A CHILD ASLEEP.

How he sleepeth, having drunken

Weary childhood's mandragore!

From its pretty eyes have sunken

Pleasures to make room for more;

Sleeping near the withered nosegay which he pulled the day before.

Nosegays! leave them for the waking;

Throw them earthward where they grew;

Dim are such beside the breaking

Amaranths he looks unto:

Folded eyes see brighter colours than the open ever do.

Heaven-flowers, rayed by shadows golden

From the palms they sprang beneath,

Now perhaps divinely holden,

Swing against him in a wreath:

We may think so from the quickening of his bloom and of his breath.

Vision unto vision calleth

While the young child dreameth on:

Fair, O dreamer, thee befalleth

With the glory thou hast won!

Darker wast thou in the garden yestermorn by summer sun.

We should see the spirits ringing

Round thee, were the clouds away:

‘ T is the child-heart draws them, singing

In the silent-seeming clay —

Singing! stars that seem the mutest go in music all the way.

As the moths around a taper,

As the bees around a rose,

As the gnats around a vapour,

So the spirits group and close

Round about a holy childhood as if drinking its repose.

Shapes of brightness overlean thee,

Flash their diadems of youth

On the ringlets which half screen thee,

While thou smilest... not in sooth

Thy smile, but the overfair one, dropt from some etherial mouth.

Haply it is angels’ duty,

During slumber, shade by shade

To fine down this childish beauty

To the thing it must be made

Ere the world shall bring it praises, or the tomb shall see it fade.

Softly, softly! make no noises!

Now he lieth dead and dumb;

Now he hears the angels’ voices

Folding silence in the room

Now he muses deep the meaning of the Heaven-words as they come.

Speak not! he is consecrated;

Breathe no breath across his eyes:

Lifted up and separated

On the hand of God he lies

In a sweetness beyond touching, held in cloistral sanctities.

Could ye bless him, father — mother,

Bless the dimple in his cheek?

Dare ye look at one another

And the benediction speak?

Would ye not break out in weeping and confess yourselves too weak?

He is harmless, ye are sinful;

Ye are troubled, he at ease;

From his slumber virtue winful

Floweth outward with increase.

Dare not bless him! but be blessed by his peace, and go in peace.