The Poetry Corner

Gramarye.

By Madison Julius Cawein

There are some things that entertain me more Than men or books; and to my knowledge seem A key of Poetry, made of magic lore Of childhood, opening many a fabled door Of superstition, mystery, and dream Enchantment locked of yore. For, when through dusking woods my pathway lies, Often I feel old spells, as o'er me flits The bat, like some black thought that, troubled, flies Round some dark purpose; or before me cries The owl that, like an evil conscience, sits A shadowy voice and eyes. Then, when down blue canals of cloudy snow The white moon oars her boat, and woods vibrate With crickets, lo, I hear the hautboys blow Of Elf-land; and when green the fireflies glow, See where the goblins hold a Fairy Fte With lanthorn row on row. Strange growths, that ooze from long-dead logs and spread A creamy fungus, where the snail, uncoiled, And fat slug feed at morn, are Pixy bread Made of the yeasted dew; the lichens red, Besides these grown, are meat the Brownies broiled Above a glow-worm bed. The smears of silver on the webs that line The tree's crook'd roots, or stretch, white-wove, within The hollow stump, are stains of Fary wine Spilled on the cloth where Elf-land sat to dine, When night beheld them drinking, chin to chin, O' the moon's fermented shine. What but their chairs the mushrooms on the lawn, Or toadstools hidden under flower and fern, Tagged with the dotting dew! - With knees updrawn Far as his eyes, have I not come upon PUCK seated there? but scarcely 'round could turn Ere, presto! he was gone. And so though Science from the woods hath tracked The Elfin; and with prosy lights of day Unhallowed all his haunts; and, dulling, blacked Our eyesight, still hath Beauty never lacked For seers yet; who, in some wizard way, Prove Fancy real as Fact.