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| THE LAWNS are bright, the paths are wide, | |
| The roses are bursting on every side. | |
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| All around the bowers are green, | |
| And the shining laurels a folding-screen. | |
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| The large fruit ripens on many a tree, | 5 |
| Purple and gold drooping heavily. | |
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| Of health and wealth a hidden spell | |
| Is scattered by hands invisible. | |
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| Young, and gladsome, and free they meet— | |
| Voices of laughter and running feet. | 10 |
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| Whether the seasons be dark or fair, | |
| It is always summer and sunshine there. | |
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| And like a fountain that springs and falls, | |
| There flows sweet music between the walls. | |
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| Among the guests one comes and goes | 15 |
| Whom no one sees and no one knows. | |
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| A neck more stately, a face more fair | |
| Than any that meet and mingle there. | |
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| There is heaped up many a gay sea-stone, | |
| One pearl lies among them all alone; | 20 |
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| With a golden halo all about, | |
| The full moon’s face from the clouds looks out; | |
| |
| All cold on the breast of the crimson sky, | |
| The star of the evening seems to lie. | |
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| Shining as pale, apart as far | 25 |
| As the pearl, or the moon, or the evening star, | |
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| That orbèd face, with its curvings rare, | |
| Floats out from its waves of dusky hair, | |
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| With its eyes of shadow, its archèd eyes, | |
| Whose lost looks dream upon Paradise. | 30 |
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| One only knoweth it in the throng; | |
| One knoweth too well, and knoweth too long. | |
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| The others are ever unaware, | |
| Though it pass and meet them in the air, | |
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| With sighs like the sighs of the summer night, | 35 |
| Breathing of love and of lost delight. | |
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| That haunting vision of yearning pain, | |
| One moment strikes and then fades again. | |
| |
| It rises up at the music’s sound, | |
| And sinks before they can look around. | 40 |
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| If they catch one sight of the crownèd brow, | |
| A sunbeam glances from bough to bough. | |
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| If a low voice thrills in the air along, | |
| It is but the dying note of the song. | |
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| Not to sadden, only to share, | 45 |
| To the feast unbidden that guest comes there. | |
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| Lovely as lilies ungathered, and white, | |
| The house is filled with a dream at night. | |
| |
| From chamber to chamber, from door to door, | |
| Not a sound is heard, nor step on the floor; | 50 |
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| Through the shadowy hush as white wings win;— | |
| Peace be to this house, and to all within! | |
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| The little children sleep soft and sweet;— | |
| Who stands beside them with soft white feet? | |
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| The soft white hands pass over their hair;— | 55 |
| Sleep on, dear children, so safe and fair! | |
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| Till, where two are sleeping side by side, | |
| Doth a dream at last between them glide. * * * * * | |
| Of all the angels that guard the place, | |
| The least is not that forgotten face. | 60 |
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