Maxfield Parrish painting
The House of Clouds I would build a cloudy House Cloud-walls of the morning's grey, Build the entrance high and proud, Build a spacious hall thereby: In the mutest of the house, Poet's thought,-not poet's sigh! Let them! Wipe such visionings
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
(1806-1861)
For my thoughts to live in;
When for earth too fancy-loose
And too low for Heaven!
Hush! I talk my dream aloud
I build it bright to see,
I build it on the moonlit cloud,
To which I looked with thee.
Faced with amber column,
Crowned with crimson cupola
From a sunset solemn!
May mists, for the casements, fetch,
Pale and glimmering;
With a sunbeam hid in each,
And a smell of spring.
Darkening and then brightening,
If a riven thunder-cloud,
Veined by the lightning.
Use one with an iris-stain,
For the door within;
Turning to a sound like rain,
As I enter in.
Boldly, never fearing.
Use the blue place of the sky,
Which the wind is clearing;
Branched with corridors sublime,
Flecked with winding stairs
Such as children wish to climb,
Following their own prayers.
I will have my chamber:
Silence at the door shall use
Evening's light of amber,
Solemnising every mood,
Softemng in degree,
Turning sadness into good,
As I turn the key.
'Las, they come together!
Cloudy walls divide and fly,
As in April weather!
Cupola and column proud,
Structure bright to see
Gone---except that moonlit cloud,
To which I looked with thee!
From the Fancy's cartel
Love secures some fairer things
Dowered with his immortal.
The sun may darken,-heaven be bowed-
But still, unchanged shall be,
Here in my soul,---that moonlit cloud,
To which I looked with THEE!
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