Come, My Beloved, Hear From Me

COME, my beloved, hear from me

Tales of the woods or open sea.

Let our aspiring fancy rise

A wren's flight higher toward the skies;

Or far from cities, brown and bare,

Play at the least in open air.

In all the tales men hear us tell

Still let the unfathomed ocean swell,

Or shallower forest sound abroad

Below the lonely stars of God;

In all, let something still be done,

Still in a corner shine the sun,

Slim-ankled maids be fleet of foot,

Nor man disown the rural flute.

Still let the hero from the start

In honest sweat and beats of heart

Push on along the untrodden road

For some inviolate abode.

Still, O beloved, let me hear

The great bell beating far and near-

The odd, unknown, enchanted gong

That on the road hales men along,

That from the mountain calls afar,

That lures a vessel from a star,

And with a still, aerial sound

Makes all the earth enchanted ground.

Love, and the love of life and act

Dance, live and sing through all our furrowed tract;

Till the great God enamoured gives

To him who reads, to him who lives,

That rare and fair romantic strain

That whoso hears must hear again.