Bacchanalia; or, the New Age

The evening comes, the fields are still.The tinkle of the thirsty rill,Unheard all day, ascends again;Deserted is the half-mown plain,Silent the swaths; the ringing wain,The mower's cry, the dog's alarms,All housed within the sleeping farms.The business of the day is done,The last-left haymaker is gone.And from the thyme upon the height,And from the elder-blossom whiteAnd pale dog-roses in the hedge,And from the mint-plant in the sedge,In puffs of balm the night-air blowsThe perfume which the day foregoes.And on the pure horizon far,See, pulsing with the first-born star,The liquid sky above the hill!The evening comes, the fields are still.

Loitering and leaping,With saunter, with bounds,Flickering and circlingIn files and in rounds,Gayly their pine-staff greenTossing in air,Loose o'er their shoulders whiteShowering their hair,See! the wild MænadsBreak from the wood,Youth and IacchusMaddening their blood.See! through the quiet landRioting they pass,Fling the fresh heaps about,Trample the grass,Tear from the rifled hedgeGarlands, their prize;Fill with their sports the field,Fill with their cries.

Shepherd, what ails thee, then?Shepherd, why mute?Forth with thy joyous song!Forth with thy flute!Tempts not the revel blithe?Lure not their cries?Glow not their shoulders smooth?Melt not their eyes?Is not, on cheeks like those,Lovely the flush?—Ah! so the quiet was!So was the hush!

The epoch ends, the world is still.The age has talked and worked its fill.The famous orators have shone,The famous poets sung and gone,The famous men of war have fought,The famous speculators thought,The famous players, sculptors, wrought,The famous painters filled their wall,The famous critics judged it all.The combatants are parted now;Uphung the spear, unbent the bow,The puissant crowned, the weak laid low.And in the after-silence sweet,Now strifes are hushed, our ears doth meet,Ascending pure, the bell-like fameOf this or that down-trodden name,Delicate spirits, pushed awayIn the hot press of the noonday.And o'er the plain, where the dead ageDid its now-silent warfare wage,—O'er that wide plain, now wrapped in gloom,Where many a splendor finds its tomb,Many spent fames and fallen nights—The one or two immortal lightsRise slowly up into the sky,To shine there everlastingly,Like stars over the bounding hill.The epoch ends, the world is still.

Thundering and burstingIn torrents, in waves,Carolling and shoutingOver tombs, amid graves,See! on the cumbered plainClearing a stage,Scattering the past about,Comes the new age.Bards make new poems,Thinkers new schools,Statesmen new systems,Critics new rules.All things begin again;Life is their prize;Earth with their deeds they fill,Fill with their cries.

Poet, what ails thee, then?Say, why so mute?Forth with thy praising voice!Forth with thy flute!Loiterer! why sittest thouSunk in thy dream?Tempts not the bright new age?Shines not its stream?Look, ah! what genius,Art, science, wit!Soldiers like Cæsar,Statesmen like Pitt!Sculptors like Phidias,Raphaels in shoals,Poets like Shakspeare,—Beautiful souls!See, on their glowing cheeksHeavenly the flush!—Ah! so the silence was!So was the hush!

The world but feels the present's spell:The poet feels the past as well;Whatever men have done, might do,Whatever thought, might think it too.