And on the provost's brave ridge-tile,On the provost's grand ridge-tile,The Blackamoor first to master meI saw, I saw that winsome smile,The mouth that did my heart beguile,And spoke the great Word over me,In the land beyond the sea.
I call'd his name, I call'd aloud,Alas! I call'd on him aloud;And then he fill'd his hand with stour,And threw it towards me in the air;My mouse flew out, I lost my pow'r!
My lusty strength, my power were gone;Power was gone, and all was gone.He will not let me love him more!Of bell and whip and horse's tailHe cares not if I find a store.
But I am proud if he is fierce!I am as proud as he is fierce;I'll turn about and backward go,If I meet again that Blackamoor,And he'll help us then, for he shall knowI seek another paramour.
And we'll gang once more to yon town,Wi' better luck to yon town;We'll walk in silk and cramoisie,And I shall wed the provost's sonMy lady of the town I'll be!
For I was born a crown'd king's child,Born and nursed a king's child,King o' a land ayont the sea,Where the Blackamoor kiss'd me first,And taught me art and glamourie.
Each one in her wame shall hideHer hairy mouse, her wary mouse,Fed on madwort and agramie,—Wear amber beads between her breasts,And blind-worm's skin about her knee.
The Lombard shall be Elspie's man,Elspie's gowden husband-man;Nort shall take the lawyer's hand;The priest shall swear another vow:We'll dance again the saraband!
miminy] prim, demure. gleg] bright, sharp. wud] mad. randies] viragoes. flytin'] scolding. skirlin'] shrieking. souter] cobbler. doited] mazed. a-widdershin] the wrong way of the sun: or E. to W. through N. waled] chose. cantrip] magic. stour] dust. cramoisie] crimson. ayont] beyond. glamourie] wizardry.
Aubrey De Vere. 1814-1902
732. Serenade
SOFTLY, O midnight Hours!Move softly o'er the bowersWhere lies in happy sleep a girl so fair!For ye have power, men say,Our hearts in sleep to sway,And cage cold fancies in a moonlight snare.Round ivory neck and armEnclasp a separate charm;Hang o'er her poised, but breathe nor sigh nor prayer:Silently ye may smile,But hold your breath the while,And let the wind sweep back your cloudy hair!
Bend down your glittering urns,Ere yet the dawn returns,And star with dew the lawn her feet shall tread;Upon the air rain balm,Bid all the woods be calm,Ambrosial dreams with healthful slumbers wed;That so the Maiden mayWith smiles your care repay,When from her couch she lifts her golden head;Waking with earliest birds,Ere yet the misty herdsLeave warm 'mid the gray grass their dusky bed.
Aubrey De Vere. 1814-1902
733. Sorrow
COUNT each affliction, whether light or grave,God's messenger sent down to thee; do thouWith courtesy receive him; rise and bow;And, ere his shadow pass thy threshold, cravePermission first his heavenly feet to lave;Then lay before him all thou hast; allowNo cloud of passion to usurp thy brow,Or mar thy hospitality; no waveOf mortal tumult to obliterateThe soul's marmoreal calmness: Grief should be,Like joy, majestic, equable, sedate;Confirming, cleansing, raising, making free;Strong to consume small troubles; to commendGreat thoughts, grave thoughts, thoughts lasting to the end.
George Fox. 1815-?
734. The County of Mayo FROM THE IRISH OF THOMAS LAVELLE
ON the deck of Patrick Lynch's boat I sat in woful plight,Through my sighing all the weary day and weeping all the night;Were it not that full of sorrow from my people forth I go,By the blessed sun! 'tis royally I'd sing thy praise, Mayo!
When I dwelt at home in plenty, and my gold did much abound,In the company of fair young maids the Spanish ale went round—'Tis a bitter change from those gay days that now I'm forced to goAnd must leave my bones in Santa Cruz, far from my own Mayo.
They are alter'd girls in Irrul now; 'tis proud they're grown andhigh,With their hair-bags and their top-knots, for I pass their bucklesby—But it 's little now I heed their airs, for God will have it so,That I must depart for foreign lands and leave my sweet Mayo.
'Tis my grief that Patrick Loughlin is not Earl of Irrul still,And that Brian Duff no longer rules as Lord upon the hill:And that Colonel Hugh McGrady should be lying dead and low,And I sailing, sailing swiftly from the county of Mayo.
Emily Bronte. 1818-1848
735. My Lady's Grave
THE linnet in the rocky dells,The moor-lark in the air,The bee among the heather bellsThat hide my lady fair:
The wild deer browse above her breast;The wild birds raise their brood;And they, her smiles of love caress'd,Have left her solitude!
I ween that when the grave's dark wallDid first her form retain,They thought their hearts could ne'er recallThe light of joy again.
They thought the tide of grief would flowUncheck'd through future years;But where is all their anguish now,And where are all their tears?
Well, let them fight for honour's breath,Or pleasure's shade pursue—The dweller in the land of deathIs changed and careless too.
And if their eyes should watch and weepTill sorrow's source were dry,She would not, in her tranquil sleep,Return a single sigh!
Blow, west wind, by the lonely mound:And murmur, summer streams!There is no need of other soundTo soothe my lady's dreams.
Emily Bronte. 1818-1848
736. Remembrance
COLD in the earth—and the deep snow piled above thee,Far, far removed, cold in the dreary grave!Have I forgot, my only Love, to love thee,Sever'd at last by Time's all-severing wave?
Now, when alone, do my thoughts no longer hoverOver the mountains, on that northern shore,Resting their wings where heath and fern-leaves coverThy noble heart for ever, ever more?
Cold in the earth—and fifteen wild DecembersFrom those brown hills have melted into spring:Faithful, indeed, is the spirit that remembersAfter such years of change and suffering!
Sweet Love of youth, forgive, if I forget thee,While the world's tide is bearing me along;Other desires and other hopes beset me,Hopes which obscure, but cannot do thee wrong!
No later light has lighten'd up my heaven,No second morn has ever shone for me;All my life's bliss from thy dear life was given,All my life's bliss is in the grave with thee.
But when the days of golden dreams had perish'd,And even Despair was powerless to destroy;Then did I learn how existence could be cherish'd,Strengthen'd and fed without the aid of joy.
