The Hanging of the Crane

The lights are out, and gone are all the guestsThat thronging came with merriment and jestsTo celebrate the Hanging of the CraneIn the new house,--into the night are gone;But still the fire upon the hearth burns on,And I alone remain.

O fortunate, O happy day,When a new household finds its placeAmong the myriad homes of earth,Like a new star just sprung to birth,And rolled on its harmonious wayInto the boundless realms of space!

So said the guests in speech and song,As in the chimney, burning bright,We hung the iron crane to-night,And merry was the feast and long.

And now I sit and muse on what may be,And in my vision see, or seem to see,Through floating vapors interfused with light,Shapes indeterminate, that gleam and fade,As shadows passing into deeper shadeSink and elude the sight.

For two alone, there in the hall,As spread the table round and small;Upon the polished silver shineThe evening lamps, but, more divine,The light of love shines over all;Of love, that says not mine and thine,But ours, for ours is thine and mine.

They want no guests, to come betweenTheir tender glances like a screen,And tell them tales of land and sea,And whatsoever may betideThe great, forgotten world outside;They want no guests; they needs must beEach other's own best company.

The picture fades; as at a village fairA showman's views, dissolving into air,Again appear transfigured on the screen,So in my fancy this; and now once more,In part transfigured, through the open doorAppears the selfsame scene.

Seated, I see the two again,But not alone; they entertainA little angel unaware,With face as round as is the moon;A royal guest with flaxen hair,Who, throned upon his lofty chair,Drums on the table with his spoon,Then drops it careless on the floor,To grasp at things unseen before.

Are these celestial manners? theseThe ways that win, the arts that please?Ah yes; consider well the guest,And whatsoe'er he does seems best;He ruleth by the right divineOf helplessness, so lately bornIn purple chambers of the morn,As sovereign over thee and thine.He speaketh not; and yet there liesA conversation in his eyes;The golden silence of the Greek,The gravest wisdom of the wise,Not spoken in language, but in looksMore legible than printed books,As if he could but would not speak.And now, O monarch absolute,Thy power is put to proof; for, lo!Resistless, fathomless, and slow,The nurse comes rustling like the sea,And pushes back thy chair and thee,And so good night to King Canute.

As one who walking in a forest seesA lovely landscape through the parted frees,Then sees it not, for boughs that interveneOr as we see the moon sometimes revealedThrough drifting clouds, and then again concealed,So I behold the scene.

There are two guests at table now;The king, deposed and older grown,No longer occupies the throne,--The crown is on his sister's brow;A Princess from the Fairy Isles,The very pattern girl of girls.All covered and embowered in curls,Rose-tinted from the Isle of Flowers,And sailing with soft, silken sailsFrom far-off Dreamland into ours.Above their bowls with rims of blueFour azure eyes of deeper hueAre looking, dreamy with delight;Limpid as planets that emergeAbove the ocean's rounded verge,Soft-shining through the summer night.Steadfast they gaze, yet nothing seeBeyond the horizon of their bowls;Nor care they for the world that rollsWith all its freight of troubled soulsInto the days that are to be.

Again the tossing boughs shut out the scene,Again the drifting vapors intervene,And the moon's pallid disk is hidden quite;And now I see the table wider grown,As round a pebble into water thrownDilates a ring of light.

I see the table wider grown,I see it garlanded with guests,As if fair Ariadne's CrownOut of the sky had fallen down;Maidens within whose tender breastsA thousand restless hopes and fears,Forth reaching to the coming years,Flutter awhile, then quiet lieLike timid birds that fain would fly,But do not dare to leave their nests;--And youths, who in their strength elateChallenge the van and front of fate,Eager as champions to beIn the divine knight-errantryOf youth, that travels sea and landSeeking adventures, or pursues,Through cities, and through solitudesFrequented by the lyric Muse,The phantom with the beckoning hand,That still allures and still eludes.O sweet illusions of the brain!O sudden thrills of fire and frost!The world is bright while ye remain,And dark and dead when ye are lost!

The meadow-brook, that seemeth to stand still,Quickens its current as it nears the mill;And so the stream of Time that lingerethIn level places, and so dull appears,Runs with a swifter current as it nearsThe gloomy mills of Death.

And now, like the magician's scroll,That in the owner's keeping shrinksWith every wish he speaks or thinks,Till the last wish consumes the whole,The table dwindles, and againI see the two alone remain.The crown of stars is broken in parts;Its jewels, brighter than the day,Have one by one been stolen awayTo shine in other homes and hearts.One is a wanderer now afarIn Ceylon or in Zanzibar,Or sunny regions of Cathay;And one is in the boisterous campMid clink of arms and horses' tramp,And battle's terrible array.I see the patient mother read,With aching heart, of wrecks that floatDisabled on those seas remote,Or of some great heroic deedOn battle-fields where thousands bleedTo lift one hero into fame.Anxious she bends her graceful headAbove these chronicles of pain,And trembles with a secret dreadLest there among the drowned or slainShe find the one beloved name.

After a day of cloud and wind and rainSometimes the setting sun breaks out again,And touching all the darksome woods with light,Smiles on the fields, until they laugh and sing,Then like a ruby from the horizon's ringDrops down into the night.

What see I now? The night is fair,The storm of grief, the clouds of care,The wind, the rain, have passed away;The lamps are lit, the fires burn bright,The house is full of life and light:It is the Golden Wedding day.The guests come thronging in once more,Quick footsteps sound along the floor,The trooping children crowd the stair,And in and out and everywhereFlashes along the corridorThe sunshine of their golden hair.On the round table in the hallAnother Ariadne's CrownOut of the sky hath fallen down;More than one Monarch of the MoonIs drumming with his silver spoon;The light of love shines over all.

O fortunate, O happy day!The people sing, the people say.The ancient bridegroom and the bride,Smiling contented and sereneUpon the blithe, bewildering scene,Behold, well pleased, on every sideTheir forms and features multiplied,As the reflection of a lightBetween two burnished mirrors gleams,Or lamps upon a bridge at nightStretch on and on before the sight,Till the long vista endless seems.