Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, AN ODE: THE MOON, by FREDERIC FAIRCHILD SHERMAN


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

AN ODE: THE MOON, by                    
First Line: Sweet lady, I would walk across the night
Last Line: You wander, and he thinks of you no less.
Subject(s): Moon


"Queen of the wide air: thou most lovely queen
Of all the brightness that mine eyes have seen."
-- JOHN KEATS.

I

Sweet lady, I would walk across the night
With you, for now the first fond memory
Of love that was my earliest delight
Into the shadowed dark has driven me:
I crave companionship and I would walk
Alone with you and something learn of her
From whom you with a message may have come.
Aye, I indeed would talk
With you, for I can see your pale lips stir
To tell the broken message of the dumb.

II

And this is why, night after night, you thread
The darkness silently; -- or why is it
If not to find and tell me what she said?
I often at the open window sit
And watch your lonely figure passing by
As, heedless of the stars' persistent eyes,
You travel on unto the pearly gate
Of dawn. O tell me why
You wander from the gate of Paradise
Each evening at an early hour or late?

III

Is it that when the Sun is far away
The thought of him beats in your maiden breast,
And you, who have been happy all the day,
When twilight comes can therefore never rest?
Is this the reason why you wander through
The poppied paths of dusk and always seem
Unconscious of the fragrance of the wind?
Or why is it that you
In whose face shines the glory of a dream
A lonely wanderer in Heaven I find?

IV

Are you the ghost of one who searches for
Some wandering soul or, hovering afar,
An Angel, like a mother watching o'er
The couch whereon her sleeping children are?
What thought is it that lights your lovely face
And to your eyes this dewy brilliance brings
That falls upon the world ere you have passed,
And in that starlit space
A soaring lark of Heaven so sweetly sings
That all the world forgets to dream at last?

V

Ah no, upon some mountain veiled in mist,
Unfrequented by man, I think you meet
A lover, and that there you keep a tryst
With him, for always with reluctant feet
You travel homeward through the shadows dim.
I think the thought that brings that blessed smile
And fills your eager heart with happiness
Must be the thought of him
Who is forever with you even while
You wander, and he thinks of you no less.





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