The dream of the injur’d, patient mind, That smiles at the wrongs of men, Is found in the bruis’d and wounded rind Of the cinnamon, sweetest then. Then hasten we, maid, To twine our braid, To-morrow the dreams and flowers will fade. -------------- No sooner was the flowery crown Plac’d on her head, than sleep came down, Gently as nights of summer fall, Upon the lids of NOURMAHAL;— And, suddenly, a tuneful breeze, As full of small, rich harmonies As ever wind, that o’er the tents Of AZAB[344] blew, was full of scents, Steals on her ear, and floats and swells. Like the first air of morning creeping Into those wreathy, Red-Sea shells, Where Love himself, of old, lay sleeping;[345] And now a Spirit form’d, ’twould seem, Of music and of light,—so fair, So brilliantly his features beam, And such a sound is in the air Of sweetness when he waves his wings,— Hovers around her, and thus sings:— -------------- From CHINDARA’S[346] warbling fount I come, Call’d by that moonlight garland’s spell; From CHINDARA’S fount, my fairy home, Where in music, morn and night, I dwell: Where lutes in the air are heard about, And voices are singing the whole day long, And every sigh the heart breathes out Is turn’d, as it leaves the lips, to song! Hither I come From my fairy home, And if there’s a magic in Music’s strain, I swear by the breath Of that moonlight wreath, Thy Lover shall sigh at thy feet again. For mine is the lay that lightly floats, And mine are the murmuring, dying notes, That fall as soft as snow on the sea, And melt in the heart as instantly:— And the passionate strain that, deeply going, Refines the bosom it trembles through, As the musk-wind, over the water blowing, Ruffles the wave, but sweetens it too. Mine is the charm, whose mystic sway The Spirits of past Delight obey;— Let but the tuneful talisman sound, And they come, like Genii, hovering round. And mine is the gentle song that bears From soul to soul, the wishes of love, As a bird, that wafts through genial airs The cinnamon-seed from grove to grove.[347] ’Tis I that mingle in one sweet measure The past, the present, and future of pleasure;[348] When Memory links the tone that is gone With the blissful tone that’s still in the ear; And Hope from a heavenly note flies on To a note more heavenly still that is near.