Cornell University Library PR 4063.B2SL6 A life's love. 3 1924 013 210 855 The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31 92401 321 0855 "1^ ^m 1 A LIFE'S LOVE. ^ ' I will say no word that a man might say Whose whole life's love goes down in a day.' Swinburne : TAe Triumph of Time. A LIFE'S LOVE. GEORGE BARLOW. LONDON : JOHN CAMDEN HOTTEN, 74 &• 7S Piccadilly. T?gn^ PR CONTENTS. I Psyche and Mercury . The Song of the Blind Poet ^ Bridal Blisses Blown Bubbles The Ecstasy of the Hair Don't ! . . . . My Own Dart The Discovery of Love J In the Future L Those Flowers A Meeting . A Vision Death's Lips and Palms Loves .... The Crumpled Garland Wreaths A Vision of the Past . The Philosophy of Love f My Lady The Poet's Grave PAGE I 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 lo II 12 13 14 15 i6 17 i8 19 20 7 9 fo It A Sprig of Heath 21 The Rose of Night 22 Dante and Beatrice . . . . 23 Roses for Her .... . . 24 The Leopard 25 To have Beheld 26 The Rosier Statue 27 The Pearl Necklace 28 Love and Immortality 29 The Serenader 30 Brown and Red 31 Brown and Gold 32 The Peacock's Feather 33 As of Old 34 The Same as Ever 35 My Work 36 A Horror and a Calm 37 Keats the Conqueror ...... 38 Golden Lilies 39 The Morning and the Evening Star ... 40 The Beech-Boll 41 The Rapture of Meeting 42 The Awe of Meeting 43 A Perfect Love 44 Red Roses . . 45 Compensation 46 Love's Cure 47 Love's Memory 48 The First Kiss 49 God's Heart 56 CONTENTS. Over Alice Mountain-Summits The Sense of Death /^ Not too Long Winged Passion . The Last Sacrifice My Rose Death's Teaching The Far-off Petals ^ Love's Unity One Desire . Flying Lustres The Dead Goddess . The Perfume of the Soul Golden Snakes The Open Wound f% Utter Gladness . Death's Red Rose . The Next Kiss . The Answered Prayer . A Scarlet Rose . The Last Mandate Orange-coloured Flame The Storm of Beauty . The Resurrection of Thought The Ineffable Fragrance Love at the Sepulchre. Mortal .... Immortal SI 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 CONTENTS. The Triumph of Love A Fiery Recompense The Snake-Lover . A Woman's Glory The Bitterness of Life Christmas Day Love's Abilities Nought The Great Love Hopelessness Hope Love's Stand-point The Poet's Resurrection Beneath the Oak . A Dream of the Mountains Love's Early Dew The Lapwing's Quest Kestrels . That Strange Night Parting Gifts PSYCHE AND MERCURY. One of Raphael's Frescoes. FACE that, as it seems to me, combines All sweet expression in one perfect whole. All lights and shadows of my lady's soul. Chiefly the rippling laugh that softly shines Across the corresponding facial lines ; Gaze with intensity ! Why I could swear I've seen it move as I was standing there, And look to me and speak to me by signs. It is my lady's face made pure for ever By the undying power of that painter's art, As Dante, with wild passionate endeavour. Portrayed the endless mistress of his heart, As her image gleamed beyond the seas that sever The immortal from our transitory part. \/ / THE SONG OF THE BLIND POET. B^T sootheth me on love's delights to linger, l^i^l They're true for some one else, if not for me, I cannot sing in any other key, At least I'll point them out with passionate finger, A voice, an unseen sound, a sightless singer, I'll teach them what to take and what to flee, A finger-post, a lighthouse in the sea. Of joy to all men but myself a bringer. There was a world of wonder and of daytime, I found it — men that live will find it — fair, For them will gleam the greenery of May-time, And laughter leave an echo in the air, For them the hours of work and pleasant playtime, For me the inactive deeps of dull despair. BRIDAL BLISSES. VISION of the wavy, windy tresses, And sweet, short lips, and laughing eyes of grey ; A future-enfolded vision of the day. When, free to lavish largess of caresses, At last to love my soul itself addresses. And panting steeds of passion, unrestrained. Bound forth, free, foaming, frolicking, unreined, Emerging from the old ocean of distresses. If fancy's house of cards for ever misses Some rapture unforeseen, some joy that's new. If even in thought, sweet love, your gentle kisses, Like rain of violets, or a rose-leaf dew, Lie light upon my lips, what bridal blisses Shall one day greet us, delicately true ! BLOWN BUBBLES. j^^l MAY not see you, love, but I will greet you mMl With sweet-blown bubbles, kisses of my rhymes, Sleepless, my thoughts shall wander forth to meet you — At odorous hours of dusk, at evening times, A vesper song, a fairy peal of chimes, Borne in upon your hearing they shall reach you, Take form, and, falling at your feet, beseech you To breathe a prayer for a lover in lonely climes. I would, my love, that fancy's troop of kisses Might fall upon you like a gentle dew, A shower of shaken rose-petals, or a crew Of elves to pelt you with bewildering bhsses. And cowslip-balls, beneath sweet, warm abysses Of hay to hold you softly hidden from view. THE ECSTASY OF THE HAIR. I^Tgii'D send a troop of kisses to entangle l^i^l And lose themselves in labyrinths of hair, Thy deep, dark night of hair with stars to spangle, And, each a tiny fire-fly, to dangle Amid the tresses of that forest fair. A perfume seems to blossom into air ; The ecstasy that hangs about the tresses, Their blush, their overflow, their breath, their bloom ; A wind that gently lifts them, and caresses, And wings itself, and floats about the room ; The beauty that the flame of youth expresses, A tender fire that doth not consume. Yet, seizing all my soul, pervades, possesses. And mingleth in a subtly sweet perfume. DON'T ! |on't ! Ah ! but, sweet, I will. You must not mind it ; My turn at last it is to have my will. If I should kiss my treasure till I blind it. Closed eyes of hers I'd go on kissing still. A poor, wild singer am I ; and a singer In love is not, y6u know, like other men : They kiss their mistress' hand, — I kiss each finger, Then think I've missed one out, and count again. Let these make odes, as islheir bounden duty, To love, and seal their songs with finger-tips, But as for me, when I am praising beauty, My signature is always with the lips. Just so, sweet, let me kiss the place again. Believe me, it will heal the sooner then. MY OWN DART. I^T^I '-o^^ Love, therefore am I far apart 1^!^ From Love ; because she's everything to me, The less am I allowed her face to see, The less am able to outpour my heart, Permitted less to ease its aching smart. And low to fall and say, ' I worship thee.' If I loved less, the Fates would gracious be ; But, loving much, transfixed by mine own dart Of over-great anxiety I die. I cannot get to clutch the thing I would : If it were possible — ah ! if I could Attain to it, extended in a sigh. My being — all of it — ^would prostrate lie. Fainting for joy at such a gained good. Wi THE DISCOVERY OF LOVE. YOUTH was walking, in the early hours Of life, along a garden-alley fair, When on a sudden, lo ! a rose was there, — Unseen by him before among the flowers That wove a many-coloured mist of bowers. And redolent of sweetness made the air. He came the next day, but would hardly dare To hope the night's attendant band of showers Had spared the rose ; but lo ! the rose was red, And fragrant, far more fragrant than before. And fuller petals had unfolded more. And round about it brighter bloom was shed : The rose the lover fondly feared was dead. Was blushing beauty to the very core. IN THE FUTURE. -F IWjMl FANCY somewhere waits for every one I^iHI a bride, a bridegroom, far in future years. The way thereunto sodden deep with tears It may be, or parched fiery dry with sun Of lonely misery ; but when 'tis done. With gladness each shall garland memory's biers, And make away with faces of old fears, And hail the advent of new life begun. And such a spot is waiting on the road Of each of us, — a place where three paths meet, Two sad ones into this that shall be sweet Converging, towards which our foreboding showed That ever since we can remember flowed The expectant, eager current of our feet. A^ THOSE FLOWERS. HAVE them still, those flowers, — ah ! those flowers. They blossom in my heart, not withered yet. Though more than twelve months 'tis since they were wet With tender nourishing of northern showers, Since they were beautiful in northern bowers. Sweet savours even now of soft regret Hang round them, and a fragrant misty net Of memory, having most miraculous powers To wake the past and bring it near again. Ah ! that sweet past of mine — that most sad past — Most sad, most sweet, set thick with thorns of pain, With many a cloudy canopy overcast. Yet bearing roses one or two to last, A smile or two predestined to remain. 