Tossed Off To Please My Lady

Though it is really too hot today to play the lute,
My lady has begged me to give her a song.
She, whose voice is as sweet and shrill as a flute-
When have ever her desires been wrong?
Never, of course, and that is the reason she is queen
Of the court and of my desire, and things unseen
That stir the currents of the court-

Ah, my lady, would you deny me this sport?
But, of course, the song you requested!
I will give it to you, if you only tell what lack
Means that longing in your heart has guested.
But tell me, so that I may your boredom crack,
And send my song ranging forth on wings of light,
To sing of your beauty in those distant realms 
Which, though they shelter tall and stately elms,
May never have heard you, or have had sight
Of such a tall and stately woman as you are.
I will lift my voice, and sing of a star
That beams and shines down on a small stream,
That yet is the Great River of the Country of Dream.

Did you not know, my lady? The Country of Dream
Is one of those places you have not come,
Your beauty such a heralding wind must seem
To destroy those fancies we have when young,
Which fancies to this distant Realm flee,
When we are tired of them, and no longer company-

But you would have me sing of the place?
Of course; I see the desire, impatient in your face
As it was impatient when, last night,
In your bed, in a place beyond light,
I attended to those desires that you had then-

But, of course, I was singing not of men,
But of the green Country of Dream that lies
Beyond the reach of common and mortal eyes.
Shut yours, my lady, and well may you see
The vision that my song reveals to me:
The river singing beneath dark trees and a star.
So happy and darkling all countries are
When far from the taint of mortals they lie!
Not a trace of smoke in the dark crystal sky,
Not a trace of a cottage upon the sweet grass,
And the river would be your only glass
If you dwelt there, to comb and see your hair.
Yet even without you, the river is fair-

Purling and tumbling down from the small hills
Rounded like hands to receive water, cupped
And gracious amid all the water that spills
From the heights where the goats have supped
For long ages on the sweetbreath and briar,
To a lower country, where the flowers like fire
Shine around the small shallow pools.
Both the blossoms and the shallows are jewels,
Set in gold by the light of the rising sun.
The star retreats, seeing his hour is done,
Retiring like a lover from his lady fair,
While his love steps forth from the domes of the air.

His love is fairer than unicorns, wild with beauty,
And to love her is the star's only concern, only duty.
She steps lightly, sweet on sky, demure, 
Casting light as a woman still virgin and pure
Will throw flowers for her sister who marries.
Perhaps her thought on the thought of love tarries-
But she laughs, and tosses the bright flirting petals,
Her gaze also flirting, a butterfly that never settles
On any one face, on any one thing.
That is the time of life when women everything

In a man may command, and may yield what they wish.
The sun-maiden yields to the spreading of light,
Sending beams swimming where in the night fish
Have been the only ones to dart in finned flight.
The waters swipple, and run, and shake 
Their own manes as the sun bids them wake.
They yawn, and their fingers pat the grass,
As they hold up their mistress's looking-glass.
Well-pleased, she looks in the glass and dances on.

She is not the only one who wakes at dawn.
The woodland suddenly fills with a fierce chorus,
As birds try to outdo each other in duty 
Of homage to the morning, and the sun's beauty.
Their voices, like sunlight itself, fill the forest,
And probe into burrows, and stir the leaves.
The night in the fleeing shadows still grieves,
But nothing else does. All forget the fading star,
And rub the sleep from their eyes, and stare
At the morning as she capers on the bright air.
All are awake; and then, from both near and far,

Come the sounds of the dawn-migration.
Their scales flashing like my lady's best jewels,
The dragons fly from night- to dawn-station,
Their eyes like fire, their voices like cools
Of the ocean in sunlight, when it sings and dances,
Like a woman in her best advantages and chances
Of catching the husband she wishes for.
The dragons settle between the trees, on the floor
Of the forest, and lick and lap at the sunlight. 
Then the throb of their voices tunes the trees aright,
And they sing in sliding choruses and crescendos,
Silencing the birds and drawing the does,
The does of the white deer that live in Dreamland.
They draw near, as when in fall the divine command
Is bellowed through the forest from the lord of the harem.
But it is not a mating-call that draws or holds them,

But the sight of the dragons, upright and glorious,
Bellowing out a rich song to the morning victorious.
Silver flash their scales as the back of aspen veins,
And purple their scales as the nights of the rains,
And black their scales as obsidian-made ink,
And rarer they are than most people might think.

The dragons begin to rise, their voices still singing,
The clap of their pinions a less thunderous sound
Than the throb of their voices as they go winging,
A hundred, a thousand, ten thousand feet above ground.
In circles they dance, then whirl apart,
And their scales shine like a newborn star's heart
As they scatter to the farthest heights of the sky.
The deer watch them with heads tilted back still,

And the waters come singing down from each hill,
And each tells a sweet and compelling cold lie
Of the place that it came from as the most sweet
Fountain that in roaming the pegasi meet
When they come down, wide-winged and shy,
The gleam of the stormwind touching each eye,
To drink with heads lowered and nostrils quivering.
Their ripples are like the flanks of the horses shivering
As they stand with heads barely lowered at all,
Before they leap up again at the wind's strident call.

The grass is so green there- I can hardly describe-
I could speak of shades of emerald and malachite-
But of the colors I declare myself no scribe.
Say, it is as beautiful as for when one moment the light
Breaks through the clouds after a rack of days
When the sky broods like a frown, and the sun stays
Hidden and sulky somewhere in her bower;
Yet despite this one stray and stubborn beam has power
To break the sailing rack, and pierce to earth.
When I see such a thing, then my heart is in ecstasy,
And a madness of delight in a moment has birth-
Such is the feeling when I Dreamland grass see.

The flowers are of so many kinds- there are reds,
And whites, and purples, jewels fit for queens' heads:
Little nodding violets buried in the grass all along,
Never discovered, until their scent like a song
Comes washing up to caress the foot that crushed them:
There are the irises, like broidery on the hem
Of some great lady's gown as she goes to be bride.
They seem to hint at beauty, a greater beauty hide.

There are mountains in the distance, backing the hills,
And sometimes I think those stony great mountains
Are the true source of the snow-climbing fountains
That they love to brag about, those noisy rills.
Crowned and touched with blue, complacently they soar,
And as to what they touch, what skiey shore-
Who can know? Their place, their description is not mine.
I live rather for the things that I can gain in ground-clime.

There are quiet places in the woods where nothing comes,
And I can be alone with the bliss of the silence,
Until my heart in my ears maniacally drums,
And I taste of the sweetest fruits of sweet self-reliance.
I have been there, and tasted the flowers and fruit,
And leaned my back on the bank, and touched the root
That is the great tree that looms all above
That place that is garlanded and hounded with love-

What, my lady? Of course, if you would prefer.
It really is too hot, and too late, to play the lute.
I will put it down, and laugh with you at her,
The girl who speaks when she should be mute.
She is a great lady, to be sure, draped in jewels.
But passion speaks most often when reason cools.

What? Of course it is a beautiful night,
And you are the most beautiful of all to me.
Of course I think you more lovely than some faery light
I conjured up from a place I shall never see.
Of course I would not want to go sit in silence,
And forsake your love. I live for compliance.

My lady, look how the purple night is staining
The glass, and the sunset's light is running
Like rills down the mountains. Is it not stunning?
And while the sky such bounty is raining
Upon the still earth, we sit here and think
That the great things are what we eat and drink.

What, my lady? Of words I have a great store.
But now I will be silent, and speak no more.