The Moon Spirit

One night I lingered in the wood
And saw a spirit-form that stood
Among the wildflowers. Like the dew
It twinkled; partly wind and scent;
Then down a moonbeam there it blew,
And like a gleam of water went.
Or was it but a dream that grew
Out of the wind and dew and scent.

Could I have seized it, made it mine,
As poets have the thought divine
Of Nature, then I too might know,—
(Like them who once wild magic bound

Into their rhymes of long-ago),—
Such ecstasy of earth around
As never yet held heart before
Or language for its beauty found.