Of that dear vale where you and I have lain Scanning the mysteries of life and death I dreamed, though how impassable the space Of time between the present and the past! This was the vision that possessed my mind; I thought the weird and gusty days of March Had eased themselves in melody and peace. Pale lights, swift shadows, lucent stalks, clear streams, Cool, rosy eves behind the penciled mesh Of hazel thickets, and the huge feathered boughs Of walnut trees stretched singing to the blast; And the first pleasantries of sheep and kine; The cautioned twitterings of hidden birds; The flight of geese among the scattered clouds; Night's weeping stars and all the pageantries Of awakened life had blossomed into May, Whilst she with trailing violets in her hair Blew music from the stops of watery stems, And swept the grasses with her viewless robes, Which dreaming men thought voices, dreaming still. Now as I lay in vision by the stream That flows amidst our well beloved vale, I looked throughout the vista stretched between Two ranging hills; one meadowed rich in grass; The other wooded, thick and quite obscure With overgrowth, rank in the luxury Of all wild places, but ever growing sparse Of trees or saplings on the sudden slope That met the grassy level of the vale;-- But still within the shadow of those woods, Which sprinkled all beneath with fragrant dew, There grew all flowers, which tempted little paths Between them, up and on into the wood. Here, as the sun had left his midday peak The incommunicable blue of heaven blent With his fierce splendor, filling all the air With softened glory, while the pasturage Trembled with color of the poppy blooms Shook by the steps of the swift-sandaled wind. Nor any sound beside disturbed the dream Of Silence slumbering on the drowsy flowers. Then as I looked upon the widest space Of open meadow where the sunlight fell In veils of tempered radiance, I saw The form of one who had escaped the care And equal dullness of our common day. For like a bright mist rising from the earth He made appearance, growing more distinct Until I saw the stole, likewise the lyre Grasped by the fingers of the modeled hand. Yea, I did see the glory of his hair Against the deep green bay-leaves filleting The ungathered locks. And so throughout the vale His figure stood distinct and his own shade Was the sole shadow. Deeming this approach Augur of good, as if in hidden ways Of loveliness the gods do still appear The counselors of men, and even where Wonder and meditation wooed us oft, I cried, "Apollo"--and his form dissolved, As if the nymphs of echo, who took up The voice and bore it to the hollow wood, By that same flight had startled the great god To vanishment. And thereupon I woke And disarrayed the figment of my thought. For of the very air, magic with hues,