Yattendon
Among the woods and tillageThat fringe the topmost downs,All lonely lies the village,Far off from seas and towns.Yet when her own folk slumberedI heard within her streetMurmur of men unnumberedAnd march of myriad feet.
For all she lies so lonely,Far off from towns and seas,The village holds not onlyThe roofs beneath her trees:While Life is sweet and tragicAnd Death is veiled and dumb,Hither, by singer's magic,The pilgrim world must come.
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Devon
Deep-wooded combes, clear-mounded hills of morn,Red sunset tides against a red sea-wall,High lonely barrows where the curlews call,Far moors that echo to the ringing horn,—Devon! thou spirit of all these beauties born,All these are thine, but thou art more than all:Speech can but tell thy name, praise can but fallBeneath the cold white sea-mist of thy scorn.
Yet, yet, O noble land, forbid us notEven now to join our faint memorial chimeTo the fierce chant wherewith their hearts were hotWho took the tide in thy Imperial prime;Whose glory's thine till Glory sleeps forgotWith her ancestral phantoms, Pride and Time.
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Among the Tombs
She is a lady fair and wise,Her heart her counsel keeps,And well she knows of time that fliesAnd tide that onward sweeps;But still she sits with restless eyesWhere Memory sleeps—Where Memory sleeps.
Ye that have heard the whispering deadIn every wind that creeps,Or felt the stir that strains the leadBeneath the mounded heaps,Tread softly, ah! more softly treadWhere Memory sleeps—Where Memory sleeps.
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Gold
At bedtime, when the sunset fire was redOne cypress turned to gold beneath its touch."Sleep now, my little son," the mother said;"In God's high garden all the trees are such."Then did the child in his bright dream beholdBranches of gold, trees, forests all of gold.
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A Sower
With sanguine looksAnd rolling walkAmong the rooksHe loved to stalk,
While on the landWith gusty laughFrom a full handHe scattered chaff.
Now that withinHis spirit sleepsA harvest thinThe sickle reaps;
But the dumb fieldsDesire his tread,And no earth yieldsA wheat more red.
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The Mossrose
Walking to-day in your garden, O gracious lady,Little you thought as you turned in that alley remote and shady,And gave me a rose and asked if I knew its savour—The old-world scent of the mossrose, flower of a bygone favour—
Little you thought as you waited the word of appraisement,Laughing at first and then amazed at my amazement,That the rose you gave was a gift already cherished,And the garden whence you plucked it a garden long perished.
But I—I saw that garden, with its one treasureThe tiny mossrose, tiny even by childhood's measure,And the long morning shadow of the dusty laurel,And a boy and a girl beneath it, flushed with a childish quarrel.
She wept for her one little bud: but he, outreachingThe hand of brotherly right, would take it for all her beseeching:
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And she flung her arms about him, and gave like a sister,And laughed at her own tears, and wept again when he kissed her.
So the rose is mine long since, and whenever I find itAnd drink again the sharp sweet scent of the moss behind it,I remember the tears of a child, and her love and her laughter,And the morning shadows of youth and the night that fell thereafter.
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Ave, Soror
I left behind the ways of care,The crowded hurrying hours,I breathed again the woodland air,I plucked the woodland flowers:
Bluebells as yet but half awake,Primroses pale and cool,Anemones like stars that shakeIn a green twilight pool—
On these still lay the enchanted shade,The magic April sun;With my own child a child I strayedAnd thought the years were one.
As through the copse she went and cameMy senses lost their truth;I called her by the dear dead nameThat sweetened all my youth.
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To a River in the South
Call me no more, O gentle stream,To wander through thy sunny dream,No more to lean at twilight coolAbove thy weir and glimmering pool.
Surely I know thy hoary dawns,The silver crisp on all thy lawns,The softly swirling undersongThat rocks thy reeds the winter long.
Surely I know the joys that ringThrough the green deeps of leafy spring;I know the elfin cups and domesThat are their small and secret homes.
Yet is the light for ever lostThat daily once thy meadows crossed,The voice no more by thee is heardThat matched the song of stream and bird.
Call me no more!—thy waters rollHere, in the world that is my soul,And here, though Earth be drowned in night,Old love shall dwell with old delight.
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On the Death of a Noble Lady
Time, when thou shalt bring againPallas from the Trojan plain,Portia from the Roman's hall,Brynhild from the fiery wall,Eleanor, whose fearless breathDrew the venom'd fangs of Death,And Philippa doubly braveOr to conquer or to save—
When thou shalt on one bestowAll their grace and all their glow,All their strength and all their state,All their passion pure and great,Some far age may honour thenSuch another queen of men.
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Midway
Turn back, my Soul, no longer setThy peace upon the years to comeTurn back, the land of thy regretHolds nothing doubtful, nothing dumb.
There are the voices, there the scenesThat make thy life in living truthA tale of heroes and of queens,Fairer than all the hopes of youth.
