It is quiet here: the wet hill-wind's sigh Sobs faintly, as though behind a curtain of thick grass. The vanishing curlew wails a fading cry. I can hear the least soft footfall pass. Is that the shrewmouse I hear, or does the night-moth whirr? I have waited so long, so long, so long, alas! No one. No one. I hear no faintest stir. Yet Love spake once, with lips of flame and eyes of fire, With breath of burning frankincense and myrrh— Spake, and the vow was even as Desire . . . Terrible, winged, magnific, crested with flame, So that I bowed before it, mounting gyre upon gyre . . . . I see now a grey bird by the grey stone of no name: It is blind and deaf, and its wings are tipped with mire. Is it Love's lordly vow or mine own bitter shame? | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE COMPLAINT OF CHAUCER TO HIS EMPTY PURSE by GEOFFREY CHAUCER BIRTHDAY OF DANIEL WEBSTER by OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES WE ARE CHILDREN by ROBERT WILLIAMS BUCHANAN THE THREAD OF TRUTH by ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH THE IDLE WORD by SAMUEL VALENTINE COLE MUSIC by SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE |