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PART III

DREAMS AND FANCIES

DREAMERS

Aн, there be souls none understand,
Like clouds, they cannot touch the land,
Drive as they may by field or town.
Then we look wise at this, and frown,
And we cry, "Fool!" and cry, "Take hold
Of earth, and fashion gods of gold!"

Unanchor'd ships, that blow and blow,
Sail to and fro, and then go down
In unknown seas that none shall know,
Without one ripple of renown;
Poor drifting dreamers, sailing by,
That seem to only live to die.

Call these not fools; the test of worth
Is not the hold you have of earth;
Lo, there be gentlest souls, sea blown,
That know not any harbor known;
And it may be the reason is

They touch on fairer shores than this.

JOAQUIN MILLER (Up the Nile).

FANCIES

FANCIES are but streams

Of vain pleasure;
They who by their dreams

True joys measure,

Feasting, starve, laughing, weep,

Playing, smart; whilst in sleep

Fools, with shadows smiling,
Wake and find

Hopes like wind,

Idle hopes, beguiling.

Thoughts fly away; Time hath passed them;
Wake now, awake! see and taste them!

JOHN FORD.

DRIFTING

My soul to-day

Is far away,

Sailing the Vesuvian Bay;

My winged boat,

A bird afloat,

Swims round the purple peaks remote.

Round purple peaks
It sails, and seeks
Blue inlets and their crystal creeks,
Where high rocks throw,
Through deeps below,

A duplicated golden glow.

Far, vague and dim

The mountains swim; While on Vesuvius' misty brim, With outstretch'd hands

The gray smoke stands,
O'erlooking the volcanic lands.

Here Ischia smiles
O'er liquid miles;
And yonder, bluest of the isles,

Calm Capri waits,

Her sapphire gates

Beguiling to her bright estates.

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Over the rail

My hand I trail

Within the shadow of the sail ;

A joy intense,

The cooling sense

Glides down my drowsy indolence.

With dreamful eyes
My spirit lies

Where Summer sings and never dies,
O'erveil'd with vines,

She glows and shines
Among her future oil and wines.

Her children, hid

The cliffs amid,

Are gambolling with the gambolling kid; Or down the walls,

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Unto the smooth, bright sand beguiled,

With glowing lips

Sings as she skips,

Or gazes at the far-off ships.

Yon deep bark goes

Where Traffic blows,

From lands of sun to lands of snows;

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Sorrento swings

On sunset wings,

Where Tasso's spirit soars and sings.

THOMAS BUCHANAN READ.

BASKING

WHEEL me into the sunshine,

Wheel me into the shadow;

There must be leaves on the woodbine.
Is the king-cup crowned in the meadow?

My soul lies out like a basking hound
A hound that dreams and dozes;
Along my life my length I lay,

I fill to-morrow and yesterday,

I am warm with the suns that have long since set, I am warm with the summers that are not yet, And like one who dreams and dozes

Softly afloat on a sunny sea,

Two worlds are whispering over me,

And there blows a wind of roses

From the backward shore to the shore before,

From the shore before to the backward shore,
And like two clouds that meet and pour
Each through each, till core in core
A single self reposes,

The nevermore with the evermore
Above me mingles and closes ;

As my soul lies out like the basking hound,
And wherever it lies seems happy ground;
And when awaken'd by some sweet sound,
A dreamy eye uncloses,

I see a blooming world around,
And I lie amid primroses,
Years of sweet primroses,

Springs of fresh primroses,

Springs to be, and springs for me

Of distant dim primroses.

SYDNEY DOBELL (Home, Wounded).

KUBLA KHAN

IN Xanadu did Kubla Khan

In stately pleasure-dome decree :

Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.

So twice five miles of fertile ground

With walls and towers were girdled round :
And here were gardens bright with sinuous rills
Where blossom'd many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted

As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted

By woman wailing for her demon-lover!

And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,
As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,
A mighty fountain momently was forced :
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail :
And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,
Then reach'd the caverns measureless to man,
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean :
And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war!

The shadow of the dome of pleasure
Floated midway on the waves;
Where was heard the mingled measure
From the fountain and the caves.

It was a miracle of rare device,

A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!

A damsel with a dulcimer

In a vision once I saw :
It was an Abyssinian maid,
And on her dulcimer she play'd,
Singing of Mount Abora.
Could I revive within me

Her symphony and song,

To such a deep delight 't would win me

That with music loud and long,

I would build that dome in air,

That sunny dome! those caves of ice!

And all who heard should see them there,

And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!

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