Towards Break Of Day

Towards Break Of Day

WAS it the double of my dream

The woman that by me lay

Dreamed, or did we halve a dream

Under the first cold gleam of day?

I thought: "There is a waterfall

Upon Ben Bulben side

That all my childhood counted dear;

Were I to travel far and wide

I could not find a thing so dear.

My memories had magnified

So many times childish delight.

I would have touched it like a child

But knew my finger could but have touched

Cold stone and water. I grew wild.

Even accusing Heaven because

It had set down among its laws:

Nothing that we love over-much

Is ponderable to our touch.

I dreamed towards break of day,

The cold blown spray in my nostril.

But she that beside me lay

Had watched in bitterer sleep

The marvellous stag of Arthur,

That lofty white stag, leap

From mountain steep to steep.