Poem by Duncan Campbell Scott

The Magic House

In her chamber, wheresoe’er
  Time shall build the walls of it,
Melodies shall minister,
  Mellow sounds shall flit
Through a dusk of musk and myrrh.

Lingering in the spaces vague,
  Like the breath within a flute,
Winds shall move along the stair;
  When she walketh mute
Music meet shall greet her there.

Time shall make a truce with Time,
  All the languid dials tell
Irised hours of gossamer,
  Eve perpetual
Shall the night or light defer.

From her casement she shall see
  Down a valley wild and dim,
Swart with woods of pine and fir;
  Shall the sunsets swim
Red with untold gold to her.

From her terrace she shall see
  Lines of birds like dusky motes
Falling in the heated glare;
  How an eagle floats
In the wan unconscious air.

From her turret she shall see
  Vision of a cloudy place,
Like a group of opal flowers
  On the verge of space,
Or a town, or crown of towers.

From her garden she shall hear
  Fall the cones between the pines;
She shall seem to hear the sea,
  Or behind the vines
Some small noise, a voice may be.

But no thing shall habit there,
  There no human foot shall fall,
No sweet word the silence stir,
  Naught her name shall call,
Nothing come to comfort her.

But about the middle night,
  When the dusk is loathéd most,
Ancient thoughts and words long said,
  Like an alien host,
There shall come unsummonéd.

With her forehead on her wrist
  She shall lean against the wall
And see all the dream go by;
  In the interval
Time shall turn Eternity.

But the agony shall pass--
  Fainting with unuttered prayer,
She shall see the world’s outlines
  And the weary glare
And the bare unvaried pines.

1. Above St. Irénée
2. Meditation at Perugia
3. The Wood-Spring to the Poet
4. Permanence
5. The Height of Land

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