Then did I check the tears of useless passion—Wean'd my young soul from yearning after thine;Sternly denied its burning wish to hastenDown to that tomb already more than mine.
And, even yet, I dare not let it languish,Dare not indulge in memory's rapturous pain;Once drinking deep of that divinest anguish,How could I seek the empty world again?
Emily Bronte. 1818-1848
737. The Prisoner
STILL let my tyrants know, I am not doom'd to wearYear after year in gloom and desolate despair;A messenger of Hope comes every night to me,And offers for short life, eternal liberty.
He comes with Western winds, with evening's wandering airs,With that clear dusk of heaven that brings the thickest stars:Winds take a pensive tone, and stars a tender fire,And visions rise, and change, that kill me with desire.
Desire for nothing known in my maturer years,When Joy grew mad with awe, at counting future tears:When, if my spirit's sky was full of flashes warm,I knew not whence they came, from sun or thunder-storm.
But first, a hush of peace—a soundless calm descends;The struggle of distress and fierce impatience ends.Mute music soothes my breast—unutter'd harmonyThat I could never dream, till Earth was lost to me.
Then dawns the Invisible; the Unseen its truth reveals;My outward sense is gone, my inward essence feels;Its wings are almost free—its home, its harbour found,Measuring the gulf, it stoops, and dares the final bound.
O dreadful is the check—intense the agony—When the ear begins to hear, and the eye begins to see;When the pulse begins to throb—the brain to think again—The soul to feel the flesh, and the flesh to feel the chain.
Yet I would lose no sting, would wish no torture less;The more that anguish racks, the earlier it will bless;And robed in fires of hell, or bright with heavenly shine,If it but herald Death, the vision is divine.
Emily Bronte. 1818-1848
738. Last Lines
NO coward soul is mine,No trembler in the world's storm-troubled sphere:I see Heaven's glories shine,And faith shines equal, arming me from fear.
O God within my breast,Almighty, ever-present Deity!Life—that in me has rest,As I—undying Life—have power in Thee!
Vain are the thousand creedsThat move men's hearts: unutterably vain;Worthless as wither'd weeds,Or idlest froth amid the boundless main,
To waken doubt in oneHolding so fast by Thine infinity;So surely anchor'd onThe steadfast rock of immortality.
With wide-embracing loveThy Spirit animates eternal years,Pervades and broods above,Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, and rears.
Though earth and man were gone,And suns and universes cease to be,And Thou were left alone,Every existence would exist in Thee.
There is not room for Death,Nor atom that his might could render void:Thou—Thou art Being and Breath,And what Thou art may never be destroyed.
Charles Kingsley. 1819-1875
739. Airly Beacon
AIRLY Beacon, Airly Beacon;O the pleasant sight to seeShires and towns from Airly Beacon,While my love climb'd up to me!
Airly Beacon, Airly Beacon;O the happy hours we layDeep in fern on Airly Beacon,Courting through the summer's day!
Airly Beacon, Airly Beacon;O the weary haunt for me,All alone on Airly Beacon,With his baby on my knee!
Charles Kingsley. 1819-1875
740. The Sands of Dee
'O MARY, go and call the cattle home,And call the cattle home,And call the cattle home,Across the sands of Dee.'The western wind was wild and dark with foam,And all alone went she.
The western tide crept up along the sand,And o'er and o'er the sand,And round and round the sand,As far as eye could see.The rolling mist came down and hid the land:And never home came she.
'O is it weed, or fish, or floating hair—A tress of golden hair,A drowned maiden's hair,Above the nets at sea?'Was never salmon yet that shone so fairAmong the stakes of Dee.
They row'd her in across the rolling foam,The cruel crawling foam,The cruel hungry foam,To her grave beside the sea.But still the boatmen hear her call the cattle home,Across the sands of Dee.
Arthur Hugh Clough. 1819-1861
741. Say not the Struggle Naught availeth
SAY not the struggle naught availeth,The labour and the wounds are vain,The enemy faints not, nor faileth,And as things have been they remain.
If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;It may be, in yon smoke conceal'd,Your comrades chase e'en now the fliers,And, but for you, possess the field.
For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,Seem here no painful inch to gain,Far back, through creeks and inlets making,Comes silent, flooding in, the main.
And not by eastern windows only,When daylight comes, comes in the light;In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly!But westward, look, the land is bright!
Walt Whitman. 1819-1892
742. The Imprisoned Soul
AT the last, tenderly,From the walls of the powerful, fortress'd house,From the clasp of the knitted locks—from the keep of the well-closeddoors,Let me be wafted.
Let me glide noiselessly forth;With the key of softness unlock the locks—with a whisperSet ope the doors, O soul!
Tenderly! be not impatient!(Strong is your hold, O mortal flesh!Strong is your hold, O love!)
Walt Whitman. 1819-1892
743. O Captain! My Captain!
O CAPTAIN! my Captain! our fearful trip is done,The ship has weather'd every rack, the prize we sought is won,The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;But O heart! heart! heart!O the bleeding drops of red!Where on the deck my Captain lies,Fallen cold and dead.
O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills,For you bouquets and ribbon'd wreaths—for you the shores crowding,For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;Here, Captain! dear father!This arm beneath your head!It is some dream that on the deckYou've fallen cold and dead.
My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still,My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;The ship is anchor'd safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;Exult, O shores! and ring, O bells!But I, with mournful tread,Walk the deck my Captain lies,Fallen cold and dead.
John Ruskin. 1819-1900
744. Trust Thou Thy Love
TRUST thou thy Love: if she be proud, is she not sweet?Trust thou thy Love: if she be mute, is she not pure?Lay thou thy soul full in her hands, low at her feet;Fail, Sun and Breath!—yet, for thy peace, She shall endure.
Ebenezer Jones. 1820-1860
745. When the World is burning
WHEN the world is burning,Fired within, yet turningRound with face unscathed;Ere fierce flames, uprushing,O'er all lands leap, crushing,Till earth fall, fire-swathed;Up amidst the meadows,Gently through the shadows,Gentle flames will glide,Small, and blue, and golden.Though by bard beholden,When in calm dreams folden,—Calm his dreams will bide.
