When I lay wakeful yesternight
My fever's flame was a clear light,
A taper, flaring in the wind,
Whither, fluttering out of the dim
Night, many dreams glimmered by.
Like moths, out of the darkness, blind,
Hurling at that taper's flame,
From drinking honey of the night's flowers
Into my circled light they came:
So near I could see their soft colours,
Grey of the dove, most soothely grey;
But my heat singed their wings, and away
Darting into the dark again,
They escaped me....
Others floated down
Like those vaned seeds that fall
In autumn from the sycamore's crown
When no leaf trembleth nor branch is stirred,
More silent in flight than any bird,
Or bat's wings flitting in darkness, soft
As lizards moving on a white wall
They came quietly from aloft
Down through my circle of light, and so
Into unlighted gloom below.
But one dream, strong-winged, daring
Flew beating at the heart of the flame
Till I feared it would have put out my light,
My thin taper, fitfully flaring,
And that I should be left alone in the night
With no more dreams for my delight.
Can it be that from the dead
Even their dreams, their dreams are fled?