Yea, and an omen fair we well may deem This dreamy shadowing of ancient dream, Of what our own hearts long for on the day When the first furrow cleaves the fallow grey. THE EMPRESS O fair it is! let us go forth, my sweet, And be alone amid the babbling street; Yea, so alone that scarce the hush of night May add one joy unto our proved delight. GILES Fair lovers were they: I am fain To see them both ere long again; Yea, nigher too, if it might be. JOAN Too wide and dim, love, lies the sea, That we should look on face to face This Pharamond and Azalais. Those only from the dead come back Who left behind them what they lack. GILES Nay, I was asking nought so strange, Since long ago their life did change: The seeming King and Queen I meant. And e'en now 'twas my full intent To bid them home to us straightway, And crown the joyance of to-day. He may be glad to see my face, He first saw mid that waggon race When the last barley-sheaf came home. JOAN A great joy were it, should they come. They are dear lovers, sure enough. He deems the summer air too rough To touch her kissed cheek, howsoe'er Through winter mountains they must fare, He would bid spring new flowers to make Before her feet, that oft must ache With flinty driftings of the waste. And sure is she no more abased Before the face of king and lord, Than if the very Pharamond's sword Her love amid the hosts did wield Above the dinted lilied shield: O bid them home with us, and we Their scholars for a while will be In many a lesson of sweet lore To learn love's meaning more and more. GILES And yet this night of all the year Happier alone perchance they were, And better so belike would seem The glorious lovers of the dream: So let them dream on lip to lip: Yet will I gain his fellowship Ere many days be o'er my head, And they shall rest them in our stead; And there we four awhile shall dwell As though the world were nought but well, And that old time come back again When nought in all the earth had pain. The sun through lime-boughs where we dine Upon my father's cup shall shine; The vintage of the river-bank, That ten years since the sunbeams drank, Shall fill the mazer bowl carved o'er With naked shepherd-folk of yore. Dainty should seem worse fare than ours As o'er the close-thronged garden flowers The wind comes to us, and the bees Complain overhead mid honey-trees. JOAN Wherewith shall we be garlanded? GILES For thee the buds of roses red. JOAN For her white roses widest blown. GILES The jasmine boughs for Pharamond's crown. JOAN And sops-in-wine for thee, fair love. GILES Surely our feast shall deeper move The kind heart of the summer-tide Than many a day of pomp and pride; And as by moon and stars well lit Our kissing lips shall finish it, Full satisfied our hearts shall be With that well-won felicity. JOAN