Down The Songo.

I.     Floating!     Floating--and all the stillness waits     And listens at the ivory gates,     Full of a dim uncertain presage     Of some strange, undelivered message.     There is no sound save from the bush     The alto of the shy wood-thrush,     And ever and anon the dip     Of a lazy oar.     The rhythmic drowsiness keeps time     To hazy subtleties of rhyme     That seem to slip     Through the lulled soul to seek the sleepy shore.     The idle clouds go floating by;     Above us sky, beneath us sky;     The sun shines on us as we lie     Floating.     It is a dream.     It is a dream, my love; see how     The ripples quiver at the prow,     And all the long reflections shake     Unsteadily beneath the lake.     The mists about the uplands show     Dim violet towers that come and go.     Phantasmagoric palaces     Rise trembling there,     As though one breath of waking weather     Would crash their airy walls together     With sudden stress,     While silent detonations shook the air--     Vast fabrics toppling to the ground     And vanishing without a sound.     Ah, love, these are not what we deem;     It is a dream. II.     Let us dream on, then,----dream and die     Ere the dream pass.     Let us for once, like idle flowers,     Let slip the unregarded hours,     Like the wise flowers that lie     Unfretted by a feeble thought,     Future and past alike forgot,     Drinking the dew contentedly     In the cool grass. III.     Look yonder where the clouds float; could we glide     As they, across the sky's blue shoreless tide,     What better were it than to dream     Across yon lake and into this still stream? IV.     Trees and a glimpse of sky!     And the slow river, quiet as a pool!     And thou and I--and thou and I--     Kiss me! How soft the air is and how cool!