The Secret of the Nightingale

The ground I walked on felt like air,
Airs buoyant with the year's young mirth ;
Far, filmy, undulating fair,
The down lay, a long wave of earth ;
And a still green foam of woods rose high
Over the hill-line into the sky.
In meadowy pasture browse the kine,
Thin wheat-blades colour a brown ploughline ;
Fresh rapture of the year's 5-oung joy
Was in the unfolded luminous leaf,
And birds that shower as they toy
Melodious rain that knows not grief,
A song-maze where my heart in bliss
Lay folded, like a chrysalis.
They allured my feet far into the wood,
Down a winding glade with leaflets walled,
With an odorous dewy dark im'ued ;
Rose, and maple, and hazel called
Me into the shadowy solitude ;
Wild blue germander eyes enthralled,
Made me free of the balmy bowers,
Where a wonderful garden-party of flowers.
Laughing sisterhood under the trees,
Dancing merrily, played with the bees ;
Anemone, starwort, bands in white,
Like girls for a first communion dight,
And pale yellow primrose ere her flight.
Ushered me onward wondering
To a scene more fair than the court of a king.
Ah ! they were very fair themselves.
Sweet maids of honour, woodland elves !
Frail flowers that arrive with the cuckoo.
Pale lilac, hyacinth purple of hue,
And the little pink geranium,
All smiled and nodded to see me come ;
All gave me welcome ; " No noise," they said,
" For we will show you the bridal bed,
Where Philomel, our queen, was wed ;
Hush ! move with a tender, reverent foot,
Like a shy light over the bole and root ; "
And they blew in the delicate air for flute.
Into the heart of the verdure stole
My feet, and a music enwound my soul ;
Zephyr flew over a cool bare brow —
I am near, very near to the secret now !
For the rose-covers, all alive with song,
Flash with it, plain now low and long ;
Sprinkle a holy water of notes ;
On clear air melody leans and floats ;
The blithe-winged minstrel merrily moves,
Dim bushes burn with mystical loves !

Lo ! I arrive I immersed in green,
Where the wood divides, though barely seen,
A nest in one of the blue leaf-rifts !
There over the border a bird uplifts
Her downy head, billed, luminous-eyed ;
Behold the chosen one, the bride I
And the singer, he singeth by her side.
Leap, heart ! be aflame with them ! loud, not dumb.
Give a voice to their epithalamium !
Whose raptures wax not pale nor dim
Beside the fires of seraphim.
These are glorious, glowing stairs.
In gradual ascent to theirs ;
With human loves acclaim and hail
The holy lore of the nightingale !