Where the dance is sweeping,Through the greensward peeping,Shall the soft lights start;Laughing maids, unstaying,Deeming it trick-playing,High their robes upswaying,O'er the lights shall dart;And the woodland haunterShall not cease to saunterWhen, far down some glade,Of the great world's burning,One soft flame upturningSeems, to his discerning,Crocus in the shade.
Frederick Locker-Lampson. 1821-1895
746. At Her Window
BEATING Heart! we come againWhere my Love reposes;This is Mabel's window-pane;These are Mabel's roses.
Is she nested? Does she kneelIn the twilight stilly,Lily clad from throat to heel,She, my virgin Lily?
Soon the wan, the wistful stars,Fading, will forsake her;Elves of light, on beamy bars,Whisper then, and wake her.
Let this friendly pebble pleadAt her flowery grating;If she hear me will she heed?Mabel, I am waiting.
Mabel will be deck'd anon,Zoned in bride's apparel;Happy zone! O hark to yonPassion-shaken carol!
Sing thy song, thou tranced thrush,Pipe thy best, thy clearest;—Hush, her lattice moves, O hush—Dearest Mabel!—dearest…
Matthew Arnold. 1822-1888
747. The Forsaken Merman
COME, dear children, let us away;Down and away below.Now my brothers call from the bay;Now the great winds shoreward blow;Now the salt tides seaward flow;Now the wild white horses play,Champ and chafe and toss in the spray.Children dear, let us away.This way, this way!
Call her once before you go.Call once yet.In a voice that she will know:'Margaret! Margaret!'Children's voices should be dear(Call once more) to a mother's ear;Children's voices, wild with pain.Surely she will come again.Call her once and come away.This way, this way!'Mother dear, we cannot stay.'The wild white horses foam and fret.Margaret! Margaret!
Come, dear children, come away down.Call no more.One last look at the white-wall'd town,And the little grey church on the windy shore.Then come down.She will not come though you call all day.Come away, come away.Children dear, was it yesterdayWe heard the sweet bells over the bay?In the caverns where we lay,Through the surf and through the swell,The far-off sound of a silver bell?Sand-strewn caverns, cool and deep,Where the winds are all asleep;Where the spent lights quiver and gleam;Where the salt weed sways in the stream;Where the sea-beasts, ranged all round,Feed in the ooze of their pasture-ground;Where the sea-snakes coil and twine,Dry their mail, and bask in the brine;Where great whales come sailing by,Sail and sail, with unshut eye,Round the world for ever and aye?When did music come this way?Children dear, was it yesterday?
Children dear, was it yesterday(Call yet once) that she went away?Once she sate with you and me,On a red gold throne in the heart of the sea,And the youngest sate on her knee.She comb'd its bright hair, and she tended it well,When down swung the sound of the far-off bell.She sigh'd, she look'd up through the clear green sea.She said, 'I must go, for my kinsfolk prayIn the little grey church on the shore to-day.'Twill be Easter-time in the world—ah me!And I lose my poor soul, Merman, here with thee.'I said, 'Go up, dear heart, through the waves.Say thy prayer, and come back to the kind sea-caves.'She smiled, she went up through the surf in the bay.Children dear, was it yesterday?
Children dear, were we long alone?'The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan.Long prayers,' I said, 'in the world they say.Come,' I said, and we rose through the surf in the bay.We went up the beach, by the sandy downWhere the sea-stocks bloom, to the white-wall'd town.Through the narrow paved streets, where all was still,To the little grey church on the windy hill.From the church came a murmur of folk at their prayers,But we stood without in the cold-blowing airs.We climb'd on the graves, on the stones worn with rains,And we gazed up the aisle through the small leaded panes.She sate by the pillar; we saw her dear:'Margaret, hist! come quick, we are here.Dear heart,' I said, 'we are long alone.The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan.'But, ah! she gave me never a look,For her eyes were seal'd to the holy book.Loud prays the priest; shut stands the door.Came away, children, call no more.Come away, come down, call no more.
Down, down, down;Down to the depths of the sea.She sits at her wheel in the humming town,Singing most joyfully.Hark what she sings: 'O joy, O joy,For the humming street, and the child with its toy.For the priest, and the bell, and the holy well.For the wheel where I spun,And the blessed light of the sun.'And so she sings her fill,Singing most joyfully,Till the shuttle falls from her hand,And the whizzing wheel stands still.She steals to the window, and looks at the sand;And over the sand at the sea;And her eyes are set in a stare;And anon there breaks a sigh,And anon there drops a tear,From a sorrow-clouded eye,And a heart sorrow-laden,A long, long sighFor the cold strange eyes of a little Mermaiden,And the gleam of her golden hair.
Come away, away, children.Come children, come down.The hoarse wind blows colder;Lights shine in the town.She will start from her slumberWhen gusts shake the door;She will hear the winds howling,Will hear the waves roar.We shall see, while above usThe waves roar and whirl,A ceiling of amber,A pavement of pearl.Singing, 'Here came a mortal,But faithless was she:And alone dwell for everThe kings of the sea.'
But, children, at midnight,When soft the winds blow;When clear falls the moonlight;When spring-tides are low:When sweet airs come seawardFrom heaths starr'd with broom;And high rocks throw mildlyOn the blanch'd sands a gloom:Up the still, glistening beaches,Up the creeks we will hie;Over banks of bright seaweedThe ebb-tide leaves dry.We will gaze, from the sand-hills,At the white, sleeping town;At the church on the hill-side—And then come back down.Singing, 'There dwells a loved one,But cruel is she.She left lonely for everThe kings of the sea.'
Matthew Arnold. 1822-1888
748. The Song of Callicles
THROUGH the black, rushing smoke-bursts,Thick breaks the red flame.All Etna heaves fiercelyHer forest-clothed frame.
Not here, O Apollo!Are haunts meet for thee.But, where Helicon breaks downIn cliff to the sea.
Where the moon-silver'd inletsSend far their light voiceUp the still vale of Thisbe,O speed, and rejoice!
On the sward at the cliff-top,Lie strewn the white flocks;On the cliff-side, the pigeonsRoost deep in the rocks.
In the moonlight the shepherds,Soft lull'd by the rills,Lie wrapt in their blankets,Asleep on the hills.
