The Fairies Dancing

I heard along the early hills,         Ere yet the lark was risen up,      Ere yet the dawn with firelight fills         The night-dew of the bramble-cup, -      I heard the fairies in a ring         Sing as they tripped a lilting round      Soft as the moon on wavering wing.         The starlight shook as if with sound,      As if with echoing, and the stars         Prankt their bright eyes with trembling gleams      While red with war the gusty Mars         Rained upon earth his ruddy beams.      He shone alone, low down the West,         While I, behind a hawthorn-bush,      Watched on the fairies flaxen-tressed         The fires of the morning flush.      Till, as a mist, their beauty died,         Their singing shrill and fainter grew;      And daylight tremulous and wide         Flooded the moorland through and through;      Till Urdon's copper weathercock         Was reared in golden flame afar,      And dim from moonlit dreams awoke         The towers and groves of Arroar.