5^ A MEETING. iR^'jMl PRAY you kiss me once, my queen, to show IeHimI That all the past is merged in present bliss ; And kiss me twice to make more certain this, And once again to signify the flow, The happy future undivided glow. Of love. Make each kiss keener than the last, To indicate the pallor of the past Compared with rosy days we two shall know. A kiss for present, future, past, for each Was good. The past was lit by expectation Striving across the waves of tribulation Unto the present arms of hope to reach ; Sweet is the present, blessed beyond speech, Sweeter each future than the former station. A VISION. HAVE a vision of a lady bending Over a wounded warrior clad in mail. Blood-stained, sore-smitten, weak, and very pale ; A vision of sweet, delicate fingers tending His feebleness, a fair physician sending Throughout his veins a draught that doth avail ; And ever and anon I see her fail, And faint half backward, woman's courage ending For a season ; then he smileth — such a smile ! Great eyes of fire glowing back within The head encased in panoply of tin, A smile as of a child not knowing guile. For she hath pitied him who mocked him while Unwounded, which is worth a death to win. 6 DEATH'S LIPS AND PALMS. I^'^JHERE are two crowns I covet most of all — IP^I One that the clear white brows of poets wear, That singers only have the right to share ; The other that a woman's grace lets fall Upon the head of him she wills to call Her knight, and whom she singleth out to bear Her banner. But as yet, alas ! my hair Is neither shadowed by a laurel pall, Nor have my lips been crowned with Love's long kiss. I wait for both — I wait the most for this. I wait, and it may be that no warm grasp May round my living brow' the former clasp. That I may never know the latter bliss. Till lips and brow Death's lips and rough-hands' rasp. n LOVES. li ilovES vary : one is like a summer night Just after rainfall, rich with fragrant dews ; Another Love is like a shy recluse Who shuns the glaring openness of light, And folds his happiness from pubUc sight, Wandering the woods at eventide to muse. Love is a flower of vari-coloured hues. Passion an eagle of uncertain might. Some lips there are that tremble, others close ITpon their rapture ; faces that grow pale With longing, others shrouded in a veil Of reticence, or flushing as a rose. This seeks to hide emotion, that one shows In every lineament Love's written tale. =0=^ ^ THE CRUMPLED GARLAND. | tai'[Bi| |HE poet wore a wreath of many years BM\ Of labour, and of agony of thought, And straightway he the fresh green bay-leaf brought, That she might crown him whom with outpoured tears. And strong solicitude, and anxious fears. His forward footsteps had unceasing sought. He found her not, and all the fame was nought ; And, as the sturdier steed the higher rears. He bounded, vehement in passion, back. And tore the bay-leaves — slowly — one by one — Dropping his garland, uncaressed, undone. In crumpled pieces on the dusty track. What is the world to him who finds it lack The warmth and radiance of Beauty's sun? WREATHS. WREATH of oak-leaves for a runner's head, Gold for the monarch, laurel for the brow Of the successful warrior, I trow, Bay-leaves upoij the poet should be shed, And o'er the tresses of a Genius dead * To place white roses his admirers bow — Towards another coronet I vow Allegiance, to a strange ambition wed, A crown of woven ferns" and meadow-sweet. I cannot tell you why I choose this thing, But go ye into summer woods and bring The flowers of my choice with speedy feet, And I will sweep the lyre with finger fleet. For very love of recollection sing. * Over the tomb of Charles Dickens they placed a chaplet of roses. -.O.^ A VISION OF THE PAST. HAVE a Vision, clad in green and gold, Of the Past, that seemeth very sweet at times, And wakeneth an echo of old rhymes — Green for the leafage and the mossy mould And soft fern-clusters amid which we strolled, Gold for the sunlight falling branches through, Falling upon a face as bright — that's you ! And berries of the mountain-ash we hold. Do you remember ? I shall not forget. Though now ('tis in November that I write) In that sweet woodland all the leaves are wet, Symbolical of that most sorry blight Which has thought good my withered being to smite, Leaving an antique savour of regret. TH£ PHILOSOPHY OF LOVE. l^'jajlHEY sat together in an autumn wood, \w.m\ Those two — they were not very old, you know — She on a mossy pinnacle, he below, Discussing (do you think they understood The subject, wise ones, ye who wear the hood Of Learning ?) the Philosophy of Love, The lady lecturer from the rock above Discoursing, he replying as best he could. Ah, well ! one ' learned love from a lady's eyes,' Says Shakespeare, this man's task was sweeter far. More highly privileged are they that are Permitted to become in love-lore wise By teaching of the lips, albeit in sighs The lesson endeth, having left a scar. i MY LADY. WM\ ^*'^» ' ^y 1°'^^ '^ sweet, and I will seek \mS Whereto to liken her ; her eyes are grey As the grey water mingled in a creek With green, and greener than the seas are they. And browner than the golden moor-fed stream ; Her hands are wonderful, her lips are red, And as the light of morning is the beam That like a coronet crowns my lady's head ; She hath a supple fawn's advancing grace ; She hath the flushing of a mountain rose, Like some sweet lily in a shady place My lady, quiet yet most queenly, grows, Waiting for one to pluck the tender flower Wliose beauty floods with white the garden bower.' THE POET'S GRAVE. Ib'^'dJE hath sung sweetly, he hath died for me,' iSi Said Beauty, bending o'er the poet dead ; ' He hath sung sweetly, round my hero's head A wreath of farewell bay-leaves let there be. Lilies and roses likewise, in that he Was white as well as unto passion wed : And, lastly, let a pearly tear be shed In that I loved him — yea, I do love thee, Thou poor, pale corpse.' No sooner said than lo ! Across his cheek there runs a rosy flush, As of the life returning, as the snow At advent of the morning 'gins to blush, For — where are Love and Beauty, sideways rush Death's waters in a horror-stricken flow. A SPRIG OF HEATH. lO'fcjl HAVE not written sonnets lately, sweet, |rj9.^| About you, have I ? What am I to say. What melody wring from out my brain to-day Worthy your soft approving smile to meet? What flower of novel song before your feet, Already deep in blossoms, shall I lay — A rosebud, or a white acacia spray. Or golden globfed lily incomplete ? Nay, sweet, on second thoughts it shall be none Of these : cast glance of memory back, my Queen, Be quick to apprehend the thing I mean, When I recall a sprig of heath undone By careless fingers underneath a sun Of afternoon, and what you asked for glean. W^ -^ ^ THE ROSE OF NIGHT. She kept me awake, as a tune of Mozart's might do.' — Keats. |nd she kept me awake, but not tjhie same The vision, or the phantasy of sound That kept my sleepless senses still unbound And all my heart encircled by a flame, But rather as if some splpndid flower came Waving a magic mist of perfume round, And occupied my being itself, and wound About me with a most imperious claim, Coloured as is a choice kaleidoscope ; And ever and anon the clouds would rise, And, as a moon, would beam before my eyes, That far from closing ever wider ope. The form that to the craving clasp of hope Pursuing, she retreating still denies. DANTE AND BEATRICE. I'^'aiE circled round his Queen, and nearer grew IB-IUI Each fainting circle ; at each meeting-place His hands with some sweet flower she would grace, Diverse in perfume, different in hue — A gracious rose, or hyacinth-bud blue, To summon up the vision of her face, To burn before him till his steps retrace The well-worn path his former footing knew. But at the last she stood, fair, flowerless, white To nieet him ; even herself he shall attain This time, and, having traversed icy plain And fiery seas and penetrated night, Shall stride — worn weary Dante — into light, And share the sceptre of his lady's reign. ROSES FOR HER! r«jd]0SES for her ! the dark green bays for him, To adorn the furrowed brows, the weary head. Over which leaves of sorrow had been shed. As many as on the autumn breezes swim. LiHes for her ! for Dante wreathe a dim Grey crown as for one risen from the dead, Through every cell of purgatory led. For whom hell's horror mantled to the brim. ^ ^ For her the flowers of spring, for him the sere And withered branches of the later days — O Dante, great worn Dante, whom we praise. By all the ages counted first and dear. Be thine the flaming offerings of the year Being ended, hers its softer opening sprays ! 1^ ^^= -0=:?^ w^ T WW t THE LEOPARD. |WEET leopard, kill me, claw me, anything, The more you irritate me I the more Shall love your chiding — though my soul be sore. The more you tease me louder I shall sing. The further cast away the closer cling, Fiercely repelled more fervently adore ; More gracious far than any peace the war Of feelings those green catlike glances bring. Be merciful and slay me, let me know The utmost sweet abandonment of being. The extremity of a delicious woe ; Love, I am here before thee, ceased from fleeing, Be tender if thou canst, and strike me so That I may die thy face, entranced, seeing ! m ya^^Q, TO HAVE BEHELD. j|o have beheld is something — for I might Alone with my Ideal have sought in vain Through centuries of passionate absent pain Along the sunbeam's path the casting light ; But I have found it ; though the end be night, At least the fact of finding doth remain Eternal — that a lily without stain Hath blossomed, that a woman hath been white. To have beheld and loved ! if nothing more, Yet can there be a greater thing than this ? If I behold and love, what do I miss ? Am I within the shrine, or at the door ? Though Jieartbe_fain ting, every fibre -sor-e^ - If I behold and love, I also-Jdss.- /^ THE ROSIER STATUE. HIS hath been given, that the thing I sought I have also found — a flower I might love, A bird to sing to, soft as any dove. And supple, and as wayward as a thought ; Towards me such a worship hath been brought. And is it not enough ? I might have sighed •For such a vision vainly till I died. Building my silent statue all for nought. It is not so ; God gives me better things : The stone is moved and flushes, and I see No longer a white maid with marble wings, A cold ideal rounded mournfully, A shape to which Thought's speechless chisel clings, But living woman's ripe reality. THE PEARL NECKLACE. iFfSHAT can I give you, sweet ? I am but poor I^MI As men count riches, yet I have my pen. That flings aside a ruby now and then, Or emerald not all unworthy your Acceptance ; seeing I will not endure With aught save choicest jewels to bedeck That pure, unequalled, choicer Parian neck, . What gift of passionate sense can I procure ? Well, I will take my heart and string the same Upon a necklace — lady, will that do ? Each pearl shall be a sonnet, and its hue The brighter, in that tinged with blood it came. The clearer, being cleansed in the flame That burns incessant sacrifice to you. // LOVE AND IMMORTALITY. V, ' l^'nglHOSE magic dreams of boyhood ! passing sweet mMi They were, the ghmpses swift as when we see From a railway window, field and tower and tree Tom by us on the wings of motion fleet, I The flashes of a future joy to meet, ! A heaven all untrodden yet to be. 1 But present Love transcends foreboded glee, ' As April suns are pale in August heat, And youth's romance was but a star beside The moon of riper passion ; so I think It shall be when we float upon death's tide To a new shore's, another ocean's, brink ; The draught shall deeper, sweeter, be to drink Than dimly in the distance we descried. THE SERENADER. |UT at a window looked a lady fair, Set, like a miniature, sweet within the frame, And upward gazed a youth with heart aflame, Who laughing said, ' To-night I will prepare A serenade to soften all the air. And shafts of singing at that casement aim.' The night wore on, the lover never came. For pouting lips had answered, ' If you dare !' But, O sweet lady, he has done it still. He could not help it — please his fault condone; He could not find a lyre of silver tone Enough to satisfy his searching will That autumn, therefore has he sought to fill This volume with the serenader's moan. BROWN AND RED. |hat can I do to please you?' answer then Was wanting, lady, I will tell you now ; Let my poor poems round about your brow Wave as a wreath of flowers, or as when In a tiara jewels twice times ten Flash Hke red fruits that 'tween the branches bow. Accept my service, this my gift allow. The first aspiring produce of my pen. I plucked, sweet, I remember, once for you A tiny plant with tender separate leaves Of red, that olden gift I would renew ; My poem is successful if it weaves Itself within your memory, and achieves A proud position, peeping brown hair through. BROWN AND GOLD WEET colours as I think ! a golden band Mingled with black the Bride of Corinth wore, That flashed upon her lover when the door Gave sudden ingress to a snow-white hand ; And, sweet, for you a circlet I have planned, To mingle if it may be with the brown Soft tresses, and I lay it gently down — My ' poems ' namely, do you understand ? But I am too ambitious, such a gift Is not for me, but rather if I may Let me a second time my hand uplift (For once before I touched your hair in play). And, awkward as I am, I may make shift To twine therein a gold thread that shall stay. THE PEACOCK'S FEATHER. T was a peacock's feather, that old time Before, that, as a boy, tight in your hair I twisted — nothing, lady, half as fair I bring now, only a stray wreath of rhyme, No peacock's feather spotted and sublime With many eyes and Eastern colours rare — Rather a brown pale plume a man might tear From some street-sparrow in our colder clime. But take it as it is, and it may be That, touched by you, a wonder shall be done. And, as a black bird underneath the sun Shining with many coloiu-s you may see, So, suddenly across my rhyme may run Paradise-plumage, tropic brilliancy ! m \ AS OF OLD. ^ SWEET, you are not gone ? it cannot be, affll You must be waiting underneath the light. Amid the perfume, of a Northern night, And soon the moon will rise above the sea And silver, as of old, the ruin, ^^ we ? Shall wander off together out of sight. It cannot but be so — it is not rigM That anything so exquisite should flee ! No, I am certain that you still are there. Under those dreamy pale blue Northern skies. Not a day older, not an hour, as fair As ever, with-the-samedelici^wis-eyes. And panoply of sweetly pert replies, And with that same divinely-coloured-4mir. THE SAME AS EVER. NDER the dim blue Northern skies she waits The same as ever, days are but a dream ; At night again the green witch-glances gleam As fierce as ever through my fancy's gates, And shifted is the circle of the fates. Backward my strong imaginations stream. Present in living force past figures seem, And blotted are my memory's evil dates. And she is waiting, and that strange pale crown Of turquoises and pearls is on her brow, White clouds— blue spaces— never shining now Across the sky, but in that long-lost town I am present, and again am kneeling down To that Witch-Lady my sole self to vow. MY WORK. [BotSIave I left out a flower, or a shade |b.I§.B| Of colour on the wind-swept, changing grass ? Has any tint of sunset seemed to pass Into the silence of a thing unsaid ? Or have I failed to count each single braid As you might, sweet, before your looking-glass ? Each sigh, each leaf, each fleeting cloud, alas ! Deep in abysses of my memory laid, Is present with me — have I told them all? Good ; then my work is over, and I may Lean head upon the table, and let fall The pen that had so many things to say, Each second of a summer to portray. All your forgotten glances to recall. /A A HORROR AND A CALM. j]wEET, gather me some clover ' — and he stepped Over the stile into the crimson field, And she with a green hedge behind for shield, Leaned back and waited, dreamed and smiled and slept, The while he wandered onward far, and leapt To seize another flower fairer still ; But, on a sudden, came a cold sharp thrill Across him, and a horror grew and crept With slimy sickening feet throughout his brain, A The sense that she was gone — he hurried back, And let the grasses fall upon the track. And with his eyes strained wide in eager pain Met — that full tender hazel glance again ! Of flowers of love they did not find a lack. /5 KEATS THE CONQUEROR. |S'^a|EATS conquered Death, I fancy, when he said, IBiBial ' It is not Death I fear, 'tis leaving j-^tw : Not any clammy advent of the dew Of swift departure round a languid head. Nor any breaking of the final bread. Nor any farewell vision of the blue, But your face, sweet one, never more to view — This is the sting of Death, his spear-point red. His arrow of cold insertion, his damp dart;' And, as he said it. Death's defeated wings Were outspread and sonorous to depart, And, though the poet's voice no longer sings On earth, the chorus of his victory rings In the chamber of each sweet unselfish heart. 38 GOLDEN LILIES. WEET, teach me gentle secrets that thy soul Has learnt of God in early girUsh years ; Let me with outpouring of sweet calm tears My self-sufficient manhood sideways roll, And humbly touch with lips the crystal bowl Thou holdest out with timid hands and fears : No, sweet one, I have made away with sneers ; The cynic perished when his heart you stole And wrapped it in your mantle mute and pure. See, I am seated, quiet, at your feet, Waiting to gather golden lilies, sweet : Preach to me, and be confidently sure That what God's tenderness has taught to you Must be for me delicious, perfect, true. //- THE MORNING AND THE EVENING STAR. Hou art the morning, I the evening star, I I am the sun, thou art the dainty moon ; When thou art absent I am risen soon, When thou dost fade the morning is not far. And when the sun sets sadly, lo ! thy car Is shortly present for a silver boon To lovers, so we keep the world in tune, And all the tides and cloudlands that there are. The sweet significance is deeper yet. My moon, thy light is gathered from the sun. And with his kisses, lo ! thy lips are wet ; And shining soft attire he hath spun For thee, and having crossed the dark and met The evening and the morning star are one. r°= m m m ^ 1 ^mm 1 3 ^^ THE BEECH-BOLL. iB^'gal DREAMED that I was carving Rosalind's name VMJ^I Upon a beech-boll in a sweet green wood, And laughed to see the letters start out good And rapid, like white strips of cloven flame, But soon a sense of sick desire came Upon me, weak and tottering I stood, My vehemence was gone, I hardly could Move knife within the rind for tears and shame. And, as I looked, behold the sap grew red And I grew fainter — waking with a start, I saw, that, where I thought the trunk had bled. My veins were opened, that with careful art My soul's impetuous ichor I had shed. Carving the name of Rosalind on my heart. /i THE RAPTURE OF MEETING, HE meeting of two souls that have not met Through the past untraversed ages, kept apart On opposite sides of God's wide bow-bent heart, Not suffered joyfully to cross as yet The silver string of separation wet With outpoured tears of either, and the sobs Of God, whose overwhelming fancy tlirobs With tenderness and pity and regret. But they shall meet, at some gold point of time, The solitary deserts being passed. And every sand-hUl trodden o'er at last. And every mountainous sin reduced to rhyme, To hear the beating of a double chime. Heart weeping into open heart-cup fast. p " "Tr Ti- -" ^^^''^TL— " ~ " II IT '■ ■' ■' ■■ '1 II III n n THE AWE OF MEETING. ^ Ifej'i^l HAT two should meet, hereafter not to part, |l^.™| Hath an awe that God's soul only understands ; To wind together quiet wedded hands, And quiet wedded tendrils of the heart, And bear together every wound and smart. And sing together, weep together, groan ABdJdss,Jeanx,and progress^ till each is blown Under the pruning of God's kindly art Into a flower fit for another world — This is a calm conception that as yet In God's brain Heth waiting, folded, furled ; And, though our eyes with love of it are wet, The ideal far in front of us is set As-a woolly fern-bud, green, and crooked, and curled. A PERFECT LOVE. PERFECT Love proceeds by stages three, The waiting, and the ripening, and the fruit, The upward dimbing of the young green shoot Into a succulent untarnished tree. And many years to perfect each must be Shed upon its slow ascent from the root, Before its stem is fit to form a lute For God's inquisitive keen gaze to see. The fruit is in the next world ; but to one It was given to omit the middle stage. From sorrow to fruition fast to run. Turning death's blank and intermediate page With the hand that has been even as the sun To Dante's each succeeding humble age. RED ROSES. OSES to crown a courtship, and the calm And perfect liHes for a wedded pair, White cups against abundant dark-brown hair. Or golden globes to meet a quiet palm. And shed the unspeakable sense of peace and balm And immortality upon the air ; But what shall sweet victorious lovers share. What flowers gather to a low-voiced psalm. When first the next world's gates are clear to view ? Why, what but roses ? ' They had these before,' You say ? then let the roses now be new. Red roses be content and quick to pour Upon heaven's fragrant and untarnished floor. Eclipsing earth's in majesty of hue. COMPENSATION. TELL you nothing perishes, nor falls back, Nor faints into annihilation's arms. The old and unseen dainties and lost charms Are not behind but further on the track. And even now, as through a, tiny crack, We get a glimpse of ni,eadows passing fair, And feel the inspiring perfume of an air We thought our soulfs for ever were to lack. Two lovers through a toilsome mist of years Loved and endured, ahd even as a swoon The time seemed for the presence of hot tears And groans and many troubles : but they died. And slept, and woke togethfer side by side In the old strange ecstasy of the honeymoon. 46 LOVE'S CURE. [|'^a|ovE's cure is simple, for we gently take w.