—What forms are these comingSo white through the gloom?What garments out-glisteningThe gold-flower'd broom?
What sweet-breathing PresenceOut-perfumes the thyme?What voices enraptureThe night's balmy prime?—
'Tis Apollo comes leadingHis choir, The Nine.—The Leader is fairest,But all are divine.
They are lost in the hollows.They stream up again.What seeks on this mountainThe glorified train?—
They bathe on this mountain,In the spring by their road.Then on to Olympus,Their endless abode.
—Whose praise do they mention:Of what is it told?—What will be for ever.What was from of old.
First hymn they the FatherOf all things: and then,The rest of Immortals,The action of men.
The Day in his hotness,The strife with the palm;The Night in her silence,The Stars in their calm.
Matthew Arnold. 1822-1888
749. To Marguerite
YES: in the sea of life enisled,With echoing straits between us thrown.Dotting the shoreless watery wild,We mortal millions live alone.The islands feel the enclasping flow,And then their endless bounds they know.
But when the moon their hollows lights,And they are swept by balms of spring,And in their glens, on starry nights,The nightingales divinely sing;And lovely notes, from shore to shore,Across the sounds and channels pour;
O then a longing like despairIs to their farthest caverns sent!For surely once, they feel, we wereParts of a single continent.Now round us spreads the watery plain—O might our marges meet again!
Who order'd that their longing's fireShould be, as soon as kindled, cool'd?Who renders vain their deep desire?—A God, a God their severance ruled;And bade betwixt their shores to beThe unplumb'd, salt, estranging sea.
Matthew Arnold. 1822-1888
750. Requiescat
STREW on her roses, roses,And never a spray of yew.In quiet she reposes:Ah! would that I did too.
Her mirth the world required:She bathed it in smiles of glee.But her heart was tired, tired,And now they let her be.
Her life was turning, turning,In mazes of heat and sound.But for peace her soul was yearning,And now peace laps her round.
Her cabin'd, ample Spirit,It flutter'd and fail'd for breath.To-night it doth inheritThe vasty hall of Death.
Matthew Arnold. 1822-1888
751. The Scholar-Gipsy
GO, for they call you, Shepherd, from the hill;Go, Shepherd, and untie the wattled cotes:No longer leave thy wistful flock unfed,Nor let thy bawling fellows rack their throats,Nor the cropp'd grasses shoot another head.But when the fields are still,And the tired men and dogs all gone to rest,And only the white sheep are sometimes seenCross and recross the strips of moon-blanch'd green;Come Shepherd, and again begin the quest.
Here, where the reaper was at work of late,In this high field's dark corner, where he leavesHis coat, his basket, and his earthen cruise,And in the sun all morning binds the sheaves,Then here, at noon, comes back his stores to use;Here will I sit and wait,While to my ear from uplands far awayThe bleating of the folded flocks is borne,With distant cries of reapers in the corn—All the live murmur of a summer's day.
Screen'd is this nook o'er the high, half-reap'd field,And here till sundown, Shepherd, will I be.Through the thick corn the scarlet poppies peep,And round green roots and yellowing stalks I seePale blue convolvulus in tendrils creep:And air-swept lindens yieldTheir scent, and rustle down their perfumed showersOf bloom on the bent grass where I am laid,And bower me from the August sun with shade;And the eye travels down to Oxford's towers:
And near me on the grass lies Glanvil's book—Come, let me read the oft-read tale again:The story of that Oxford scholar poor,Of pregnant parts and quick inventive brain,Who, tired of knocking at Preferment's door,One summer morn forsookHis friends, and went to learn the Gipsy lore,And roam'd the world with that wild brotherhood,And came, as most men deem'd, to little good,But came to Oxford and his friends no more.
But once, years after, in the country lanes,Two scholars, whom at college erst he knew,Met him, and of his way of life inquired.Whereat he answer'd that the Gipsy crew,His mates, had arts to rule as they desiredThe workings of men's brains;And they can bind them to what thoughts they will:'And I,' he said, 'the secret of their art,When fully learn'd, will to the world impart:But it needs Heaven-sent moments for this skill!'
This said, he left them, and return'd no more,But rumours hung about the country-side,That the lost Scholar long was seen to stray,Seen by rare glimpses, pensive and tongue-tied,In hat of antique shape, and cloak of grey,The same the Gipsies wore.Shepherds had met him on the Hurst in spring;At some lone alehouse in the Berkshire moors,On the warm ingle-bench, the smock-frock'd boorsHad found him seated at their entering,
But 'mid their drink and clatter, he would fly:And I myself seem half to know thy looks,And put the shepherds, Wanderer, on thy trace;And boys who in lone wheatfields scare the rooksI ask if thou hast pass'd their quiet place;Or in my boat I lieMoor'd to the cool bank in the summer heats,'Mid wide grass meadows which the sunshine fills,And watch the warm green-muffled Cumnor hills,And wonder if thou haunt'st their shy retreats.
For most, I know, thou lov'st retired ground.Thee, at the ferry, Oxford riders blithe,Returning home on summer nights, have metCrossing the stripling Thames at Bablock-hithe,Trailing in the cool stream thy fingers wet,As the slow punt swings round:And leaning backwards in a pensive dream,And fostering in thy lap a heap of flowersPluck'd in shy fields and distant Wychwood bowers,And thine eyes resting on the moonlit stream:
And then they land, and thou art seen no more.Maidens who from the distant hamlets comeTo dance around the Fyfield elm in May,Oft through the darkening fields have seen thee roam,Or cross a stile into the public way.Oft thou hast given them storeOf flowers—the frail-leaf'd, white anemone—Dark bluebells drench'd with dews of summer eves,And purple orchises with spotted leaves—But none has words she can report of thee.
And, above Godstow Bridge, when hay-time 's hereIn June, and many a scythe in sunshine flames,Men who through those wide fields of breezy grassWhere black-wing'd swallows haunt the glittering Thames,To bathe in the abandon'd lasher pass,Have often pass'd thee nearSitting upon the river bank o'ergrown:Mark'd thine outlandish garb, thy figure spare,Thy dark vague eyes, and soft abstracted air;But, when they came from bathing, thou wert gone.
