Noel! Noel! Through the valley Where the river goes In and out between the meadows, Soft the music flows, And the river, dumbly sleeping, Feels its cold heart beat Answering to the pulsing rhythm Of the anthem sweet.
Noel! Noel! Hark! a rustling On the frosty air, Where the aspens, all a-quiver, Bend their branches bare; Airy birches, stately maples, Black against the sky, Wave their leafless boughs like banners When a king goes by.
Noel! Noel! Sweet-breathed oxen, In the farm-yard close, Lift their horned heads to listen, Startled from repose; Then they sleep as slept the white flocks On Judea’s hills, While again the olden glory Earth with rapture fills.
Noel! Noel! Little children In their soft nests smile, Dreaming of fair choiring angels Floating near the while; Voiceless snow-birds, half awakened, Stir their drowsy wings With, mayhap, a vague, unconscious Sense of heavenly things.
Noel! Noel! In the church-yard, Where the low graves lie, Light winds bear the strains melodious, Soft as spirit’s sigh; Do ye hear it, O ye sleepers, As it dies and swells? Hear your ears the mystic music Of earth’s Christmas bells?
MY LADY SLEEP
In cool gray cloisters walks my Lady Sleep, Telling her smooth beads slowly, one by one; Along the wall the stealthy shadows creep; Night holds the world in thrall, and day is done.
Sometimes, while winds sigh soft above her head, Down the long garden path my Lady strays, And kneeling by the pansies’ purple bed, Counts the small faces in the moonlit haze.
Sometimes she lies upon the silver sands, Following the sea-birds, as they wheel and dip; Or idly clasps, in still persistent hands, The shining grains that through her fingers slip.
Or paces long, with flowing locks all wet, Where the low thunder booms forevermore, And the great waves no man hath numbered yet, Roll, one by one, to break upon the shore.