Page:Southern Life in Southern Literature.djvu/439

Rh The dry fields burn and the mills are to turn, And a thousand meadows* mortally yearn. And the final main from beyond the plain Calls o er the hills of Habersham, And calls through the valleys of Hall.

THE CRYSTAL 1

At midnight, death s and truth s unlocking time, When far within the spirit s hearing rolls The great soft rumble of the course of things A bulk of silence in a mask of sound When darkness clears our vision that by day Is sun-blind, and the soul s a ravening owl For truth, and flitteth here and there about Low-lying woody tracts of time and oft Is minded for to sit upon a bough, Dry-dead and sharp, of some long-stricken tree And muse in that gaunt place, t was then my heart, Deep in the meditative dark, cried out: Ye companies of governor-spirits grave, Bards, and old bringers-down of flaming news From steep-walled heavens, holy malcontents, Sweet seers, and stellar visionaries, all That brood about the skies of poesy, Full bright ye shine, insuperable stars; Yet, if a man look hard upon you, none With total luster blazeth, no, not one k. Changed to "myriad of flowers." /. Changed to "lordly." 1 This poem appeared in the Independent, July 15, 1880, from which it is taken. The passage in which Lanier reviews the world s great names, Shakespeare, Homer, Socrates, Buddha, Dante, Milton, JEschylus, Lucretius, etc., only tq find some flaw in each, is here omitted.