X. THE JUBILEE
"Master of your wounded heart, regent of your pleasure!
We that long defied your art, tamèd Moods at leisure,
All with you, nor now apart, would tread out our measure."
"Welcome, equal powers benign, quit of ancient madness!
Dance with me beneath the vine, not ungentle Sadness;
Link your little hand in mine soberly, my Gladness."
[Winter Boughs]
How tender and how slow, in sunset cheer,
Far on the hill, our quiet treetops fade!
A broidery of ebon seaweed, laid
Long in a book, were scarce more fine and clear.
Frost and sad light and windless atmosphere
Have breathed on them, and of their frailties made
Beauty more sweet than summer's builded shade,
Whose green domes fallen, leave this wonder here.
O ye forgetting and outliving boughs,
With not a plume, gay in the joust before,
Left for the Archer! so, in evening's eye,
So stilled, so lifted, let your lover die,
Set in the upper calm no voices rouse,
Stript, meek, withdrawn, against the heavenly door.
[W.H.]
A.D. MDCCLXXVIII-MDCCCXXX