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.