His house is in the mountain ways,
A phantom house of misty walls,
Whose golden flocks at evening graze,
And witch the moon with muffled calls.
Upwelling from his shadowy springs
Sweet waters shake a trembling sound,
There flit the hoot-owl's silent wings,
There hath his web the silkworm wound.
Dark in his pools clear visions lurk,
And rosy, as with morning buds,
Along his dales of broom and birk
Dreams haunt his solitary woods.
I met at eve the Prince of Sleep,
His was a still and lovely face,
He wandered through a valley steep,
Lovely in a lonely place.
LULLABY
Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul;
The little mouse cheeps plaintively,
The night-bird in the chestnut-tree—
They sing together, bird and mouse,
In starlight, in darkness, lonely, sweet,
The wild notes and the faint notes meet—
Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul.
Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul;
Amid the lilies floats the moth,
The mole along his galleries goeth
In the dark earth; the summer moon
Looks like a shepherd through the pane
Seeking his feeble lamp again—
Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul.
Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul;
Time comes to keep night-watch with thee,
Nodding with roses; and the sea
Saith "Peace! Peace!" amid his foam.
"O be still!"
The wind cries up the whispering hill—
Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul.
ENVOI
Child, do you love the flower
Ashine with colour and dew
Lighting its transient hour?
So I love you.