Alison's Mother To The Brook

Brook, of the listening grass,     Brook of the sun-fleckt wings,     Brook of the same wild way and flickering spell!     Must you begone? Will you forever pass,     After so many years and dear to tell?--     Brook of all hoverings ...     Brook that I kneel above;     Brook of my love.     Ah, but I have a charm to trouble you;     A spell that shall subdue     Your all-escaping heart, unheedful one     And unremembering!     Now, when I make my prayer     To your wild brightness there     That will but run and run,     O mindless Water!--     Hark,--now will I bring     A grace as wild,--my little yearling daughter,     My Alison.     Heed well that threat;     And tremble for your hill-born liberty     So bright to see!--     Your shadow-dappled way, unthwarted yet,     And the high hills whence all your dearness bubbled;--     You, never to possess!     For let her dip but once--O fair and fleet,--     Here in your shallows, yes,     Here in your silverness     Her two blithe feet,--     O Brook of mine, how shall your heart be troubled!     The heart, the bright unmothering heart of you,     That never knew.--     (O never, more than mine of long ago.     How could we know?--)     For who should guess     The shock and smiting of that perfectness?--     The lily-thrust of those ecstatic feet     Unpityingly sweet?--     Sweet beyond all the blurred blind dreams that grope     The upward paths of hope?     And who could guess     The dulcet holiness,     The lilt and gladness of those jocund feet,     Unpityingly sweet?     Ah, for your coolness that shall change and stir     With every glee of her!--     Under the fresh amaze     That drips and glistens from her wiles and ways;     When the endearing air     That everywhere     Must twine and fold and follow her, shall be     Rippled to ring on ring of melody,--     Music, like shadows from the joy of her,     Small starry Reveller!--     When from her triumphings,--     All frolic wings--     There soars beyond the glories of the height,     The laugh of her delight!     And it shall sound, until     Your heart stand still;     Shaken to human sight;     Struck through with tears and light;     One with the one desire     Unto that central Fire     Of Love the Sun, whence all we lighted are     Even from clod to star.     And all your glory, O most swift and sweet!--     And all your exultation only this;     To be the lowly and forgotten kiss     Beneath those feet.     You that must ever pass,--     You of the same wild way,--     The silver-bright good-bye without a look!--     You that would never stay,     For the beseeching grass ...     Brook!--     You, Four Walls,         Wall not in my heart!     When the lovely night-time falls         All so welcomely,     Blinding, sweet hearth-fire,     Light of heart's desire,         Blind not, blind not me!     Unto them that weep apart,--     While you glow, within,         Wreckt, despairing kin,--     Dark with misery:     --Do not blind my heart!         You, close Heart!             Never hide from mine             Worlds that I divine         Through thy human dearness.         O belovd Nearness,             Hallow all I understand             With thy hand-in-hand;--         All the lights I seek,         With thy cheek-to-cheek;             All the loveliness I loved apart.             You, heart's Home!--             Wall not in my heart.