At some lone homestead in the Cumnor hills,Where at her open door the housewife darns,Thou hast been seen, or hanging on a gateTo watch the threshers in the mossy barns.Children, who early range these slopes and lateFor cresses from the rills,Have known thee watching, all an April day,The springing pastures and the feeding kine;And mark'd thee, when the stars come out and shine,Through the long dewy grass move slow away.
In autumn, on the skirts of Bagley Wood,Where most the Gipsies by the turf-edged wayPitch their smoked tents, and every bush you seeWith scarlet patches tagg'd and shreds of gray,Above the forest-ground call'd Thessaly—The blackbird picking foodSees thee, nor stops his meal, nor fears at all;So often has he known thee past him strayRapt, twirling in thy hand a wither'd spray,And waiting for the spark from Heaven to fall.
And once, in winter, on the causeway chillWhere home through flooded fields foot-travellers go,Have I not pass'd thee on the wooden bridgeWrapt in thy cloak and battling with the snow,Thy face towards Hinksey and its wintry ridge?And thou hast climb'd the hillAnd gain'd the white brow of the Cumnor range;Turn'd once to watch, while thick the snowflakes fall,The line of festal light in Christ Church hall—Then sought thy straw in some sequester'd grange.
But what—I dream! Two hundred years are flownSince first thy story ran through Oxford halls,And the grave Glanvil did the tale inscribeThat thou wert wander'd from the studious wallsTo learn strange arts, and join a Gipsy tribe:And thou from earth art goneLong since and in some quiet churchyard laid;Some country nook, where o'er thy unknown graveTall grasses and white flowering nettles wave—Under a dark red-fruited yew-tree's shade.
—No, no, thou hast not felt the lapse of hours.For what wears out the life of mortal men?'Tis that from change to change their being rolls:'Tis that repeated shocks, again, again,Exhaust the energy of strongest souls,And numb the elastic powers.Till having used our nerves with bliss and teen,And tired upon a thousand schemes our wit,To the just-pausing Genius we remitOur worn-out life, and are—what we have been.
Thou hast not lived, why shouldst thou perish, so?Thou hadst one aim, one business, one desire:Else wert thou long since number'd with the dead—Else hadst thou spent, like other men, thy fire.The generations of thy peers are fled,And we ourselves shall go;But thou possessest an immortal lot,And we imagine thee exempt from ageAnd living as thou liv'st on Glanvil's page,Because thou hadst—what we, alas, have not!
For early didst thou leave the world, with powersFresh, undiverted to the world without,Firm to their mark, not spent on other things;Free from the sick fatigue, the languid doubt,Which much to have tried, in much been baffled, brings.O Life unlike to ours!Who fluctuate idly without term or scope,Of whom each strives, nor knows for what he strives,And each half lives a hundred different lives;Who wait like thee, but not, like thee, in hope.
Thou waitest for the spark from Heaven: and we,Vague half-believers of our casual creeds,Who never deeply felt, nor clearly will'd,Whose insight never has borne fruit in deeds,Whose weak resolves never have been fulfill'd;For whom each year we seeBreeds new beginnings, disappointments new;Who hesitate and falter life away,And lose to-morrow the ground won to-day—Ah, do not we, Wanderer, await it too?
Yes, we await it, but it still delays,And then we suffer; and amongst us One,Who most has suffer'd, takes dejectedlyHis seat upon the intellectual throne;And all his store of sad experience heLays bare of wretched days;Tells us his misery's birth and growth and signs,And how the dying spark of hope was fed,And how the breast was soothed, and how the head,And all his hourly varied anodynes.
This for our wisest: and we others pine,And wish the long unhappy dream would end,And waive all claim to bliss, and try to bear,With close-lipp'd Patience for our only friend,Sad Patience, too near neighbour to Despair:But none has hope like thine.Thou through the fields and through the woods dost stray,Roaming the country-side, a truant boy,Nursing thy project in unclouded joy,And every doubt long blown by time away.
O born in days when wits were fresh and clear,And life ran gaily as the sparkling Thames;Before this strange disease of modern life,With its sick hurry, its divided aims,Its heads o'ertax'd, its palsied hearts, was rife—Fly hence, our contact fear!Still fly, plunge deeper in the bowering wood!Averse, as Dido did with gesture sternFrom her false friend's approach in Hades turn,Wave us away, and keep thy solitude.
Still nursing the unconquerable hope,Still clutching the inviolable shade,With a free onward impulse brushing through,By night, the silver'd branches of the glade—Far on the forest-skirts, where none pursue,On some mild pastoral slopeEmerge, and resting on the moonlit pales,Freshen they flowers, as in former years,With dew, or listen with enchanted ears,From the dark dingles, to the nightingales.
But fly our paths, our feverish contact fly!For strong the infection of our mental strife,Which, though it gives no bliss, yet spoils for rest;And we should win thee from they own fair life,Like us distracted, and like us unblest.Soon, soon thy cheer would die,Thy hopes grow timorous, and unfix'd they powers,And they clear aims be cross and shifting made:And then thy glad perennial youth would fade,Fade, and grow old at last, and die like ours.
Then fly our greetings, fly our speech and smiles!—As some grave Tyrian trader, from the sea,Descried at sunrise an emerging prowLifting the cool-hair'd creepers stealthily,The fringes of a southward-facing browAmong the Aegean isles;And saw the merry Grecian coaster come,Freighted with amber grapes, and Chian wine,Green bursting figs, and tunnies steep'd in brine;And knew the intruders on his ancient home,
The young light-hearted Masters of the waves;And snatch'd his rudder, and shook out more sail,And day and night held on indignantlyO'er the blue Midland waters with the gale,Betwixt the Syrtes and soft Sicily,To where the Atlantic ravesOutside the Western Straits, and unbent sailsThere, where down cloudy cliffs, through sheets of foam,Shy traffickers, the dark Iberians come;And on the beach undid his corded bales.
Matthew Arnold. 1822-1888
752. Philomela
HARK! ah, the Nightingale!The tawny-throated!Hark! from that moonlit cedar what a burst!What triumph! hark—what pain!
O Wanderer from a Grecian shore,Still, after many years, in distant lands,Still nourishing in thy bewilder'd brainThat wild, unquench'd, deep-sunken, old-world pain—Say, will it never heal?And can this fragrant lawnWith its cool trees, and night,And the sweet, tranquil Thames,And moonshine, and the dew,To thy rack'd heart and brainAfford no balm?