^l The half of our own souls we left behind Some centuries ago — a sundered mind We soften and refurbish and remake, And so we paralyse the biting ache That round us like a serpent's coil was twined, And change the cold air to a balmy wind Like that which traverses an Indian brake. The severed parts made perfect, we can feel The sense of health renewed come dancing o'er us Till the softly-maddened pulse begins to reel, New lands and towers of gold are spread before us Pure as the Atlantic to the first brave keel : So sweet a cure the Love-physician bore us. LOVE'S MEMORY. ove's memory is omnipotent ; a man Can easily remember some past age Of double Paradise, some perfect stage Before his cloven solitude began, And, straining arms of recollection, can Shake apple-blossoms on a present page From the trees of Eden, he can split the cage Of being and be godlike for a span. Yea, he can walk, as in the ancient days, With the sweet snow-white lady of his soul Through Eden's flowery sequestered ways. Recalling every rock and every knoll. And even the dew-drops on the tender sprays, Andjth£ ^idelong4o&ks-oHevej][^L-lady-stole. f THE FIRST KISS. |^<^|HE first kiss, and there came a strange new sense l^^l Of many, very many, such before ; Of wanderings on an ancient moonlit shore, Past meetings and departings, an intense Wild feeling of the falling pf a fence, And boundmg those sick broken bamers o'er To realise a union formed of yore. And plighted in primeval forests dense. With glitter of stags' eyes and flowers around, Sweet, giant, and unnamed — and many fair And wonderful great blossoms in her hair Were slowly -ivreathed, and tree-ferns waved and bound Her bosom in a bodice green, and air Made hot with misty vapour hid the ground. GOD'S HEART. l^mlY eyes were sweetly opened, and I knew mSM The mystery of Marriage, and, behold, God's heart I had the power to unfold, And bring its inmost chambers into view ; And treasures many, beautiful and new, I found therein, and memories fair and old. Loves silver, plumes and diadems of gold, And frosts and summer seasons set in blue. But in the centre bloomed two roses, one Being red, the other white ; and these were set Therein for ever, lest a man forget Whence that most sweet ideal first was spun That we call Marriage, and I knew that none Of God's thoughts had surpassed this Poem yet. OVER. Iw^^io it is over, sweet ! you never came |E^il In golden honey-scented dreams at night To tip the worship of my mouth with light. I only saw the shadow of the flame Of mine own vast desire, and the aim Of mine own bow bent backward, and the might Of mine own love — now you are fled from sight. And yet, good God, the sun has risen the same ! And harder than aught else it is to think That I shall never gather, nor will you, In any sipping of the tide of blue Whose forward march of waves we have to drink. The slightest taste upon the palate sore Of the heaven closed to each for evermore. ALICE. Alice ! Alice ! Alice ! where ain,I To go to get away from your white arms? I ran to town, you follow me -svith charms As swift as is the reaching of 'the sky From horizon to horizon^^and I try To bury myself in hell, but you are there, As the old full moon of night, as pale and fair ; Hunted and hounded, back again I fly. Have mercy, yea, a little mercy, sweet, A little until death comes, and you know At last the heart of him who loved you so— Nay, let there be no mercy in thy feet ! For me to cease to suffer is to meet Not rest, love, but annihilation's flow. /s MOUNTAIN -SUMMITS. f^ i|HY is love taken from us ? it is taken Because it was too great a thing to last, And would have overwhelmed the spirit cast From ecstasy to golden ecstasy, shaken. Drained of desire of living, and forsaken Of earthly energy ; it would have slain Our spirits with the pouring of the rain Of tears that perfect passion doth awaken. I have known two mountain-summits, and the third I can foresee ; it rises blue and sweet, And there the grass is dainty with your feet. And the gentians your voice and lips have heard, And-even as a tender-wingM-bird I am eager that far mountain-top to meet. /f THE SENSE OF DEATH. ^ l^'rajlHE sense of death is nothing, for it brings l^.^! A perfect vision of things seen aheady ; I recognise with eyesight cleansed and steady A gold-clad chorus of familiar things, And feel the fluttering of your sweet wings, And touching of your hands, and your glad breath Makes a rose-garden of the vale of death. And heaven it is for your glad voice that sings. God ! this is nothing new ; I passed before The gate of death, and felt upon my face The subtle airs of heaven, and the grace And golden glamour of the open door That leads to the eternal unbound shore, Wherrharai" in hand of mine^eTa.me-te-place. ■^^T^^^l NOT TOO LONG. r Dante, breathe upon us, that the race Be perfect and eternal in pure love ! And, Beatrice, thy golden wings above Our womanhood be calm and quick to place ; Ah ! let thy lips and the unforgotten face Lean over us and bring us into peace. Have we not loved, and is there no release ? And didst thou leave thy Dante without grace, To linger, and to struggle, and to sigh ? Dante, make us worthy, make us strong ; And, Beatrice, be pitiful, be nigh ; And, Dante, bum our passion into song, And grant that it be sweet, but not too long, Lest, inadvertent, we let death go by. WINGED PASSION. Beatrice and Dante, I can see No faces, I discern no love, but yours ! No passion is a passion that endures For a season, only that with wings to be The ripple and foretaste of eternity. And power of endless suffering that assures The soul of immortality that cures. And soothes, and fashioneth, and maketh free. O Dante, is the thing I ask too great? It is too great ; I am not worthy, I, To suffer as thou didst suffer, and to buy The blood-stained harness of a similar fate : There is not worth in any of us to mate A passion so exalted, clear, and high. THE LAST SACRIFICE. Ira'p] HAVE given you love and labour without measure, i^Q-^l And many fruits and flowers from out my hands, And robbed imagination's dainty lands. If so I might, with a gold touch of pleasure, Be as a sunbeam brightening your leisure, And you might wind your hair in statelier bands. And you have given me — a few stray sands — To cherish, and to ponder on, and treasure. These things I have given you — ^life, and toil, and trouble. And laurels, and the whisper of a name, And many a blood-red sacrifice of flame, And daily aspiration of pure breath, — I can but give you now my lungs' last bubble. There is only left the sacrifice of death. MY ROSE. N the fair garden occupied by those Loved of the poets I would place my queen, And very sure am I there hath not been Upon the grass-plots any stateHer rose, That in that garden not a flower blows With sweeter scent, or more abundant sheen Of glossy and unbroken petals seen In summer, not a bud with daintier clothes. There she shall stand for ever, and when I Am dead and she forgets my very name, My soul shall not forget to leave the sky And bend above her in the sun's red flame. And soothe her with soft showers, unknown to her My presence shall perpetually be nigh. DEATH'S TEACHING. HAT has been, is; I have lost my rose, and all The pleasure and the sweet young tears of life God prunes away with the same edge of knife By which He chose my dainty flower should fall, And she will not respond to any call, Nor shall I dart an answer to her eyes. Nor find a kindred soul in anywise On this side Death's dividing moss-fed wall. But yet, because I have learned to love in this Short episode of four-and-twenty years, And through a heaven of calm, delicious tears, Passed once to meet an unutterable bliss, I hold that when my next advancement nears, Death tenderly may teach me how to kiss. 2 / THE FAR-OFF PETALS. /S HAVE learned the way to love; the rest He keeps Till under weary soles of weary feet The utmost Alpine snows achieved are sweet, And till my spirit clears itself, and leaps To the last ridge, and tremulously peeps The first green vision of far rest to greet. Until death's clay-cold countenance I meet, And these stray ears his pitiless sickle reaps. Then I shall know the meaning of my love, And why God showed it me and hurled it back Among the glaciers on the trodden track — Those sweet departing pinions of my dove ! But now She waits far frost-bound miles above, As-a..blue geiitian»in -S'-tiny^ £racL_ LOVE'S UNITY. HERE cannot be two true loves, for the soul Is smitten by the unity of God And blooms but once, whether on heaven's sod Or where the waves of earth's salt craving roll ; But once in an existence shall the whole Of any heart be sweet between the hands Of Love, but once the vision of fair lands And far-off Canaanitish meadows stole Across the enraptured gaze of Moses ; he Was only once permitted to draw near To God upon the mountain-top and see, As the blue spaces, distant and austere. Are sundered by the branches of a tree, God's image