Page:The Hundred Best Poems (lyrical) in the English language - second series.djvu/42

ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING

V.

"This is the way," laughed the great god Pan,

(Laughed while he sate by the river!)
"The only way since gods began
To make sweet music they could succeed."
Then, dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed,
He blew in power by the river.

VI.

Sweet, sweet, sweet, O Pan,

Piercing sweet by the river!
Blinding sweet, O great god Pan!
The sun on the hill forgot to die,
And the lilies revived, and the dragon-fly
Came back to dream on the river.

VII.

Yet half a beast is the great god Pan

To laugh, as he sits by the river,
Making a poet out of a man.
The true gods sigh for the cost and pain,—
For the reed that grows nevermore again
As a reed with the reeds in the river.

1860 Edition.

ROBERT BROWNING.

HEAP cassia, sandal-buds, and stripes
Of labdanum, and aloe-balls

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