Thirty Poems/The Constellations
THE CONSTELLATIONS.
Oh, Constellations of the early nightThat sparkled brighter as the twilight died,And made the darkness glorious! I have seenYour rays grow dim upon the horizon's edge,And sink behind the mountains. I have seenThe great Orion, with his jewelled belt,That large-limbed warrior of the skies, go downInto the gloom. Beside him sauk a crowdOf shining ones. I look in vain to findThe group of sister-stars, which motherslove To show their wondering babes, the gentle Seven. Along the desert space mine eyes in vainSeek the resplendent cressets which the TwinsUplifted in their ever-youthful handsThe streaming tresses of the Egyptian QueenSpangle the heavens no more. The Virgin trailsNo more her glittering garments through the blue.Gone! all are gone! and the forsaken Night,With all her winds, in all her dreary wastes,Sighs that they shine upon her face no more. Now only here and there a little starLooks forth alone. Ah me! I know them not,Those dim successors of the numberless hostThat filled the heavenly fields, and flung to earthTheir quivering fires. And now the middle watchBetwixt the eve and morn is past, and stillThe darkness gains upon the sky, and stillIt closes round my way. Shall, then, the night, Grow starless in her later hours! Have theseNo train of flaming watchers, that shall markTheir coming and farewell! Oh Sons of Light!Have ye then left me ere the dawn of dayTo grope along my journey sad and faint? Thus I complained, and from the darkness roundA voice replied—was it indeed a voice,Or seeming accents of a waking dreamHeard by the inner ear? But thus it said:Oh, Traveller of the Night! thine eyes are dimWith watching; and the mists, that chill the valeDown which thy feet are passing, hide from viewThe ever-burning stars. It is thy sightThat is so dark, and not the heavens. Thine eyes,Were they but clear, would see a fiery hostAbove thee; Hercules, with flashing mace,The Lyre with silver chords, the Swan uppoised On gleaming wings, the Dolphin gliding onWith glistening scales, and that poetic steed,With beamy mane, whose hoof struck out from earthThe fount of Hippocrene, and many more,Fair clustered splendors, with whose rays the NightShall close her march in glory, ere she yield,To the young Day, the great earth steeped in dew. So spake the monitor, and I perceivedHow vain were my repinings, and my thoughtWent backward to the vanished years and allThe good and great who came and passed with them,And knew that ever would the years to comeBring with them, in their course, the good and great,Lights of the world, though, to my clouded sight,Their rays might seem but dim, or reach me not.