The Pageant

A sound as if from bells of silver,     Or elfin cymbals smitten clear,     Through the frost-pictured panes I hear.     A brightness which outshines the morning,     A splendor brooking no delay,     Beckons and tempts my feet away.     I leave the trodden village highway     For virgin snow-paths glimmering through     A jewelled elm-tree avenue;     Where, keen against the walls of sapphire,     The gleaming tree-bolls, ice-embossed,     Hold up their chandeliers of frost.     I tread in Orient halls enchanted,     I dream the Sagas dream of caves     Gem-lit beneath the North Sea waves!     I walk the land of Eldorado,     I touch its mimic garden bowers,     Its silver leaves and diamond flowers!     The flora of the mystic mine-world     Around me lifts on crystal stems     The petals of its clustered gems!     What miracle of weird transforming     In this wild work of frost and light,     This glimpse of glory infinite!     This foregleam of the Holy City     Like that to him of Patmos given,     The white bride coming down from heaven!     How flash the ranked and mail-clad alders,     Through what sharp-glancing spears of reeds     The brook its muffled water leads!     Yon maple, like the bush of Horeb,     Burns unconsumed: a white, cold fire     Rays out from every grassy spire.     Each slender rush and spike of mullein,     Low laurel shrub and drooping fern,     Transfigured, blaze whereer I turn.     How yonder Ethiopian hemlock     Crowned with his glistening circlet stands!     What jewels light his swarthy hands!     Here, where the forest opens southward,     Between its hospitable pines,     As through a door, the warm sun shines.     The jewels loosen on the branches,     And lightly, as the soft winds blow,     Fall, tinkling, on the ice below.     And through the clashing of their cymbals     I hear the old familiar fall     Of water down the rocky wall,     Where, from its wintry prison breaking,     In dark and silence hidden long,     The brook repeats its summer song.     One instant flashing in the sunshine,     Keen as a sabre from its sheath,     Then lost again the ice beneath.     I hear the rabbit lightly leaping,     The foolish screaming of the jay,     The choppers axe-stroke far away;     The clamor of some neighboring barn-yard,     The lazy cocks belated crow,     Or cattle-tramp in crispy snow.     And, as in some enchanted forest     The lost knight hears his comrades sing,     And, near at hand, their bridles ring,     So welcome I these sounds and voices,     These airs from far-off summer blown,     This life that leaves me not alone.     For the white glory overawes me;     The crystal terror of the seer     Of Chebars vision blinds me here.     Rebuke me not, O sapphire heaven!     Thou stainless earth, lay not on me,     Thy keen reproach of purity,     If, in this August presence-chamber,     I sigh for summers leaf-green gloom     And warm airs thick with odorous bloom!     Let the strange frost-work sink and crumble,     And let the loosened tree-boughs swing,     Till all their bells of silver ring.     Shine warmly down, thou sun of noontime,     On this chill pageant, melt and move     The winters frozen heart with love.     And, soft and low, thou wind south-blowing,     Breathe through a veil of tenderest haze     Thy prophecy of summer days.     Come with thy green relief of promise,     And to this dead, cold splendor bring     The living jewels of the spring!