Yet, indeed, this flux of guesses,-- Mad delight, and frozen calms,-- Mirth to-day, and vine-bound tresses, And to-morrow--folded palms; Is this all? this balanced measure? Could life run no happier way? Joyous at the height of pleasure, Passive at the nadir of dismay? But, indeed, this proud possession, This far-reaching, magic chain, Linking in a mad succession Fits of joy and fits of pain,-- Have you seen it at the closing? Have you tracked its clouded ways? Can your eyes, while fools are dozing, Drop, with mine, adown life’s latter days? When a dreary light is wading Through this waste of sunless greens, When the flashing lights are fading On the peerless cheek of queens, When the mean shall no more sorrow, And the proudest no more smile; While the dawning of the morrow Widens slowly westward all that while? Then, when change itself is over, When the slow tide sets one way, Shall you find the radiant lover, Even by moments, of to-day? The eye wanders, faith is failing: Oh, loose hands, and let it be! Proudly, like a king bewailing, Oh, let fall one tear, and set us free! All true speech and large avowal Which the jealous soul concedes; All man’s heart which brooks bestowal, All frank faith which passion breeds,-- These we had, and we gave truly; Doubt not, what we had, we gave! False we were not, nor unruly; Lodgers in the forest and the cave. Long we wandered with you, feeding Our rapt souls on your replies, In a wistful silence reading All the meaning of your eyes. By moss-bordered statues sitting, By well-heads, in summer days. But we turn, our eyes are flitting-- See, the white east, and the morning-rays! And you too, O worshipped Graces, Sylvan gods of this fair shade! Is there doubt on divine faces? Are the blessed gods dismayed? Can men worship the wan features, The sunk eyes, the wailing tone, Of unsphered, discrownèd creatures, Souls as little godlike as their own? Come, loose hands! The wingèd fleetness Of immortal feet is gone; And your scents have shed their sweetness, And your flowers are overblown. And your jewelled gauds surrender Half their glories to the day; Freely did they flash their splendor, Freely gave it--but it dies away. In the pines, the thrush is waking; Lo, yon orient hill in flames! Scores of true-love-knots are breaking At divorce which it proclaims. When the lamps are paled at morning, Heart quits heart, and hand quits hand. Cold in that unlovely dawning, Loveless, rayless, joyless, you shall stand!