outlined beautifully clear. i. ONE DESIRE. lliSlSI ^-^^^ °^^ desire left, to strain my voice, ISj^ Sweet lady, as your pale melodious swan. Along the corridors of Time, and don A garment fair and worthy of your choice, That you may not repent you, but rejoice. When through the future suddenly have shone The pinions for a season mute and wan. Expanding in a statelier equipoise. For I will send your name, my lady, ringing Through those impregnable, untarnished airs, Where only similar snow-white swans are singing, And as their custom is to fly in pairs, Will bear you, to my feathery outskirts clinging, Triumphantly along the solar stairs. '^. FLYING LUSTRES. I^'^JHESE flying lustres shot athwart the gloom, IpS Like a vague cloud of errant sea-gulls' wings, The hand of Love, who is not mortal, brings, Seized from mine own interminable tomb ; Some he hath ta'en occasion to exhume, And others from a novel mouth he flings. But unto all the old desire clings. And each the unchanging former flames consume. No hand of mine is here, for I am dead And buried, and forgotten long ago ; But Love's, who is immortal, risen and red. And eager — ^as a rose in fire and glow — Yet having fingers as a flake of snow. Poured for a blessing over every head. THE DEAD GODDESS; PON the sofa in my silent room There lies the image of a goddess dead, With bowed and awful amplitude of head, And white serenity of marble bloom, And I glow round her as a mystic tomb Kindled by beams from off her body shed, And unto her my songs are daily led For that strange fire which clothes her to consume. She does not hearken ; but I hurl the more. Into the bosom of that fragrant flame That swept my spirit into sound of yore Flowers and fresh grasses with a tender aim, That presently she may awake the same Sweet woman, ten times sweeter than before. 64 THE PERFUME OF THE SOUL. HERE are seasons when the fragrant soul within Leaps, as a yearning child within the womb, And shakes the fleshly fences of its tomb, Eager to mount, and rustle, and begin A life delivered from the fangs of sin And these slow passionate fires that consume ; And then the sweet soul flings a strange perfume From limbs that move and struggle, and we win At times a wild intoxicating sense Of the large life of death-land that shall be One meadow of sweet ether with no fence, One imperturbable unbounded sea, Wherein the soul shall revel, winged and free, Exulting in a magnitude intense. 6s GOLDEN SNAKES. CANNOT escape her ! on a sudden I Saw the reverse of this with golden wings Shine, as a bird of soft attire that sings From some bright branch that cleaves a summer sky : She cannot escape me ! as the seasons die Each season like to like the nearer brings, And every hour more pitilessly flings Around her form the plumes of each wild sigh And every groan I utter, for the world And life and the sweet mystery of death But seem to sever ; a delicious breath From the immortal mountain-tops unfurled Is as an infinite air of hope that saith, ' Thy pangs are golden snakes about her curled.' ^. r^ THE OPEN WOUND. |lfA'*lj|iTH solemn joy and sacred throbs of pain llaM| After mine intermittent treachery I fluttered back, sweet endless love, to thee. Seeking the old familiar perch again Upon thine hand, and there will I remain. For now mine eyes are opened, and I see That where thy tender touch has traversed me Abides a red interminable stain. I will not seek to cleanse it, but I leap, Ecstatically, infinitely, bold. And ring my wound about with rarest gold, And make it pitilessly broad and deep, That so mine ancient passion I may keep For ever moist and bleeding as of old. 67 ®^W/l UTTER GLADNESS. ow I know utter gladness passing song, Seeing that the love I fancied was away Is as the sun of heaven's endless day, Interminably luminous and strong, And tender and immovable and long, Patient of tears and languor and delay. Able to suifer underneath the grey Autumnal skies till many a gold-clad throng Of happy hours shines in the advancing spring ; Now I know utter gladness, in that I Have trampled death and time and everything, And seen, resplendent in the further sky, The form to whose departing skirts I cling Brought once for all irrevocably nigh. DEATH'S RED ROSE. If^IovE kissed me twice, and either time I said, P.Wi\ ' Love, slay me sweetly, make thy work complete, And trample with white tenderness of feet Unveiled and fair mine unreluctant head. Burn me with endless delicacy shed About me, let thine aromatic meat Be as a fragrant robe of downfall sweet, Consume me perfectly, and stroke me dead !' But Love was cruel ; for the rose I sought, Blood-stained, accomplished, and divine, and bright. He gave me but a double rose-bud white, And let me live, and smiled, and answered nought : But sure am I the red rose shall be brought When Death's, the third and last kiss, comes in sight. 69 THE NEXT KISS. to'^l AM not eager, having twice been bold |[a.OI| To stem the torrent of the stream of love, Again to test those wavelets till above The river is translated into gold ;. Love is a bird too beautiful to hold In any untransfigured earthly hand. And sings the sweeter from the heavenly land In that our feet are hidden in grasses cold. I am not eager, though the nights are long And doleful, to renew love's magic thrill. And ancient tenderness of silver song. For well I know that when I reach the hill Towards which I journey firm of foot and strong, Love's next apocalyptic kiss will kill. THE ANSWERED PRAYER. j|wEET, slay me ; so my urgent heart besought Twice in the windy tenure of my life The firmer favour of love's wavering knife, And twice my wild petition went for nought ; No boon of perfect death my lady brought, Rather a ceaseless storm of black-crowned days. The ceaseless threading of a thorny maze. And ceaseless sorry thunder-claps of thought. But yet a third time into kindly air Shall the soft plumes of my petition rise To settle downward as an answered prayer ; Sweet, slay me, I shall utter ; and the fair Shafts shall be speedy from remorseless eyes, And she shall bum me with remorseless hair. A SCARLET ROSE. HE has not slain me ; she has given me white And tender roses of her distant hands, Sounds Of her feet have fallen in neighbouring lands, And sounds of her approaching form by night. But never unveiled, beautifully bright. Present in pitiless full desire she stands : But I shall meet her on death's yellow sands As a strange awful sun's advancing light, And she shall take me very close indeed, And with her mouth, that rose of utmost red. Make every violated veinlet bleed. And then shall I be satisfied and led Towards that sweet heaven of endless life I need, Smiling like some soft child, and crowned, and dead. THE LAST MANDATE. [Stoker presence is another's ; but on me IBiiUI Descends the soft unfathomable gift Of having voice and plumes of sound to lift My lady over time's untrodden sea, As windy gulls that traverse knee to knee The hollows and the purple nests of foam, And, after, spread sweet circles round the dome That towers into white infinity. Her presence is another's ; but I hold As her last mandate flung towards my despair An amulet, a parting gift of gold, Better than e'en a trinket of her hair. ' Thou lovest me ? then be my beauty told In wingfed songs imperishably fair.' ORANGE- COLOURED FLAME. IJ^^AST year before my heart's desire was dead jB.I^I Swift songs flew round me like brown autumn leaves, Or stray gold ears from wind-divided sheaves, But now from every pore my heart has bled. And every leaf is crimson-veined and red, Yet, swift and multitudinous as before, They circle round me and aspire and soar, And cover with their mantles my bowed head. And, gathering in my hand the red strange flowers And blood-stained leaflets of autumnal song, I light the path my lost love went along, Fhnging behind her feet in flaring showers These torches to illuminate her bowers With bloody orange-coloured flame and strong. THE STORM OF BEAUTY. T times