I

Where are ye, goblins of a while ago? Ill-health, dull gloom, Grief with its footsteps slow, Wry-visaged Pain, the bat-winged form of Care; Insomnia, whose accursed and cruel brood Fasten their horrid fangs in faithful Sleep, Burrs of our life, whose hooked talons creep Even to the very soul; whose unseen snare Besets our path, our bed, our toil, our food; Whose touch is madness, and whose poisoned breath Is worse than the hard clutch of fatal Death?

Behold they fly! Further and further yet they hie Past yon dry and ice-smooth grass Where the sculptured shadows pass; Where the bee, intent to steal, Catches with its small armed heel At those fairy palace wells The purple lips of flower bells, Whose deep chalices hold fast Their strong-stored sweetness; till at last, The robber grown importunate, Teeth and hairy claws are set Full in the soft and damask sides Where the garnered treasure hides, And, the deed of daring done, With a loud triumphant hum Off the wingèd felon flies And to some fresh conquest hies. Oh, pleasant things familiar long, What magic doth to you belong? What secret unpolluted wells, What store of unexhausted spells? Can your unruffled sweetness woo My devious soul again to you, Sweep from the years regret--how vain-- And give pure Bliss her own again?

Alas! the kindly magic palls, Its spell dies off; even it recalls, Even you recall the strain, the stress Of life’s consummate restlessness. “Life, let it come in any guise, Is life,” we say, and over-wise Our soul informs with its own hue These tenants of th’ ethereal blue. We know you all too well, too long, Your hues, your gambols, and your song; You cannot think to cheat our eyes With hope of any new surprise, Your brightest shows, your deftest wiles Are trite to us as oft-seen smiles On some familiar face; as trite As Time’s unconquerable flight; Trite as the cradle-songs which haunt Some dying ear; trite as the chaunt Of oft-heard thrush in garden shade; Trite as the love to children paid; Trite as the prayers whose rhythmic flow Across unheeding memory go; Trite as the very vital breath; Aye, trite as Life, and trite as Death!

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