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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
BALLAD TO THE MOON, by ALFRED DE MUSSET Poem Explanation Poet's Biography First Line: Twas a dusky night I spied Last Line: "like the dot above an ""I." Subject(s): Moon | |||
'TWAS a dusky night I spied, Hitched above the steeple high, The moon ride Like the dot above an "i." Moon what sombre ghost doth trail Thee in leash through the unknown Shadow pale, Face a-slant or fully shown? Art thou heaven's only eye Whence a sneaking cherub peers, Us to spy As from thy wan mask he leers? Art thou nothing but a bowl? Or a spider huge of girth That doth roll Legless, armless, over earth? Art thou, as I half do dread, That old clock that sounds the doom Of the dead Damned to hell's eternal gloom? On thy speeding brow what toll, This same night, of time is ta'en From the whole Of their everlasting pain? Art thou nibbled by a worm When thy disk grows black and dim, And thy form Shrivels to a crescent slim? Who despoiled thee yesternight? Wert thou as a huge axe-blade Hidden bright In some giant of the glade? For thou camest, chill and wan, And they slender horn did spill On my pane Light athwart the window-sill. Go, O Moon, that ebbest slow, Fair-browed Phœbe's body fell Far below, Deep into the surgy swell. Now no more than face hast thou, Wrinkled and long overworn; Even now Fades away thy brow forlorn. The white huntress give us back In her stainless maidenhood, On the track Of the drowsed deer in the wood. O! beneath the hazel screen Underneath the budding plane, Dian Queen And her lusty hounds astrain! Where the black kid halts in doubt High upon his rocky hill, Hearkening out How the sound drifts nearer still. Following till the quarry's ta'en, Gully, sward, or field asway Gold with grain, Dian's hounds are sped away. O eve when the winds arise, Phœbe, God Apollo's kin, Doth surprise By dim streams, a foot dipt in! Phœbe who at close of day On the shepherd's lips doth sit Them to sway Like a light bird newly lit. Moon, the mind will ever hold Of thy loves the lovely tale, As in gold Letters that can never pale. And in youth that cannot die Blest for ever thou to him That goes by, Full of face or sickle-slim. Thou hast love from shepherds old, Thou that alabaster-browed, Nigh the fold Setst the sheep-dogs baying loud. Thou hast love from seamen hale Shut within high-builded ships That do sail Under skies without eclipse. And the girl thro' woodland ways Nimble-footed that doth fare, In thy praise Breathes her song upon the air. Like a bear that drags its chains, Thy blue eyes behold below The loud main's Endless heaving to and fro. Why, be winds or loud or dumb; Why, be skies or foul or fair, Hither come I this way to sit and stare? 'Tis to see in dusk of night Hitched above the steeple high, The moon bright, Like the dot above an "i." | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...POEM TO TAKE BACK THE NIGHT by JUNE JORDAN THE MOON AND THE SPECTATOR by LEONIE ADAMS FULL MOON by KARLE WILSON BAKER NO MORE OF THE MOON by MORRIS GILBERT BISHOP |
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