AT windows that from Westminster Look southward to the Lollard's Tower, She sat, my lovely friend. A blur Of gilded mist, -- ('twas morn's first hour,) -- Made vague the world: and in the gleam Shivered the half-awakened stream. Through tinted vapour looming large, Ambiguous shapes obscurely rode. She gazed where many a laden barge Like some dim-moving saurian showed. And 'midst them, lo! two swans appeared, And o'er the waters proudly steered. Two stately swans! What did they there? Whence came they? Whither would they go? Think of them, -- things so faultless fair, -- 'Mid the black shipping down below! On, through the rose and gold, they passed, And melted in the morn at last. Ah, can it be, that they had come, Where Thames in sullied glory flows, Fugitive rebels, tired of some Secluded lake's ornate repose, Eager to taste the life that pours Its muddier wave 'twixt mightier shores? We ne'er shall know: our wonderment No barren certitude shall mar. They left behind them, as they went, A dream than knowledge ampler far; And from our world they sailed away Into some visionary day. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A TIME TO DANCE by CECIL DAY LEWIS BOOTH'S PHILIPPI by EDGAR LEE MASTERS THE WIFE A-LOST by WILLIAM BARNES 1914: 5. THE SOLDIER by RUPERT BROOKE THE TWO MYSTERIES by MARY ELIZABETH MAPES DODGE EIGHT O'CLOCK by ALFRED EDWARD HOUSMAN |