Dost thou to-night beholdHere, through the moonlight on this English grass,The unfriendly palace in the Thracian wild?Dost thou again peruseWith hot cheeks and sear'd eyesThe too clear web, and thy dumb Sister's shame?Dost thou once more assayThy flight, and feel come over thee,Poor Fugitive, the feathery changeOnce more, and once more seem to make resoundWith love and hate, triumph and agony,Lone Daulis, and the high Cephissian vale?Listen, Eugenia—How thick the bursts come crowding through the leaves!Again—thou hearest!Eternal Passion!Eternal Pain!
Matthew Arnold. 1822-1888
753. Shakespeare
OTHERS abide our question. Thou art free.We ask and ask: Thou smilest and art still,Out-topping knowledge. For the loftiest hillThat to the stars uncrowns his majesty,Planting his steadfast footsteps in the sea,Making the heaven of heavens his dwelling-place,Spares but the cloudy border of his baseTo the foil'd searching of mortality;And thou, who didst the stars and sunbeams know,Self-school'd, self-scann'd, self-honour'd, self-secure,Didst walk on earth unguess'd at. Better so!All pains the immortal spirit must endure,All weakness that impairs, all griefs that bow,Find their sole voice in that victorious brow.
Matthew Arnold. 1822-1888
754. From the Hymn of Empedocles
IS it so small a thingTo have enjoy'd the sun,To have lived light in the spring,To have loved, to have thought, to have done;To have advanced true friends, and beat down baffling foes;
That we must feign a blissOf doubtful future date,And while we dream on thisLose all our present state,And relegate to worlds yet distant our repose?
Not much, I know, you prizeWhat pleasures may be had,Who look on life with eyesEstranged, like mine, and sad:And yet the village churl feels the truth more than you;
Who 's loth to leave this lifeWhich to him little yields:His hard-task'd sunburnt wife,His often-labour'd fields;The boors with whom he talk'd, the country spots he knew.
But thou, because thou hear'stMen scoff at Heaven and Fate;Because the gods thou fear'stFail to make blest thy state,Tremblest, and wilt not dare to trust the joys there are.
I say, Fear not! life stillLeaves human effort scope.But, since life teems with ill,Nurse no extravagant hope.Because thou must not dream, thou need'st not then despair.
William Brighty Rands. 1823-1880
755. The Flowers
WHEN Love arose in heart and deedTo wake the world to greater joy,'What can she give me now?' said Greed,Who thought to win some costly toy.
He rose, he ran, he stoop'd, he clutch'd;And soon the Flowers, that Love let fall,In Greed's hot grasp were fray'd and smutch'd,And Greed said, 'Flowers! Can this be all?'
He flung them down and went his way,He cared no jot for thyme or rose;But boys and girls came out to play,And some took these and some took those—
Red, blue, and white, and green and gold;And at their touch the dew return'd,And all the bloom a thousandfold—So red, so ripe, the roses burn'd!
William Brighty Rands. 1823-1880
756. The Thought
INTO the skies, one summer's day,I sent a little Thought away;Up to where, in the blue round,The sun sat shining without sound.
Then my Thought came back to me.—Little Thought, what did you seeIn the regions whence you come?And when I spoke, my Thought was dumb.
But she breathed of what was there,In the pure bright upper air;And, because my Thought so shone,I knew she had been shone upon.
Next, by night a Thought I sentUp into the firmament;When the eager stars were out,And the still moon shone about.
And my Thought went past the moonIn between the stars, but soonHeld her breath and durst not stir,For the fear that covered her;Then she thought, in this demur:
'Dare I look beneath the shade,Into where the worlds are made;Where the suns and stars are wrought?Shall I meet another Thought?
'Will that other Thought have wings?Shall I meet strange, heavenly things?Thought of Thoughts, and Light of Lights,Breath of Breaths, and Night of Nights?'
Then my Thought began to harkIn the illuminated dark,Till the silence, over, under,Made her heart beat more than thunder.
And my Thought, came trembling back,But with something on her track,And with something at her side;Nor till she has lived and died,Lived and died, and lived again,Will that awful thing seem plain.
William Philpot. 1823-1889
757. Maritae Suae
OF all the flowers rising now,Thou only saw'st the headOf that unopen'd drop of snowI placed beside thy bed.
In all the blooms that blow so fast,Thou hast no further part,Save those the hour I saw thee last,I laid above thy heart.
Two snowdrops for our boy and girl,A primrose blown for me,Wreathed with one often-play'd-with curlFrom each bright head for thee.
And so I graced thee for thy grave,And made these tokens fastWith that old silver heart I gave,My first gift—and my last.
I dream'd, her babe upon her breast,Here she might lie and calmly restHer happy eyes on that far hillThat backs the landscape fresh and still.
I hoped her thoughts would thrid the boughsWhere careless birds on love carouse,And gaze those apple-blossoms throughTo revel in the boundless blue.
But now her faculty of sightIs elder sister to the light,And travels free and unconfinedThrough dense and rare, through form and mind.
Or else her life to be completeHath found new channels full and meet—Then, O, what eyes are leaning o'er,If fairer than they were before!
William (Johnson) Cory. 1823-1892
758. Mimnermus in Church
YOU promise heavens free from strife,Pure truth, and perfect change of will;But sweet, sweet is this human life,So sweet, I fain would breathe it still;Your chilly stars I can forgo,This warm kind world is all I know.
You say there is no substance here,One great reality above:Back from that void I shrink in fear,And child-like hide myself in love:Show me what angels feel. Till thenI cling, a mere weak man, to men.
You bid me lift my mean desiresFrom faltering lips and fitful veinsTo sexless souls, ideal quires,Unwearied voices, wordless strains:My mind with fonder welcome ownsOne dear dead friend's remember'd tones.
Forsooth the present we must giveTo that which cannot pass away;All beauteous things for which we liveBy laws of time and space decay.But O, the very reason whyI clasp them, is because they die.
