Collected Poems Volume I Part 22

_A fairy band are we In fairy-land: Singing march we, hand in hand; Singing, singing all day long: (Some folk never heard a fairy-song!)_

_Singing, singing, When the merry thrush is swinging On a springing spray; Or when the witch that lives in gloomy caves And creeps by night among the graves Calls a cloud across the day; Cease we never our fairy song, March we ever, along, along, Down the dale, or up the hill, Singing, singing still._

And suddenly the Hermit turned and ran with all his might Through the back-door of his parlour as we thought of little Peterkin; And the great grey roof was shattered by a shower of rosy light, And the spider-house went floating, torn and tattered through the night In a flight of prismy streamers, as a shout went up for Peterkin; And lo, the glistening fairy-host stood there arrayed for fight, In arms of rose and green and gold, to lead us on to Peterkin.

And all around us, rippling like a pearl and opal sea, The host of fairy faces winked a kindly hint of Peterkin; And all around the rosy glade a laugh of fairy glee Watched spider-streamers floating up from fragrant tree to tree Till the moonlight caught the gossamers and, oh we wished for Peterkin!

Each rope became a rainbow; but it made us ache to see Such a fairy forest-pomp without explaining it to Peterkin.

Then all the glittering crowd With a courtly gesture bowed Like a rosy jewelled cloud Round a flame, As the King of Fairy-land, Very dignified and grand, Stepped forward to demand Whence we came.

He'd a cloak of gold and green Such as caterpillars spin, For the fairy ways, I ween, Are very frugal; He'd a bow that he had borne Since the crimson Eden morn, And a honeysuckle horn For his bugle.

So we told our tale of faery to the King of Fairy-land, And asked if he could let us know the latest news of Peterkin; And he turned him with a courtly smile and waved his jewelled wand And cried, _Pease-blossom, Mustard-seed! You know the old command; Well; these are little children; you must lead them on to Peterkin._ Then he knelt, the King of Faery knelt; his eyes were great and grand As he took our hands and kissed them, saying, _Father loves your Peterkin!_

So out they sprang, on either side, A light fantastic fairy guide, To lead us to the land unknown Where little Peterkin was gone; And, as we went with timid pace, We saw that every fairy face In all that moonlit host was wet With tears: we never shall forget The mystic hush that seemed to fade Away like sound, as down the glade We pa.s.sed beyond their zone of light.

Then through the forest's purple night We trotted, at a pleasant speed, With gay Pease-blossom and Mustard-seed.

PART IV

PEASE-BLOSSOM AND MUSTARD-SEED

Shyly we surveyed our guides As through the gloomy woods we went In the light that the straggling moonbeams lent: We envied them their easy strides!

Pease-blossom in his crimson cap And delicate suit of rose-leaf green, His crimson sash and his jewelled dagger, Strutted along with an elegant swagger Which showed that he didn't care one rap For anything less than a Fairy Queen: His eyes were deep like the eyes of a poet, Although his crisp and curly hair Certainly didn't seem to show it!

While Mustard-seed was a devil-may-care Epigrammatic and pungent fellow Clad in a splendid suit of yellow, With emerald stars on his glittering breast And eyes that shone with a diamond light: They made you feel sure it would always be best To tell him the truth: he was not perhaps _quite_ So polite as Pease-blossom, but then who could be _Quite_ such a debonair fairy as he?

We never could tell you one-half that we heard And saw on that journey. For instance, a bird Ten times as big as an elephant stood By the side of a nest like a great thick wood: The clouds in glimmering wreaths were spread Behind its vast and shadowy head Which rolled at us trembling below. (Its eyes Were like great black moons in those pearl-pale skies.) And we feared he might take us, perhaps, for a worm.

But he ruffled his breast with the sound of a storm, And snuggled his head with a careless disdain Under his huge hunched wing again; And Mustard-seed said, as we stole thro' the dark, There was nothing to fear: it was only a Lark!

And so he cheered the way along With many a neat little epigram, While dear Pease-blossom before him swam On a billow of lovely moonlit song, Telling us why they had left their home In Sherwood, and had hither come To dwell in this magical scented clime, This dim old Forest of sweet Wild Thyme,

"Men toil," he said, "from morn till night With bleeding hands and blinded sight For gold, more gold! They have betrayed The trust that in their souls was laid; Their fairy birthright they have sold For little disks of mortal gold; And now they cannot even see The gold upon the greenwood tree, The wealth of coloured lights that pa.s.s In soft gradations through the gra.s.s, The riches of the love untold That wakes the day from grey to gold; And howsoe'er the moonlight weaves Magic webs among the leaves Englishmen care little now For elves beneath the hawthorn bough: Nor if Robin should return Dare they of an outlaw learn; For them the Smallest Flower is furled, Mute is the music of the world; And unbelief has driven away Beauty from the blossomed spray."

Then Mustard-seed with diamond eyes Taught us to be laughter-wise, And he showed us how that Time Is much less powerful than a rhyme; And that s.p.a.ce is but a dream; "For look," he said, with eyes agleam, "Now you are become so small You think the Thyme a forest tall; But underneath your feet you see A world of wilder mystery Where, if you were smaller yet, You would just as soon forget This forest, which you'd leave above As you have left the home you love!

For, since the Thyme you used to know Seems a forest here below, What if you should sink again And find there stretched a mighty plain Between each gra.s.s-blade and the next?

You'd think till you were quite perplexed!

Especially if all the flowers That lit the sweet Thyme-forest bowers Were in that wild transcendent change Turned to Temples, great and strange, With many a pillared portal high And domes that swelled against the sky!

How foolish, then, you will agree, Are those who think that all must see The world alike, or those who scorn Another who, perchance, was born Where--in a different dream from theirs-- What they call sins to him are prayers!

