John Townsend Trowbridge (Джон Таунсенд Троубридж)

Recollections of «Lalla Rookh»

WHEN we were farm boys, years ago,
I dare not tell how many,
When, strange to say, the fairest day
Was often dark and rainy;

No work, no school, no weeds to pull,
No picking up potatoes,
No copy-page to fill with blots,
With little o's or great O's;

But jokes and stories in the barn
Made quiet fun and frolic;
Draughts, fox-and-geese, and games like these,
Quite simple and bucolic;

Naught else to do, but just to braid
A lash, or sing and whittle,
Or go, perhaps, and set our traps,
If it "held up" a little;

On one of those fine days, for which
We boys were always wishing,
Too wet to sow, or plant, or hoe,
Just right to go a fishing,—

I found, not what I went to seek,
In the old farmhouse gable,—
Nor line, nor hook, but just a book
That lay there on the table,

Beside my sister's candlestick
(The wick burned to the socket);
A handy book to take to bed,
Or carry in one's pocket.

I tipped the dainty cover back,
With little thought of finding
Anything half so bright within
The red morocco binding;

And let by chance my careless glance
Range over song and story;
When from between the magic leaves
There streamed a sudden glory, —

As from a store of sunlit gems,
Pellucid and prismatic,—
That edged with gleams the rough old beams,
And filled the raftered attic.

I stopped to read; I took no heed
Of time or place, or whether
The window-pane was streaked with rain,
Or bright with clearing weather.

Of chore time or of supper-time
I had no thought or feeling;
If calves were bleating to be fed,
Or hungry pigs were squealing.

The tangled web of tale and rhyme,
Enraptured, I unraveled;
By caravan, through Hindostan,
Toward gay Cashmere, I traveled.

Before the gate of Paradise
I pleaded with the Peri;
And even of queer old Fadladeen
I somehow did not weary;

Until a voice called out below:
"Come, boys! the rain is over!
It's time to bring the cattle home!
The lambs are in the clover!"

My dream took flight; but day or night,
It came again, and lingered.
I kept the treasure in my coat,
And many a time I fingered

Its golden leaves among the sheaves
In the long harvest nooning;
Or in my room, till fell the gloom,
And low boughs let the moon in.

About me beamed another world,
Refulgent, oriental;
Life all aglow with poetry,
Or sweetly sentimental.

My hands were filled with common tasks,
My head with rare romances;
My old straw hat was bursting out
With light locks and bright fancies.

In field or wood, my thoughts threw off
The old prosaic trammels;
The sheep were grazing antelopes,
The cows, a train of camels.

Under the shady apple-boughs,
The book was my companion;
And while I read, the orchard spread
One mighty branching banyan.

To mango-trees or almond-groves
Were changed the plums and quinces.
I was the poet, Feramorz,
And had, of course, my Princess.

The well-curb was her canopied,
Rich palanquin; at twilight,
'T was her pavilion overhead,
And not my garret skylight.

Ah, Lalla Rookh! O charmèd book!
First love, in manhood slighted!
To-day we rarely turn the page
In which our youth delighted.

Moore stands upon our shelves to-day,
I fear a trifle dusty;
With Scott, beneath a cobweb wreath,
And Byron, somewhat musty.

But though his orient cloth-of-gold
Is hardly now the fashion,
His tender melodies will live
While human hearts have passion.

The centuries roll; but he has left,
Beside the ceaseless river,
Some flowers of rhyme untouched by Time,
And songs that sing forever.

1. Dorothy in the Garret
2. Old Man Gram
3. The Boy I Love
4. A Home Idyl
5. The Old Burying-Ground

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