William (Johnson) Cory. 1823-1892
759. Heraclitus
THEY told me, Heraclitus, they told me you were dead,They brought me bitter news to hear and bitter tears to shed.I wept as I remember'd how often you and IHad tired the sun with talking and sent him down the sky.
And now that thou art lying, my dear old Carian guest,A handful of grey ashes, long, long ago at rest,Still are thy pleasant voices, thy nightingales, awake;For Death, he taketh all away, but them he cannot take.
Coventry Patmore. 1823-1896
760. The Married Lover
WHY, having won her, do I woo?Because her spirit's vestal graceProvokes me always to pursue,But, spirit-like, eludes embrace;Because her womanhood is suchThat, as on court-days subjects kissThe Queen's hand, yet so near a touchAffirms no mean familiarness;Nay, rather marks more fair the heightWhich can with safety so neglectTo dread, as lower ladies might,That grace could meet with disrespect;Thus she with happy favour feedsAllegiance from a love so highThat thence no false conceit proceedsOf difference bridged, or state put by;Because although in act and wordAs lowly as a wife can be,Her manners, when they call me lord,Remind me 'tis by courtesy;Not with her least consent of will,Which would my proud affection hurt,But by the noble style that stillImputes an unattain'd desert;Because her gay and lofty brows,When all is won which hope can ask,Reflect a light of hopeless snowsThat bright in virgin ether bask;Because, though free of the outer courtI am, this Temple keeps its shrineSacred to Heaven; because, in short,She 's not and never can be mine.
Coventry Patmore. 1823-1896
761. 'If I were dead'
'IF I were dead, you'd sometimes say, Poor Child!'The dear lips quiver'd as they spake,And the tears brakeFrom eyes which, not to grieve me, brightly smiled.Poor Child, poor Child!I seem to hear your laugh, your talk, your song.It is not true that Love will do no wrong.Poor Child!And did you think, when you so cried and smiled,How I, in lonely nights, should lie awake,And of those words your full avengers make?Poor Child, poor Child!And now, unless it beThat sweet amends thrice told are come to thee,O God, have Thou no mercy upon me!Poor Child!
Coventry Patmore. 1823-1896
762. Departure
IT was not like your great and gracious ways!Do you, that have naught other to lament,Never, my Love, repentOf how, that July afternoon,You went,With sudden, unintelligible phrase,And frighten'd eye,Upon your journey of so many daysWithout a single kiss, or a good-bye?I knew, indeed, that you were parting soon;And so we sate, within the low sun's rays,You whispering to me, for your voice was weak,Your harrowing praise.Well, it was wellTo hear you such things speak,And I could tellWhat made your eyes a growing gloom of love,As a warm South-wind sombres a March grove.And it was like your great and gracious waysTo turn your talk on daily things, my Dear,Lifting the luminous, pathetic lashTo let the laughter flash,Whilst I drew near,Because you spoke so low that I could scarcely hear.But all at once to leave me at the last,More at the wonder than the loss aghast,With huddled, unintelligible phrase,And frighten'd eye,And go your journey of all daysWith not one kiss, or a good-bye,And the only loveless look the look with which you pass'd:'Twas all unlike your great and gracious ways.
Coventry Patmore. 1823-1896
763. The Toys
MY little Son, who look'd from thoughtful eyesAnd moved and spoke in quiet grown-up wise,Having my law the seventh time disobey'd,I struck him, and dismiss'dWith hard words and unkiss'd,—His Mother, who was patient, being dead.Then, fearing lest his grief should hinder sleep,I visited his bed,But found him slumbering deep,With darken'd eyelids, and their lashes yetFrom his late sobbing wet.And I, with moan,Kissing away his tears, left others of my own;For, on a table drawn beside his head,He had put, within his reach,A box of counters and a red-vein'd stone,A piece of glass abraded by the beach,And six or seven shells,A bottle with bluebells,And two French copper coins, ranged there with careful art,To comfort his sad heart.So when that night I pray'dTo God, I wept, and said:Ah, when at last we lie with tranced breath,Not vexing Thee in death,And Thou rememberest of what toysWe made our joys,How weakly understoodThy great commanded good,Then, fatherly not lessThan I whom Thou hast moulded from the clay,Thou'lt leave Thy wrath, and say,'I will be sorry for their childishness.'
Coventry Patmore. 1823-1896
764. A Farewell
WITH all my will, but much against my heart,We two now part.My Very Dear,Our solace is, the sad road lies so clear.It needs no art,With faint, averted feetAnd many a tear,In our opposed paths to persevere.Go thou to East, I West.We will not sayThere 's any hope, it is so far away.But, O, my Best,When the one darling of our widowhead,The nursling Grief,Is dead,And no dews blur our eyesTo see the peach-bloom come in evening skies,Perchance we may,Where now this night is day,And even through faith of still averted feet,Making full circle of our banishment,Amazed meet;The bitter journey to the bourne so sweetSeasoning the termless feast of our contentWith tears of recognition never dry.
Sydney Dobell. 1824-1874
765. The Ballad of Keith of Ravelston
THE murmur of the mourning ghostThat keeps the shadowy kine,'O Keith of Ravelston,The sorrows of thy line!'
Ravelston, Ravelston,The merry path that leadsDown the golden morning hill,And thro' the silver meads;
Ravelston, Ravelston,The stile beneath the tree,The maid that kept her mother's kine,The song that sang she!
She sang her song, she kept her kine,She sat beneath the thorn,When Andrew Keith of RavelstonRode thro' the Monday morn.
His henchman sing, his hawk-bells ring,His belted jewels shine;O Keith of Ravelston,The sorrows of thy line!
Year after year, where Andrew came,Comes evening down the glade,And still there sits a moonshine ghostWhere sat the sunshine maid.
Her misty hair is faint and fair,She keeps the shadowy kine;O Keith of Ravelston,The sorrows of thy line!
I lay my hand upon the stile,The stile is lone and cold,The burnie that goes babbling bySays naught that can be told.
Yet, stranger! here, from year to year,She keeps her shadowy kine;O Keith of Ravelston,The sorrows of thy line!
Step out three steps, where Andrew stood—Why blanch thy cheeks for fear?The ancient stile is not alone,'Tis not the burn I hear!
She makes her immemorial moan,She keeps her shadowy kine;O Keith of Ravelston,The sorrows of thy line!
