The Daydream by Alfred Tennyson

The Sleeping Palace

The varying year with blade and sheaf
    Clothes and reclothes the happy plains;
Here rests the sap within the leaf,
    Here stays the blood along the veins.
Faint shadows, vapours lightly curl'd,
    Faint murmurs from the meadows come,
Like hints and echoes of the world
    To spirits folded in the womb.

Soft lustre bathes the range of urns
    On every slanting terrace-lawn.
The fountain to his place returns
    Deep in the garden lake withdrawn.
Here droops the banner on the tower,
    On the hall-hearths the festal fires,
The peacock in his laurel bower,
    The parrot in his gilded wires.

Roof-haunting martins warm their eggs:
    In these, in those the life is stay'd.
The mantles from the golden pegs
    Droop sleepily: no sound is made,
Not even of a gnat that sings.
    More like a picture seemeth all
Than those old portraits of old kings,
    That watch the sleepers from the wall.

Here sits the Butler with a flask
    Between his knees, half-drain'd; and there
The wrinkled steward at his task,
    The maid-of-honor blooming fair:
The page has caught her hand in his:
    Her lips are sever'd as to speak:
His own are pouted to a kiss:
    The blush is fix'd upon her cheek.

Till all the hundred summers pass,
    The beams, that thro' the Oriel shine,
Make prisms in every carven glass,
    And beaker brimm'd with noble wine.
Each baron at the banquet sleeps,
    Grave faces gather'd in a ring.
His state the king reposing keeps.
    He must have been a jolly king.

All round a hedge upshoots and shows
    At distance like a little wood;
Thorns, ivies, woodbine, misletoes,
    And grapes with bunches red as blood;
All creeping plants, a wall of green
    Close-matted, bur and brake and briar,
And glimpsing over these, just seen,
    High up, the topmost palace-spire.

When will the hundred summers die,
    And thought and time be born again,
And newer knowledge, drawing nigh,
    Bring truth that sways the soul of men?
Here all things in their place remain,
    As all were order'd ages since.
Come, Care and Pleasure, Hope and Pain,
    And bring the fated fairy Prince.


The Sleeping Beauty

Year after year unto her feet,
    She lying on her couch alone,
Across the purpled coverlet,
    The maiden's jet-black hair has grown,
On either side her tranced form
    Forthstreaming from a braid of perl:
The slumbrous light is rich and warm,
    And moves not on the rounded curl.

The silk star-broider'd coverlid
    Unto her limbs itself doth mould
Languidly ever; and, amid
    Her full black ringlets downward roll'd,
Glows forth each softly-shadow'd arm
    With bracelets of the diamond bright:
Her constant beauty doth inform
    Stillness with love, and day with light.

She sleeps: her breathings are not heard
    In palace chambers far apart.
The fragrant tresses are not stirr'd
    That lie upon her charmed heart.
She sleeps: on either hand upswells
    The gold-fringed pillow lightly pressed:
She sleeps, nor dreams, but ever dwells
    A perfect form in perfect rest.



The Arrival

All precious things, discover'd late,
    To those that seek them issue forth;
For love in sequel works with fate,
    And draws the veil from hidden worth.
He travels far from other skies--
    His mantle glitters on the rocks--
A fairy Prince, with joyful eyes,
    And lighter-footed than the fox.

The bodies and the bones of those
    That strove in other days to pass,
Are wither'd in the thorny close,
    Or scatter'd blanching in the grass.
He gazes on the silent dead:
    "They perish'd in their daring deeds."
This proverb flashes thro' his head,
    "The many fail: the one succeeds."

He comes, scarce knowing what he seeks:
    He breaks the hedge: he enters there:
The colour flies into his cheeks:
    He trusts to light on something fair;
For all his life the charm did talk
    About his path, and hover near
With words of promise in his walk,
    And wisper'd voices in his ear.

More close and close his footsteps wind;
    The magic music in his heart
Beats quick and quicker, till he find
    The quiet chamber far apart.
His spirit flutters like a lark,
    He stoops--to kiss her--on his knee.
"Love, if thy tresses be so dark,
    How dark those hidden eyes must be!"


The Revival

A touch, a kiss! the charm was snapt.
    There rose a noise of striking clocks,
And feet that ran, and doors that clapt,
    And barking dogs, and crowing cocks.
A fuller light illumined all,
    A breeze thro' all the garden swept,
A sudden hubbub shook the hall,
    And sixty feet the fountain lept.

The hedge broke in, the banner blew,
    The butler drank, the steward scrawl'd,
The fire shot up, the martin flew,
    The parrot scream'd, the peacock squall'd,
The maid and page renew'd their strife,
    The palace bang'd, and buzz'd and clackt,
And all the long pent stream of life
    Dash'd downward in a cataract.

And last of all the king awoke,
    And in his chair himself uprear'd,
And yawn'd, and rubb'd his face, and spoke,
    "By holy rood, a royal beard!
How say you? we have slept, my lords.
    My beard has grown into my lap."
The barons swore, with many words,
    "Twas but an after-dinner's nap."

"Pardy," return'd the king, "but still
    My joints are something stiff or so.
My lord, and shall we pass the bill
    I mention'd half an hour ago?"
The chancellor, sedate and vain,
    In courteous words return'd reply;
But dallied with his golden chain,
    And, smiling, put the question by.


The Departure

And on her lover's arm she leant,
    And round her waist she felt it fold.
And far across the hills they went
    In that new world which is the old.
Across the hills, and far away
    Beyond their utmost purple rim,
And deep into the dying day
    The happy princess follow'd him.

"I'd sleep another hundred years,
    O love, for such another kiss;"
"O wake forever, love," she hears,
    "O love, 'twas such as this and this."
And o'er them many a sliding star,
    And many a merry wind was borne,
And, stream'd thro' many a golden bar,
    The twilight melted into morn.

"Oh eyes long laid in happy sleep!"
    "O happy sleep, that lightly fled!"
"O happy kiss, that woke thy sleep!"
    "O love, thy kiss would wake the dead!"
And o'er them many a flowing range
    Of vapour buoy'd the crescent-bark,
And, rapt thro' many a rosy change,
    The twilight died into the dark.

"A hundred summers! can it be?
    And whither goest thou, tell me where?"
"O seek my father's court with me,
    For there are greater wonders there."
And o'er the hills, and far away
    Beyond their utmost purple rim,
Beyond the night, across the day,
    Thro' all the world she follow'd him.