Page:The complete poetical works and letters of John Keats, 1899.djvu/285

Rh

the witching time of night,

Orbed is the moon and bright,

And the Stars they glisten, glisten,

Seeming with bright eyes to listen.

For what listen they?

For a song and for a charm,

See they glisten in alarm,

And the Moon is waxing warm

To hear what I shall say.

Moon! keep wide thy golden ears—

Hearken, Stars! and hearken, Spheres!—

Hearken, thou eternal Sky!

I sing an infant's Lullaby,

O pretty lullaby!

Listen, listen, listen, listen,

Glisten, glisten, glisten, glisten,

And hear my Lullaby!

Though the Rushes, that will make

Its cradle, still are in the lake—

Though the linen that will be

Its swathe, is on the cotton tree—

Though the woollen that will keep

It warm, is on the silly sheep—

Listen, Starlight, listen, listen,

Glisten, glisten, glisten, glisten,

And hear my lullaby!

Child, I see thee! Child, I 've found thee

Midst of the quiet all around thee!

Child, I see thee! Child, I spy thee!

And thy mother sweet is nigh thee!

Child, I know thee! Child no more,

But a Poet evermore!

See, see, the Lyre, the Lyre,

In a flame of fire,

Upon the little cradle's top

Flaring, flaring, flaring,

Past the eyesight's bearing.

Awake it from its sleep,

And see if it can keep

Its eyes upon the blaze—

Amaze, amaze!

It stares, it stares, it stares,

It dares what no one dares!

It lifts its little hand into the flame

Unharm'd, and on the strings

Paddles a little tune, and sings,

With dumb endeavour sweetly—

Bard art thou completely!

Little child

O' th' western wild,

Bard art thou completely!

Sweetly with dumb endeavour,

A Poet now or never,

Little child

O' th' western wild,

A Poet now or never!

they were come into the Faery's Court

They rang—no one at home—all gone to sport

And dance and kiss and love as faeries do

For Faries be as humans lovers true.

Amid the woods they were so lone and wild,

Where even the Robin feels himself exil'd,

And where the very brooks, as if afraid,

Hurry along to some less magic shade.

'No one at home!' the fretful Princess cry'd;

'And all for nothing such a dreary ride,

And all for nothing my new diamond cross;

No one to see my Persian feathers toss,

No one to see my Ape, my Dwarf, my Fool,

Or how I pace my Otaheitan mule.

Ape, Dwarf, and Fool, why stand you gaping there,

Burst the door open, quick—or I declare

I 'll switch you soundly and in pieces tear.'

The Dwarf began to tremble, and the Ape

Star'd at the Fool, the Fool was all agape,

The Princess grasp'd her switch, but just in time

The dwarf with piteous face began to rhyme.

'O mighty Princess, did you ne'er hear tell

What your poor servants know but too too well?

Know you the three great crimes in Faeryland?

The first, alas! poor Dwarf, I understand,

I made a whipstock of a faery's wand;

The next is snoring in their company;

The next, the last, the direst of the three,

Is making free when they are not at home.

I was a Prince—a baby prince—my doom,

You see, I made a whipstock of a wand,

My top has henceforth slept in faery land.

He was a Prince, the Fool, a grown-up Prince,

But he has never been a King's son since

He fell a snoring at a faery Ball.