And flaming downward over all
From heat to heat the day decreased,

And slowly rounded to the east
The one black shadow from the wall.

"The day to night," she made her moan,
"The day to night, the night to morn,
And day and night I am left alone,

To live forgotten, and love forlorn."

VIII.

At eve a dry cicala sung,

There came a sound as of the sea;
Backward the lattice-blind she flung,
And leaned upon the balcony.
There all in spaces rosy-bright

Large Hesper glittered on her tears,
And deepening through the silent spheres,
Heaven over Heaven rose the night.

And weeping then she made her moan,

"The night comes on that knows not morn When I shall cease to be all alone,

To live forgotten, and love forlorn."

ELEANORE.

THY dark eyes opened not,

Nor first revealed themselves to English air,
For there is nothing here,

Which, from the outward to the inward brought,
Moulded thy baby thought.

Far off from human neighborhood,

Thou wert born, on a summer morn,

A mile beneath the cedar-wood.

Thy bounteous forehead was not fanned

With breezes from our oaken glades, But thou wert nursed in some delicious land

Of lavish lights, and floating shades:

And flattering thy childish thought

The oriental fairy brought,

At the moment of thy birth,

From old well-heads of haunted rills,

And the hearts of purple hills,

And shadowed coves on a sunny shore,

The choicest wealth of all the earth, Jewel or shell, or starry ore,

To deck thy cradle, Eleänore.

Or the yellow-banded bees,
Through half-open lattices
Coming in the scented breeze,

Fed thee, a child, lying alone,

With whitest honey in fairy gardens culled —

A glorious child, dreaming alone,

In silk-soft folds, upon yielding down,

With the hum of swarming bees

Into dreamful slumber lulled.

Who

may minister to thee?

Summer herself should minister

To thee, with fruitage golden-rinded

On golden salvers, or it may be,
Youngest Autumn, in a bower
Grape-thickened from the light, and blinded

With many a deep-hued bell-like flower

Of fragrant trailers, when the air
Sleepeth over all the heaven,

And the crag that fronts the Even,
All along the shadowing shore,

Crimsons over an inland mere,

Eleänore!

How may full-sailed verse express,

How

may measured words adore

The full-flowing harmony

Of thy swan-like stateliness,

Eleänore?

The luxuriant symmetry

Of thy floating gracefulness,

Eleänore?

Every turn and glance of thine,
Every lineament divine,

Eleänore,

And the steady sunset glow,

That stays upon thee? For in thee

Is nothing sudden, nothing single;

Like two streams of incense free

From one censer, in one shrine,

Thought and motion mingle,

To one another, even as though
They were modulated so

To an unheard melody,

Which lives about thee, and a sweep
Of richest pauses, evermore
Drawn from each other mellow-deep;
Who may express thee, Eleänore?

I stand before thee, Eleänore;

I see thy beauty gradually unfold,
Daily and hourly, more and more.
I muse, as in a trance, the while

Slowly, as from a cloud of gold,
Comes out thy deep ambrosial smile.
I muse, as in a trance, whene'er

The languors of thy love-deep eyes Float on to me. I would I were

So tranced, so rapt in ecstasies,

To stand apart, and to adore,
Gazing on thee for evermore,

Serene, imperial Eleänore!

Sometimes, with most intensity

Gazing, I seem to see

Thought folded over thought, smiling asleep,