my lady seizes me and flings Her arms around mine unreluctant form And wraps me for a season in the storm, The thunder of the closing of her wings, And I am as some white glad bird that clings Against a purple cloud-breast, and I weep, And strive with shuddering fainting hands to keep That vision of unutterable things. For she bends over me as some pure cloud. And I am as a flower that will dare, Being supremely weak, to face the air That hangs above it as a sweet dim shroud ; Next, my strained body sobs with yearning, bowed Beneath the fragrant tempest of her hair. THE RESURRECTION OF THOUGHT. SplN some clear mood of mind, when thought is free, IBSiMI I see the past transfigured into Hght, And every flower is present and as bright As when my lad/s breath was sweet with me, And hands were sweet, and mingled words, when we Bathed in the silver fountains of the night. And watched the maiden moon's unfolded might Stream over the illimitable sea. And then I know that not a thought is dead, But every one shall rise with rosy wings. And white unfettered magnitude of head, Even as an eagle's first appearing springs From some wild cliff-top, and the air is shed Over his crest in sweet divided rings. 76 THE INEFFABLE FRAGRANCE. HE sweeps across me like a fragrant wind Laden with summer and a thousand fruits, And countless messages of springing shoots, Even as a gentle woman being blind, But bearing in her bosom every kind Of flower, and coloured leaf, and unctuous roots ; And as a fervent noise of answering lutes Is the -(Eolian response of my mind Blown by her spirit into endless song, Hot with the sense of summer she conveys From cornfields over which her hand delays To gather fragrance as she sweeps along, One with the winds and scents and sounds that throng The odorous woods and hills on summer days. LOVE AT THE SEPULCHRE. T times my songs of love return and shine Each as a flower of individual head, Some white, some rosy, some blood-stained and red. Marshalled in one long unimpeded line. And these with many tears and thoughts I twine To bloom about that fragrant body dead, That over her mixed petals may be shed, And spices and sweet incense I combine, To make her beauty more surpassing yet ; And many months of passion and pale days And nights torn in unutterable ways Are as strange flowers with rain of weephig wet, Woodbine, and spotted mint, and mignonette. And roses, and white hyacinthine sprays. m- 7S MORTAL. IB^^NCE clear and white the mortal woman came l^jl And softly filled the silent yearning room With a superb exuberance of bloom, A sweet and silvery excess of flame, So that I wept for mingled love and shame And terror, and her feet she seemed to pour As some strange stream of rosebuds on the floor, And fragrant as white roses were the same. She filled the room, and as for me I wept And closed my eyes and opened them again To find her stiU before me, then I slept, But through my sleep I felt upon my brain Her hands drip gently like a rose-leaf rain. Conscious of the unending watch she kept. IMMORTAL, [j^^ow clear and white the immortal woman shines, !§gBJ8| Pervading with sweet roses of her hands, And violets of her bosom, and dark strands Of endless overflowing hair she twines. Not any room, but the blue dim-seen lines Of hills, and misty spaces of the air. And rivers, and brown forests, and the fair And murmuring interstices of pines. And larches, and green hollows of the beech : As a sweet single star she shone before. But now she fills the multitudinous shore Plain in the wet reflected orb of each. And I can winnow silver grains of speech From ocean's indistinguishable roar. THE TRIUMPH OF LOVE. lE^^iNCE Love was plain before me, for at night, | K^ | Sleeping, my eyes were sundered, and, awake. Like some sweet moon reflected in a lake Surrounded with a silver stream of light I saw my lady's presence flame in sight. And, after, came a sense of roses cast In soft encompassing luxuriance fast Over my silent body, and a bright And strange unveiling of the spirit's form And immortality made visible. And death and sin and feebleness and hell. Being black, shone white beneath the fragrant storm Of snows that clothed her body sweet and warm. And every tower of separation fell. s^ A FIERY RECOMPENSE. I^'^N the deep mystery of human things l^i^l I saw that love impHes its own return- As every arrow that our bowstrings spurn Sweeps downward in inevitable rings, Love's recompence inevitably clings To the torn handles of the hearts that yeam Into the hollow blackness, and that bum And shiver at his sad receding wings. As surely as a flower being sweet And open-eyed and fearless shall be caught By the red passion of the sun's fair feet, And, in the end, inevitably brought With hot infuriated wings to meet A fiery recompence transcending thought. THE SNAKE LOVER. READ a Story of a loving snake That twined around the body of a girl, A brown and supple Hindoo, curl on curl, Raising its hood with amorous thirst to slake Its forked and sultry longing in the lake Of her sweet eyes, and so, throughout the day. The strange coils of that blood-stained lover lay Upon her, tamed and harmless for her sake. Even such a glittering serpent is my song ; Go, twine about her with swift golden links, Be present with her when she eats or drinks. And, when she sleeps, be as a curtain strong And scaly and incessant, till the long Lashes of mom are crimson at the chinks. A WOMAN'S GLORY. GOLDEN moon of my departed pleasure, That shone as a sweet lamp about my bed, Now yellow, now divinely golden-red, Lighting the room with briUiance beyond measure. As if to guide the way to4iidden treasure, Then leading me t0 winter's dark instead ; . Thou hast decejved me, goddess, thou hast shed Floods of gold incantation at thy leisure, Cruel, to torture and impoverish me. It matters little, for a woman's glory Is as the blood-stained splendour of the^ea, Whos^ multitudinous rivulets are gory Vyith souls that paid the adventurers' final fee : Thou hast but to slay me, sweet, to close the story. THE BITTERNESS OF LIFE. l^'lgtlHis is the bitterness of life, to know M.m\ That Love lies not in front but far behind, That not for violent searching shall one find A sweet-faced rose of hope beneath time's snow. Nor any flower of new joy below The furrows swept by the autumnal wind. Nor any corn-stalk when the maidens bind The golden ears in a long laughing row. This is the bitterness of life, to feel The slow-limbed noisome minutes crawl away. But not to mark by any happy peal Of silver bells the passing of a day, Tarrying till one more consciousness doth steal Into death's pine-wood, damp, obscure, and grey. 8s CHRISTMAS DAY. jJN angel came, and it was Christmas Day, With solemn robes and awful massive head, Made like unto a woman, and she said, ' There is a God, He sends me, rise and pray;' And, when I would have stoutly answered, ' Nay,' She took me by the hand and straightly led My steps, reluctant, towards a pallid shed, Deserted, wretched, wet with rain, and grey. And pushed me through the moss-grown creaking door. And, when my spirit found itself within. It cried exceedingly and sought the floor. For the world's ceaseless and discordant din Was over, and I knew that death was o'er, And life and love should certainly begin. LOVE'S ABILITIES. If^lovE came, and round about her played a sense | i».^l Of life and heaven, and sweet and sinless sleep, And plains of golden com a man might reap For ever, for there is not any fence, And powers of thought unresting and intense, And powers of love majestic, even as deep As the blue dim Atlantic, and as steep And lofty and eternal and immense As any Alpine summit crowned with snow ; And powers of passion resolute and wild. Yet tender as the green and rosy glow. Wherewith the sun, deserting us, has smiled. And gentle as a summer stream whose flow Is hindered by the crossing of a child. 