That Night

That night I sat listening, as in a swoon,
With half-closed eyes,
To far-off bells, low-lulling as a tune
That drifts and dies
Beneath the flowery fingers of the June
Harping to summer skies.

And then I dreamed the world I knew was gone,
And some one brought,--
Leading me far o'er sainted hill and lawn,
In heavenly thought,--
My soul where well the sources of the dawn
With dew and fire fraught.

Above me the majestic dome of night,
With star on star,
Sparkled; in which one star shone blinding bright;
Radiant as spar
That walls the halls of morning, pearly white
Around her golden car.

About me temples, vast in desert seas,
Columned a land
Of ruins--bones of old monstrosities
God's awful hand
Had smitten; homes of dead idolatries,
O'erwhelmed with dust and sand.

Their bestial gods, caked thick with gems and gold,
Their blasphemies
Of beauty, rent; 'mid ruined altars rolled;
Their agonies
And rites abolished; and their priests of old--
Dust on the desert breeze.

Then Syrian valleys, purple with veiling mist,
Meseemed I trailed,
Where the frail floweret, by the dewdrop kissed,
Soft-blushing, quailed;
And drowned in dingled deeps of amethyst
The moon-mad bulbul wailed.

On glimmering wolds I seemed to hear the bleat
Of folded flocks:
Then shepherds passed me, bare of head and feet;
And then an ox
Lowed; and, above me, swept the solemn beat
Of angel wings and locks.

A manger then I seemed to see where bent,
In adoration,
Above a babe, Men of the Orient,
Where, low of station,
His mother lay, while round them swam sweet scent
And sounds of jubilation.

And then I woke. The rose-white moon above
Bloomed on my sight;--
And in her train the stars of winter drove,
Light upon light;
While Yuletide bells rocked, pealing "peace and love"
Down all the aisles of night.