A Descant upon Sleep and Love

When the lamp of Cynthia lateRises in her silver state,Through her brother's roseate light,Blushing on the brows of night;Then the pure ethereal airBreathes with zephyr blowing fair;Clouds and vapours disappear.As with chords of lute or lyre,Soothed the spirits now respire,And the heart revives againWhich once more for love is fain.But the orient evening starSheds with influence kindlier farDews of sweet sleep on the eyeOf o'er-tired mortality.

Oh, how blessed to take and keepIs the antidote of sleep!Sleep that lulls the storms of careAnd of sorrow unaware,Creeping through the closed doorsOf the eyes, and through the poresBreathing bliss so pure and rareThat with love it may compare.

Then the god of dreams doth bringTo the mind some restful thing,Breezes soft that rippling blowO'er ripe cornfields row by row,Murmuring rivers round whose brimSilvery sands the swallows skim,Or the drowsy circling soundOf old mill-wheels going round,Which with music steal the mindAnd the eyes in slumber bind.

When the deeds of love are doneWhich bland Venus had begun,Languor steals with pleasant strainThrough the chambers of the brain,Eyes 'neath eyelids gently tiredSwim and seek the rest desired.How deliriously at lastInto slumber love hath passed!But how sweeter yet the wayWhich leads love again to play!

From the soothed limbs upward spreadGlides a mist divinely shed,Which invades the heart and head:Drowsily it veils the eyes,Bending toward sleep's paradise,And with curling vapour roundFills the lids, the senses swound,Till the visual ray is boundBy those ministers which makeLife renewed in man awake.

Underneath the leafy shadeOf a tree in quiet laid,While the nightingale complainsSinging of her ancient pains,Sweet it is still hours to pass,But far sweeter on the grassWith a buxom maid to playAll a summer's holiday.When the scent of herb and flowerBreathes upon the silent hour,When the rose with leaf and bloomSpreads a couch of pure perfume,Then the grateful boon of sleepFalls with satisfaction deep,Showering dews our eyes above,Tired with honeyed strife of love.

In how many moods the mindOf poor lovers, weak and blind,Wavers like the wavering wind!As a ship in darkness lost,Without anchor tempest-tossed,So with hope and fear imbuedIt roams in great incertitudeLove's tempestuous ocean-flood.

A portion of this descant finds an echo in another lyric of theCarmina Burana:--

"With young leaves the wood is new;Now the nightingale is singing;And field-flowers of every hueOn the sward their bloom are flinging.Sweet it is to brush the dewFrom wild lawns and woody places!Sweeter yet to wreathe the roseWith the lily's virgin graces;But the sweetest sweet man knows,Is to woo a girl's embraces."

Having said so much, I will present the first part of the poem in theEnglish version I have made.