Ariadne Waking

The moist and quiet morn was scarcely breaking, When Ariadne in her bower was waking; Her eyelids still were closing, and she heard But indistinctly yet a little bird, That in the leaves o’erhead, waiting the sun, Seemed answering another distant one. She waked, but stirred not, only just to please Her pillow-nestling cheek; while the full seas, The birds, the leaves, the lulling love o’ernight The happy thought of the returning light, The sweet, self-willed content, conspired to keep Her senses lingering in the feel of sleep; And with a little smile she seemed to say, “I know my love is near me, and ’tis day.”