Page:Poems Dorr.djvu/317

In the unmeasured realms of space,
High as heaven, or deep as hell,
Thou dost lie what tongue can tell?
Send from out thy mystic portals
With the holy chrism to-day,
One of all thy high immortals
Who shall teach me what to say!

O beloveds, all the air
Was a faint, ethereal mist
Touched with rose and amethyst—
Glints of gold, and here and there
Purple 'splendors that were gone,
Like the glory of the dawn,
Ere one caught them. Soft and gray,
Lit by many a pearly ray,
Were the low skies bending dim
To the far horizon's rim;
And the landscape stretched away,
Fair, illusive, like a dream
Wherein all things do but seem!
There were mountains, but they rose
O'er the subtile vale's repose,
Light as clouds that far and high
Soar to meet the untroubled sky.
There were trees that overhead
Wide their sheltering branches spread,
Yet were empty as the shade
By the quivering vine-leaves made.
There were roses, rich with bloom,
Swinging censers of perfume
Sweet as fragrant winds of May
Blowing through spring's secret bowers;
Yet so phantom-like were they
That they seemed the ghosts of flowers.