May 1918 by John Jay Chapman

Lyrics

The moon at midnight quenched her vaporous light Leaving the stars but faintly bright Like tapers that burn ill; And in the fragrant bosom of the night The summer breezes round the garden creep Now moving and now still Nursing the buds their care has laid to sleep; Or tip-toe softly to my window-sill And whisper through the room To tell that close at hand The lilies-of-the-valley stand And lilacs are in bloom A breathing night,—no ray, no beam,— But shadowy stillness over everything I listen to the flooding of a stream That 'mid the joyous secrets of the spring Subdues his murmuring; And in the silence cool Huddles his waves, till, at a bound I hear as in a gleam of sound The gathered waters plunging to their pool Once more the silence; then the sound again! I cannot say how long I stood And listened to that velvet flood; Perhaps the stream poured lethe on my brain— Displaced the stars—for in their train I saw the French Cathedrals looming by Like citadels that beaconed on the night Or swinging urns that scattered golden light In the surrounding sky Chartres, Beauvais, Rouen—I could mark Each Gothic lantern of the mind That, kindling in the ages dark Rose, flamed and left behind The sacred shell of a mysterious ark The treasure and the solace of mankind Voices they have,—a language of their own That floats in arches, domes and spires; And many a traveler and pilgrim young Wandering unconscious and alone Has heard the accents of the ancient choirs Still echoing in their avenues of stone From men who wrought and dreamed and sung And fought and prayed in that forgotten tongue Again my eyes upon the night were turned The central darkness bloomed, and—robed in state— While her great works about her burned— Sate France enthronèd and incoronate! But ah! the vision fades: a sky of lead Has drunk the apparition. In such pain As breaks the rest of one whose love is dead I wake to greet the vacant world again The garden is a blank. Unquiet birds Are warbling gently in the rain Sweet are their voices, desolate the words That from their little throats they pour Chanting, like choristers, a requiem: "Beauvais and Chartres and Rouen yet remain; Rheims is no more; And Amiens is fading like thy dream Alas, when all is done What shall the dayspring find to shine upon?"