Then this did the noble lady say: "Bird, do you dream of our home-coming day When you flew like a courier on before From the dragon-peak to our palace-door, And we drove the steed in your singing path -- The ramping dragon of laughter and wrath: And found our city all aglow, And knighted this joss that decked it so? There were golden fishes in the purple river And silver fishes and rainbow fishes. There were golden junks in the laughing river, And silver junks and rainbow junks: There were golden lilies by the bay and river, And silver lilies and tiger-lilies, And tinkling wind-bells in the gardens of the town By the black-lacquer gate Where walked in state The kind king Chang And his sweetheart mate . . . With his flag-born dragon And his crown of pearl . . . and . . . jade, And his nightingale reigning in the mulberry shade, And sailors and soldiers on the sea-sands brown, And priests who bowed them down to your song -- By the city called Han, the peacock town, By the city called Han, the nightingale town, The nightingale town." Then sang the bird, so strangely gay, Fluttering, fluttering, ghostly and gray, A vague, unravelling, final tune, Like a long unwinding silk cocoon; Sang as though for the soul of him Who ironed away in that bower dim: -- "I have forgotten Your dragons great, Merry and mad and friendly and bold. Dim is your proud lost palace-gate. I vaguely know There were heroes of old, Troubles more than the heart could hold, There were wolves in the woods Yet lambs in the fold, Nests in the top of the almond tree . . . The evergreen tree . . . and the mulberry tree . . . Life and hurry and joy forgotten, Years on years I but half-remember . . . Man is a torch, then ashes soon, May and June, then dead December, Dead December, then again June. Who shall end my dream's confusion? Life is a loom, weaving illusion . . . I remember, I remember There were ghostly veils and laces . . . In the shadowy bowery places . . . With lovers' ardent faces Bending to one another, Speaking each his part. They infinitely echo In the red cave of my heart. `Sweetheart, sweetheart, sweetheart,' They said to one another. They spoke, I think, of perils past. They spoke, I think, of peace at last. One thing I remember: Spring came on forever, Spring came on forever," Said the Chinese nightingale. Love Songs. [Sara Teasdale] Come Come, when the pale moon like a petal Floats in the pearly dusk of Spring, Come with arms outstretched to take me, Come with lips that long to cling. Come, for life is a frail moth flying, Caught in the web of the years that pass, And soon we two, so warm and eager, Will be as the gray stones in the grass. Message I heard a cry in the night, A thousand miles it came, Sharp as a flash of light, My name, my name!