87 NOUGHT. ISSearly a year has passed since Love was sweet ||gfekB| Before me, as a maiden who is brought To some fair lord, and her devout new thought Dismays and reddens her even to the feet, And any hstener may hear the beat Of the soft heart Love's claws and wings have caught ; But now I raise my eyes and there is nought Before me — save the desultory sleet. Nor shall there be another woman fair As she was, nor another love the same, Nor any such amazing wealth of hair, Nor any passion touched by such clear flame. Kindled in heaven's most crystalline air, Having God's ultimate abode for aim. THE GREAT LOVE. iRjisjiHis is the great love, even the love that says, l^^l As a soft woman pleading with her lord, ' Sweet, slay me, put a doubly-whetted sword Through me, and pierce in thine own cunning ways This breast that knoweth only how to praise, For this is mine exceeding great reward ; . And let thy cruel strong white hands be poured Over the shingle of my trembling days, Like tidal waves that thunder on a beach. Sweet, seeing I love tlree, wilt not thou be kind And wound me with some shaft of honeyed speech, Some anguish inconceivably refined. If so I may but perish and may reach. Perishing, thine inmost unexpounded mind?' HOPELESSNESS. ||rom place to place I faint, for now I know There is not any place on earth for me, ■ Nor in the heavens, nor in the hollow sea, Nor in the extreme pale solitudes of snow. Nor where like torches hell's red banners glow, Nor where the streaming iron meteors flee. Neither on any hill-top, nor the knee Of any mountain, or green vale below. From one sad song I shift me to another. Smiting sad chords and ashen-coloured strings. But vainly, for my spirit fails to smother The old imperious agony that clings As closely as a child to womb of mother, As closely as their crowns adhere to kings. 1'3 HOPE. ES, she did hear me, and her eyes were wet ; And for that sacred jewel of a tear I bless with solemn hands my lady here, That pearl of soft impersonal regret, And many a tender searching look I met, And smiles I hold beyond expression dear ; Bloomed then the last rose of my mortal year, Last, saddest, unresumable, and yet I would not change the imperishable bloom Of this my lady's everlasting rose, That glitters and is sweet within my tomb. For any fresh young laughing flower, God knows ! For, surely, to each fragrant petal clings Hope incorruptible of happier things. /. LOVE'S STAND-POINT. HERE is a point at which the burning soul I Collects, as into one tremendous flame, Each perilous desire, every aim. Determining to sacrifice the whole ; Then all God's voices and His thunders roll Like gathering tides across the shaken sand, Whereon this spirit's trembling feet do stand, And the wide earth is as a parchment scroll Engraved with fiery letters, ' Thou shalt die, And be forgotten, even as a star That flames, and it has vanished fi-om the sky- Even as a comet gleaming from afar. Approaching, and then hastening to fly — But Love is as the eternal spirits are.' THE POET'S RESURRECTION. |to||e hath sung sweetly, he hath risen to bear |8-§B.b| My name upon soft wings of soaring words To heaven ; see, he is pale, and yet he girds Himself as if to suffer and to dare Exceedingly, and hasteneth to declare My beauty, and with unexampled voice Biddeth.the stars re-echo and rejoice. And sundereth the solemn heights of air. Now am I weU-pleased, in that I have found A lover whose soft words are wingfed things, His praises as fresh rivulets of sound, And amorous speeches even as leaping springs. Or as the passionate voice that floats around A firwood, resonant in ten thousand rings. BENEATH THE OAK. CLOSED my eyes in winter ; when I woke, Or seemed to wake, the trees were new and green, • And many a flower was there, and glossy sheen Of insects, each resplendent in his cloak Of gorgeous summer, and the bird-choirs spoke, And I heard a woman's voice that seemed to say — 'Twill ring within me to my dying day — ' Hasten, I wait for thee beneath the oak, I was expecting thee;' and never more Shall any other voice be strange and sweet . As that was, though I search from shore to shore, From the blue Arctic icebergs to the heat Of the extreme South, and open every door. And try the hollows of each green retreat. A DREAM OF THE MOUNTAINS. SENSE of sleeping in between dark firs That clothe some dreamy monstrous Apennines, A sense of fragrance wafted from sweet pines Across the illimitable mountain-spurs, And then, as the awaking mind demurs. The soft discovery that a woman twines Long leafy tresses, that her splendour shines Through sleep, and that the ambrosial breath was hers. So dreamed I, and my spirit took its flight, Invulnerable, o'er the mountain-tops, On beatific pinions, softly bright As are the golden crowns of August crops ; ■■ Go where I will she follows me, nor stops. Drooping for the malignance of the night. ^M ^ 1 ^M ^ LOVE'S EARLY DEW. F I can put my soul within this book Will you not take it, lady, as a dead Pale corpse, a. faded flower whose trembling head Your pity, perhaps, may not disdain to hook Within your dress, in memory of the brook Beside whose waters once our steps were led. The fragrant ferny wood through which we fled, And every soft inviting mossy nook ? A little odour clings about it yet, A touch, a fragment of the ancient flame. Even as a shady grass-blade may be met At lioonday not devoid of modest shame, Preserving the first gift of love that came. The earliest dew wherewith its lips were wet. 96 THE LAPWING'S QUEST. 1^^ FIRST love, thou retumest on the wings ^^ Of this sweet music softly round me playing : will my soul for ever be delayiiig, Mixed with a sense of perishable things ? For through and through me this past linnet sings, Lo ! how my lady's silver voice is staying Upon the branches oi my life, betraying The soul that to that silver memory clings. Sing on, sweet dreamy voice, and pierce and swallow The ice-bound terrors of the years between : Lo ! I am as a lapwing, and will follow With burnished plumes each gesture of my queen. As these accompany o'er hill and hollow One who has trespassed on their wet demesne. KESTRELS. I^'rIf I could lift you would it not be good, |fcl.E8i| If I could lift you on the wings of song Pure, feathery, sinewy, resolute, and long, Through purple hollows of Time's dreamy wood, Until, together, hand in hand we stood On the first pink celestial mountain prong ? So let me gather voice and training strong By bitterly enforced solitude. And then, together, let us beat the airs And test the immense impregnable blue dome, Like kestrels who in wild red-breasted pairs Tower, and spread resistless plumes to roam Over the voluble cerulean stairs. Making the pathless heaven their proper home. THAT STRANGE NIGHT. H, that strange night ! the sense as if a lady Bearing in her sweet fingers all things good With pleasant smell of roses, as a shady Melodious aspen, over against me stood. The sense of melting softly in her bosom. As into beds of flowers, new-mown hay. Or some transparent odorous tall blossom. Or crimson bloom magnificent of May ; The sense of mingling, once for all, for ever. Till hair and lips and faces are but one Body supreme that Death shall fail to sever. And Life, and Time, and every moon and sun : Ah, loVe ! 'twas somewhat such as this I felt When through my trembling soul thy soul did melt. if PARTING GIFTS. WEET roses white and red my lady gave me, And olives, and brown cypress of despair, And a pure lily or two of hope to save me. And a red coral trinket from her hair, And a gold amulet most rich and fair, And a pale look of parting wild emotion When all our passion hovered in the air. Like a white sea-bird over a wild ocean, Or as a poet's passionate vivid notion Circles above the billows of his thought; — And mint and mignonette for a soft lotion, ^ And rosemary and balm my lady brought ; But most of all I love the roses white That filled her pale cheek as she fled from sight. KTlL uktS^^ ftu"^ h^-y^L (Xcx,.^ ] (!/] Primed by John Strangeways, Castle St. Leicester Sq.