A Gift.

My gift would find thee fast asleep,         And arise a dream in thee;     A violet sky o'er the roll and sweep         Of a purple and pallid sea;     And a crescent moon from my sky should creep         In the golden dream to thee.     Thou shouldst lay thee down, and sadly list         To the wail of our cold birth-time;     And build thee a temple, glory-kissed,         In the heart of the sunny clime;     Its columns should rise in a music-mist,         And its roofs in a spirit-rhyme.     Its pillars the solemn hills should bind         'Neath arches of starry deeps;     Its floor the earth all veined and lined;         Its organ the ocean-sweeps;     And, swung in the hands of the grey-robed wind,         Its censers the blossom-heaps.     And 'tis almost done; for in this my rhyme,         Thanks to thy mirror-soul,     Thou wilt see the mountains, and hear the chime         Of the waters after the roll;     And the stars of my sky thy sky will climb,         And with heaven roof in the whole.