Song And Story

I was destined, when a baby, For that land which lieth hidden In the moon; and whither, may be, At their birth all souls are bidden.

She bewitched me then and bound me, She a daughter of Apollo, In a golden snare who wound me, And compelled me thus to follow:--

Once she sent a stallion, sired Of the Wind; a mare his mother, Whom Thessalian madness fired, And the Hurricane his brother.

And a voice said, "Do not tarry! Mount him while the world is sleeping: He, my beautiful, will carry You, my Soul, into my keeping."

And I mounted: tempest whistled In my ears, and, yawning o'er us, Flamed the lightning; boomed the missiled Thunder, crashing far before us.

On we hurled. The world was rubble Underneath us; and the wonder Of our passage seemed to double Heaven's tempest and its thunder.

With us rode the air's wild races: Wisps and witches; all the Brocken, Stunted, gnarled, with fiendish faces, Seemed around us, gibing, mocking:

Hate, that shook the heart with hooting: Humpbacked Horror; gibbet-headed Murder: and,--great ravens shooting Over,--Fear, in bats embedded.

All were left; were passed like water Hurling headlong from a mountain,-- Hag and elf and demon's daughter,-- Ere we reached that mystic fountain.

There we stopped. I drained a beaker Old as Earth: the draught was fire: On my soul the burning liquor Acted like a new desire.

On again! The darkness lifted Like an up-rolled banner. Scattered Overhead, in points that shifted, Shone the stars through tempest tattered.

Then the moon rose. Slowly, slowly, Of a wild and copper color, Rose the moon, in melancholy Deeps; and all the stars grew duller.

And we passed,--an instant's scanning,-- Swift as thought, the spider-arches Of the ray-built bridges spanning Space between her lunar marches.

So I reached her kingdom, olden As the God that was its maker, Where the rocks and trees are golden, And the sea and air are nacre.

Where, 'mid ingot-glowing flowers, Over streams of diamond brightness, Palaces of pearl and towers, Wrought of topaz, loom in whiteness.

Here she met me with a chalice, Like the Giamschid ruby burning; And I entered in her palace, From the world forever turning.

Centuries have passed, have vanished; Still she holds me with her glory, She, whom Earth long since hath banished? She, the Soul of Song and Story.