The aisles grow dim, and as by winding ways
⁠I eager climb St. Ouen's stately height
The silver censers vanish from my gaze,
⁠As shooting stars upon a dusky night;
I hear the chanted vespers at my feet
Like wordless water-music faint and sweet.

On priest and acolyte and people fall
⁠From western windows many a sapphire ray.
The sculptured knights within the nichèd wall
⁠Look not more marble-like and mute than they.
Living arid dead, with fingers clasped, seem praying,
Christ and the angels hear what they are saying.

Where am I now? As if a dream went by,
⁠And dream still fairer came, I breathless gaze,
Fearing to break by whispered word or sigh
⁠The rapture of my spirit's deep amaze.
The sleeping world beneath my vision lies,
Only the stars divide me from the skies.

The city gleams with lights that come and go,
⁠The hills stand out against the opal west,
The river hath a soft and onward flow
⁠As some tired spirit fain to seek its rest,
Whilst from outlying valleys deep between
Tinkles some vesper bell of church unseen.

Monk, martyr, saint, and paladin arise
⁠Around me in a pinnacled array;
An hour ago they seemed to touch the skies,
⁠And now I stand as near to heaven as they.
And mid this mute companionship of stone
I cannot feel that I am quite alone.

For who is quite alone? In solitude,
⁠Things that would else be dumb discourse to men,
Leading the mind to an ecstatic mood
⁠That hath no name and cannot come again.
These sculptured saints and martyrs seemed to be
Spirits that claimed a brotherhood with me.

O life! take back thy burden. I am free.
⁠Pain, sorrow, fruitless toil, love ill-bestowed,
Are as they were not; and the mystery
⁠Of death is as a star that leaves a cloud.
What matters where I go or whence I come?
Spring and the daisies far outlive the tomb.

O, Nature ! if I strayed from thy control,
⁠Resume thy empire now, and with delights
Unspeakable, conduct my dreaming soul
⁠From sordid things unto sublimest heights.
Give back the thoughts that once aspired in vain,
New joyful wings with which to mount again!

Ah me! the curfew with its silvery chime
⁠Too swiftly breaks the witchery of the hour;
With clanging keys I hear the beadle climb
⁠The cobwebbed mazes of the belfry tower.
I quit with wistfulness akin to pain
My visionary world for that of men.

The stars are out; gargoyle and image quaint,
⁠Rare ogive, frieze fantastic, oriel,
Hero and martyred monk and virgin saint,
⁠Make up a world where mortals cannot dwell.
Why do I linger? What so chaineth me
Unto this mute and mystic company?

Aha! aha! Oh woes on woes!
Again the bitter toil of faithful seer
My whirling brain doth vex with first-born bode.
See ye those young ones seated at the house, —
Such spectral forms as are the stuff of dreams?
Children (belike) who died by deed of kin,
They hold, ye mark, their hands all filled with flesh,
Their own flesh, banquet-ripe, aye, (piteous dish!)
The loathsome meal of which their father ate.
I tell you 'tis to punish this he plots,
The dastard lion, slinking in the lair
He watched, forsooth l what time my master came, —
My master, for I cannot choose but serve.
He knows not, he, the captain of the fleet,
Troy's devastator, how the lewd she-whelp
With fawning tongue such welcome hath spun out,
As shall, like Ate, win to secret doom.
So far her daring goes. Man-slayer she,
Yet woman. By what name of hateful beast
Shall she be rightly called? Or two-faced snake,
Or rock-housed Scylla, bane of ships and men,
Her offspring Death, her breath a ruthless curse
Blown homewards? How she raised her cry of joy,
The shameless one, as if for battle turned!
What glee she feigns, too, at the safe return!
And now what care I, if thou listen not?
The day will come. And thou shalt see, and soon
Shalt, pitying, say I was too true a seer.