"We cannot judge; we cannot know; All things mingle; all things flow; There's only one thing constant here-- Love--that untranscended sphere: Love, that while all ages run Holds the wheeling worlds in one; Love that, as your sages tell, Soars to heaven and sinks to h.e.l.l."

Even as he spoke, we seemed to grow Smaller, the Thyme trees seemed to go Farther away from us: new dreams Flashed out on us with mystic gleams Of mighty Temple-domes: deep awe Held us all breathless as we saw A carven portal glimmering out Between new flowers that put to rout Our other fancies: in sweet fear We tiptoed past, and seemed to hear A sound of singing from within That told our souls of Peterkin: Our thoughts of _him_ were still the same Howe'er the shadows went and came, So, on we wandered, hand in hand, And all the world was fairy-land.

And as we went we seemed to hear Surging up from distant dells A solemn music, soft and clear As if a field of lily-bells Were tolling all together, sweet But sad and low and keeping time To mult.i.tudinous marching feet With a slow funereal beat And a deep harmonious chime That told us by its dark refrain The reason fairies suffered pain.

SONG

Bear her along Keep ye your song Tender and sweet and low: Fairies must die!

Ask ye not why Ye that have hurt her so.

_Pa.s.sing away--flower from the spray! Colour and light from the leaf!

Soon, soon will the year shed its bloom on her bier, and the dust of its dreams on our grief._

Men upon earth Bring us to birth Gently at even and morn!

When as brother and brother They greet one another And smile--then a fairy is born!

But at each cruel word Upon earth that is heard, Each deed of unkindness or hate, Some fairy must pa.s.s From the games in the gra.s.s And steal thro' the terrible Gate.

_Pa.s.sing away--flower from the spray! Colour and light from the leaf!

Soon, soon will the year shed its bloom on her bier, and the dust of its dreams on our grief._

If ye knew, if ye knew All the wrong that ye do By the thought that ye harbour alone, How the face of some fairy Grows wistful and weary And the heart in her cold as a stone!

Ah, she was born Blithe as the morn Under an April sky, Born of the greeting Of two lovers meeting.

They parted, and so she must die.

_Pa.s.sing away--flower from the spray! Colour and light from the leaf!

Soon, soon will the year shed its bloom on her bier, and the dust of its dreams on our grief._

Cradled in blisses, Yea, born of your kisses, Oh, ye lovers that met by the moon, She would not have cried In the darkness and died If ye had not forgotten so soon.

Cruel mortals, they say, Live for ever and aye, And they pray in the dark on their knees.

But the flowers that are fled And the loves that are dead, What heaven takes pity on these?

_Bear her along--singing your song--tender and sweet and low!

Fairies must die! Ask ye not why--ye that have hurt her so._

Pa.s.sing away-- Flower from the spray!

Colour and light from the leaf!

Soon, soon will the year Shed its bloom on her bier And the dust of its dreams on our grief.

Then we came through a glittering crystal grot By a path like, a pale moonbeam, And a broad blue bridge of Forget-me-not Over a shimmering stream, To where, through the deep blue dusk, a gleam Rose like the soul of the setting sun; A sunset breaking through the earth, A crimson sea of the poppies of dream, Deep as the sleep that gave them birth In the night where all earthly dreams are done.

And then, like a pearl-pale porch of the moon, Faint and sweet as a starlit shrine, Over the gloom Of the crimson bloom We saw the Gates of Ivory shine; And, lulled and lured by the lullaby tune Of the cradling airs that drowsily creep From blossom to blossom, and lazily croon Through the heart of the midnight's mystic noon, We came to the Gates of the City of Sleep.

Faint and sweet as a lily's repose On the broad black breast of a midnight lake, The City delighted the cradling night: Like a straggling palace of cloud it rose; The towers were crowned with a crystal light Like the starry crown of a white snowflake As they pierced in a wild white pinnacled crowd, Through the dusky wreaths of enchanted cloud That swirled all round like a witch's hair.

And we heard, as the sound of a great sea sighing, The sigh of the sleepless world of care; And we saw strange shadowy figures flying Up to the Ivory Gates and beating With pale hands, long and famished and thin; Like blinded birds we saw them dash Against the cruelly gleaming wall: We heard them wearily moan and call With sharp starved lips for ever entreating The pale doorkeeper to let them in.

And still, as they beat, again and again, We saw on the moon-pale lintels a splash Of crimson blood like a poppy-stain Or a wild red rose from the gardens of pain That sigh all night like a ghostly sea From the City of Sleep to Gethsemane.

And lo, as we neared the mighty crowd An old blind man came, crying aloud To greet us, as once the blind man cried In the Bible picture--you know we tried To paint that print, with its Eastern sun; But the reds and the yellows _would_ mix and run, And the blue of the sky made a horrible mess Right over the edge of the Lord's white dress.

And the old blind man, just as though he had eyes, Came straight to meet us; and all the cries Of the crowd were hushed; and a strange sweet calm Stole through the air like a breath of the balm That was wafted abroad from the Forest of Thyme (For it rolled all round that curious clime With its magical clouds of perfumed trees.) And the blind man cried, "Our help is at hand, Oh, brothers, remember the old command, Remember the frankincense and myrrh, Make way, make way for those little ones there; Make way, make way, I have seen them afar Under a great white Eastern star; For I am the mad blind man who sees!"

Then he whispered, softly--_Of such as these_; And through the hush of the cloven crowd We pa.s.sed to the gates of the City, and there Our fairy heralds cried aloud-- _Open your Gates; don't stand and stare; These are the Children for whom our King Made all the star-worlds dance in a ring!_