Poem by Edward Bulwer-Lytton

The True Joy-Giver

  Oh Oevoë, liber Pater,
    Oh, the vintage feast divine,
  When the God was in the bosom
    And his rapture in the wine;

  When the Faun laugh'd out at morning;
    When the Mænad hymn'd the night;
  And the Earth itself was drunken
    With the worship of delight;

  Oh Oevoë, liber Pater,
    Whose orgies are upon
  The hilltops of Parnassus,
    The banks of Helicon;--

  How often have I hail'd thee!
    How often have I been
  The bearer of the thyrsus,
    When its wither'd leaves were green.

  Then the boughs were purple gleaming
    With the dewdrop and the star;
  And chanting came the wood-nymph,
    And flashing came the car.

  Long faded are the garlands
    Of the thyrsus that I bore,
  When the wood-nymph chanted "Follow"
    In the vintage-feast of yore.

  My vineyards are the richest
    Falernian slopes bestow;
  Has the vineherd lost his cunning?
    Has the summer lost its glow?

  Oh, never on Falernium
    The Care-Dispeller trod,
  Its vine-leaves wreathe no thyrsus,
    Its fruits allure no god.

  For ever young, Lyæus;
    For ever young his priest;
  The Boy-god of the Morning,
    The conqueror of the East,

  His wine is Nature's life-blood;
    His vineyards bloom upon
  The hilltops of Parnassus,
    The banks of Helicon.

  But the hilltops of Parnassus
    Are free to every age;
  I have trod them with the Poet,
    I have mapp'd them with the Sage;

  And I'll take my pert disciple
    To see, with humble eyes,
  How the Gladness-bringer honours
    The worship of the wise.

  Lo, the arching of the vine-leaves;
    Lo, the sparkle of the fount;
  Hark, the carol of the Mænads;
    Lo, the car is on the Mount!

  "Ho, room, ye thyrsus-bearers,
    Your playmate I have been!"
  "Go, madman," laughs Lyæus,
    "Thy thyrsus then was green."

  And adown the gleaming alleys
    The gladness-givers glide;
  And the wood-nymph murmurs "Follow,"
    To the young man by my side.

1. Trevylyan to Gertrude
2. On the Reperusal of Letters Written in Youth
3. The Pilgrim of the Desert
4. The Loyalty of Love
5. The First Violets

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