This is my palace, where
Great trunks are amber pillars to support
The blue roof of the vast and silent court,
In clustered columns fair:
And underneath, the bloom
Of water-lilies through the fragrant night
Of these dim arches spreads a perfumed light,
Even at highest noon.
Down dropping all day long,
With a most musical cadence in the hall,
A wandering stream lets its slow waters fall
In twinkling rhythmic song.
Hither the vagrant bee,
From the broad fields and sunshine all astray,
Loiters the idle hours of noon away,
In golden dreams like me.
And from my window frame,
This oriel window opening on the sky,
I see the white barques of the clouds drift by,
With prows of rosy flame.
Fantastical and strange,
Their purple sails go floating o'er the deep,
Like shadows through the summer land of sleep,
In never ending change.
The wild shy things which roam
The woods, and live in bough and tree and grot,
Flutter and chirp unscared, they fear me not,
For I too am at home.
And feel my heart in tune
With the great heart of Nature, and the voice
Of all the glad bright creatures that rejoice
In the green woods of June.
THE ISLE OF SLEEP.
In those dark mornings, deep in June,
When brooding birds stir in the nest,
And heavy dews slip down the leaves,
And drop into the rose's breast,
I woke and looked into the east,
And saw no sign of coming day,
The pale cold morning rolled in mist,
Slept on the hill-tops far away.