height,
Scattering the last dim streamers of the night.
Bow down, ye Persians, on your altared hills;
Worship the Sun-god who gives life, and fills
Your horn with plenteous blessings from on high.
Wake! Wake! before the dawning sunbeams die!
Fling incense on your temple's dying flame;
Sing chants and chorals in his mighty name,
For as a weary traveler from afar,
Or as a sailor on the harbor bar
After long absence spies his native town,
So, with benignant brilliance smiles he down;
Or, like a good king ruling o'er his land,
He sprinkles blessings with a bounteous hand.
And thou, O my beloved, wake! arise!
Has not the sun illumined night's dull skies?
Come, Phœbus' breath has tinged the summer morn.
Come, see the light shafts waver 'mong the corn.
Come, see the early lily's opening bloom.
Come, see the wavering light expel the gloom
From yon dark vale still sunk in misty night.
Oh, watch the circling skylark's heavenward flight,
As, wrapped in hazy waves of shimmering light,
In one grand Jubilate to the sun,
He floods the sky with song of day begun.
But golden morn is never truly fair
Unless with day, thou com'st to weave my hair
With perfumed flowers gathered in the dell
Where sylphs sing sweetly 'bout the bubbling well.
Oh, fill my cup of pleasure with new wine
Which sparkles only where thy soft eyes shine!
O my beloved, haste thee to arise
Before the light has scorched the noonday skies!
The fleeting hours haste the falling sun;
And soon the hour-glass of life is run.
August 5 & 6, 1911. |