Sydney Dobell. 1824-1874
766. Return!
RETURN, return! all night my lamp is burning,All night, like it, my wide eyes watch and burn;Like it, I fade and pale, when day returningBears witness that the absent can return,Return, return.
Like it, I lessen with a lengthening sadness,Like it, I burn to waste and waste to burn,Like it, I spend the golden oil of gladnessTo feed the sorrowy signal for return,Return, return.
Like it, like it, whene'er the east wind sings,I bend and shake; like it, I quake and yearn,When Hope's late butterflies, with whispering wings,Fly in out of the dark, to fall and burn—Burn in the watchfire of return,Return, return.
Like it, the very flame whereby I pineConsumes me to its nature. While I mournMy soul becomes a better soul than mine,And from its brightening beacon I discernMy starry love go forth from me, and shineAcross the seas a path for thy return,Return, return.
Return, return! all night I see it burn,All night it prays like me, and lifts a twinOf palmed praying hands that meet and yearn—Yearn to the impleaded skies for thy return.Day, like a golden fetter, locks them in,And wans the light that withers, tho' it burnAs warmly still for thy return;Still thro' the splendid load uplifts the thinPale, paler, palest patience that can learnNaught but that votive sign for thy return—That single suppliant sign for thy return,Return, return.
Return, return! lest haply, love, or e'erThou touch the lamp the light have ceased to burn,And thou, who thro' the window didst discernThe wonted flame, shalt reach the topmost stairTo find no wide eyes watching there,No wither'd welcome waiting thy return!A passing ghost, a smoke-wreath in the air,The flameless ashes, and the soulless urn,Warm with the famish'd fire that lived to burn—Burn out its lingering life for thy return,Its last of lingering life for thy return,Its last of lingering life to light thy late return,Return, return.
Sydney Dobell. 1824-1874
767. A Chanted Calendar
FIRST came the primrose,On the bank high,Like a maiden looking forthFrom the window of a towerWhen the battle rolls below,So look'd she,And saw the storms go by.
Then came the wind-flowerIn the valley left behind,As a wounded maiden, paleWith purple streaks of woe,When the battle has roll'd byWanders to and fro,So totter'd she,Dishevell'd in the wind.
Then came the daisies,On the first of May,Like a banner'd show's advanceWhile the crowd runs by the way,With ten thousand flowers about them they came trooping through thefields.As a happy people come,So came they,As a happy people comeWhen the war has roll'd away,With dance and tabor, pipe and drum,And all make holiday.
Then came the cowslip,Like a dancer in the fair,She spread her little mat of green,And on it danced she.With a fillet bound about her brow,A fillet round her happy brow,A golden fillet round her brow,And rubies in her hair.
Sydney Dobell. 1824-1874
768. Laus Deo
IN the hall the coffin waits, and the idle armourer stands.At his belt the coffin nails, and the hammer in his hands.The bed of state is hung with crape—the grand old bed where she waswed—And like an upright corpse she sitteth gazing dumbly at the bed.Hour by hour her serving-men enter by the curtain'd door,And with steps of muffled woe pass breathless o'er the silent floor,And marshal mutely round, and look from each to each with eyelids red;
'Touch him not,' she shriek'd and cried, 'he is but newly dead!''O my own dear mistress,' the ancient Nurse did say,'Seven long days and seven long nights you have watch'd him where helay.''Seven long days and seven long nights,' the hoary Steward said;'Seven long days and seven long nights,' groan'd the Warrener gray;'Seven,' said the old Henchman, and bow'd his aged head;'On your lives!' she shriek'd and cried, 'he is but newly dead!'Then a father Priest they sought,The Priest that taught her all she knew,And they told him of her loss.'For she is mild and sweet of will,She loved him, and his words are peace,And he shall heal her ill.'But her watch she did not cease.He bless'd her where she sat distraught,And show'd her holy cross,—The cross she kiss'd from year to year—But she neither saw nor heard;And said he in her deaf earAll he had been wont to teach,All she had been fond to hear,Missall'd prayer, and solemn speech,But she answer'd not a word.Only when he turn'd to speak with those who wept about the bed,'On your lives!' she shriek'd and cried, 'he is but newly dead!'Then how sadly he turn'd from her, it were wonderful to tell,And he stood beside the death-bed as by one who slumbers well,And he lean'd o'er him who lay there, and in cautious whisper low,'He is not dead, but sleepeth,' said the Priest, and smooth'd hisbrow.'Sleepeth?' said she, looking up, and the sun rose in her face!'He must be better than I thought, for the sleep is very sound.''He is better,' said the Priest, and call'd her maidens round.With them came that ancient dame who nursed her when a child;O Nurse!' she sigh'd, 'O Nurse!' she cried 'O Nurse!' and then shesmiled,And then she wept; with that they drewAbout her, as of old;Her dying eyes were sweet and blue,Her trembling touch was cold;But she said, 'My maidens true,No more weeping and well-away;Let them kill the feast.I would be happy in my soul."He is better," saith the Priest;He did but sleep the weary day,And will waken whole.Carry me to his dear side,And let the halls be trim;Whistly, whistly,' said she,'I am wan with watching and wail,He must not wake to see me pale,Let me sleep with him.See you keep the tryst for me,I would rest till he awakeAnd rise up like a bride.But whistly, whistly!' said she.'Yet rejoice your Lord doth live;And for His dear sakeSay Laus, Domine.'Silent they cast down their eyes,And every breast a sob did rive,She lifted her in wild surpriseAnd they dared not disobey.'Laus Deo,' said the Steward, hoary when her days were new;'Laus Deo,' said the Warrener, whiter than the warren snows;'Laus Deo,' the bald Henchman, who had nursed her on his knee.The old Nurse moved her lips in vain,And she stood among the trainLike a dead tree shaking dew.Then the Priest he softly steptMidway in the little band,And he took the Lady's hand.'Laus Deo,' he said aloud,'Laus Deo,' they said again,Yet again, and yet again,Humbly cross'd and lowly bow'd,Till in wont and fear it roseTo the Sabbath strain.But she neither turn'd her headNor 'Whistly, whistly,' said she.Her hands were folded as in grace,We laid her with her ancient raceAnd all the village wept.