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Ad Matrem Dolorosam
Think not thy little fountain's rainThat in the sunlight rose and flashed,From the bright sky has fallen again,To cold and shadowy silence dashed.The Joy that in her radiance leaptFrom everlasting hath not slept.
The hand that to thy hand was dear,The untroubled eyes that mirrored thine,The voice that gave thy soul to hearA whisper of the Love Divine—What though the gold was mixed with dust?The gold is thine and cannot rust.
Nor fear, because thy darling's heartNo longer beats with mortal life,That she has missed the ennobling partOf human growth and human strife.Only she has the eternal peaceWherein to reap the soul's increase.
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Vrais Amants
"Time mocks thy opening music with a close;What now he gives long since he gave away.Thou deemst thy sun hath risen, but ere it roseIt was eclipsed, and dusk shall be thy day."
Yet has the Dawn gone up: in loveliest lightShe walks high heaven beyond the shadow there:Whom I too veiled from all men's envious sightWith inward eyes adore and silent prayer.
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The Sangreal
Once, when beside me in that sacred placeI saw my lady lift her lovely head,And saw the Chalice gleam above her faceAnd her dear lips with life immortal red,Then, born again beyond the mist of years,I knelt in Heaven, and drank the wine of tears.
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Sir Hugh the Palmer
He kneeled among a waste of sandsBefore the Mother-Maid,But on the far green forest-landsHis steadfast eyes were stayed,And like a knight of stone his handsHe straightened while he prayed.
"Lady, beyond all women fair,Beyond all saints benign,Whose living heart through life I bearIn mystery divine,Hear thou and grant me this my prayer,Or grant no prayer of mine.
"The fever of my spirit's painHeal thou with heavenly scorn;The dust that but of dust is fainLeave thou in dust forlorn;Yea! bury love to rise againMeet for eternal morn.
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"So by thy grace my inward eyesThy beauty still shall see,And while our life in shadow liesHigh dawn shall image thee,Till with thy soul in ParadiseThy servant's soul shall be."
Before the immortal Mother-MaidLow on the sands he kneeled;But even while the words he prayedHis lips to patience sealed,Joy in his eyes a radiance madeLike stars in dusk revealed.
It was an idle company—Ladies and lordings fine—Idly under the wild-wood treeTheir laughter ran like wine.Yet as they laughed a voice they heard—A voice where none was seen,—Singing blithe as a hidden birdAmong the forest green.
"Mark ye, mark ye, a lonely knightRiding the green forest:Pardì! for one so poorly dightHe lifts a haughty crest!
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Azure and white is all his wear,He hath no gold, I trow!Wanderer, thou in the wild-wood there,Tell us why sing ye so!"
"Noble ladies and lordings gay,God have you all in guard:Since ye are pleased with me to play,My riddle it is not hard.I sing because, of all that ride,I am the least of worth:I sing because, to match my pride,Never was pride on earth.
"But, an ye ask what that may mean,Thus do I answer then:I bear with me the heart of a Queen—I that am least of men:—I bear her heart till the end of all,Yea! by her own commandI bear the heart of a Queen royalUnto the Holy Land."
Humbly there his crest he bent,—Azure it waved and white,—Haughtily there he turned and wentSinging, out of their sight.Long, long but his voice they heard,—A voice where none was seen,—Singing blithe as a hidden bird,Among the forest green.
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The Presentation
When in the womb of Time our souls' own sonDear Love lay sleeping till his natal hour,Long months I knew not that sweet life begun,Too dimly treasuring thy touch of power;And wandering all those daysBy far-off ways,Forgot immortal seed must have immortal flower.
Only, beloved, since my beloved thou artI do remember, now that memory's vain,How twice or thrice beneath my beating heartLife quickened suddenly with proudest pain.Then dreamed I Love's increase,Yet held my peaceTill I might render thee thy own great gift again.
For as with bodies, so with souls it is,The greater gives, the lesser doth conceive:That thou hast fathered Love, I tell thee this,And by my pangs beseech thee to believe.Look on his hope divine—Thy hope and mine—Pity his outstretched hands, tenderly him receive!
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The Inheritance
While I within her secret garden walked,The flowers, that in her presence must be dumb,With me, their fellow-servant, softly talked,Attending till the Flower of flowers should come.Then, since at Court I had arrived but late,I was by love made boldTo ask that of my lady's high estateI might be told,And glories of her blood, perpetuateIn histories old.
Then they, who know the chronicle of Earth,Spoke of her loveliness, that like a flameFar-handed down from noble birth to birth,Gladdened the world for ages ere she came."Yea, yea," they said, "from Summer's royal sunComes that immortal line,And was create not for this age aloneNor wholly thine,Being indeed a flower whose root is oneWith Life Divine.
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"To the sweet buds that of herself are partAlready she this portion hath bequeathed,As, not less surely, into thy proud heartHer nobleness, O poet, she hath breathed,That her inheritance by them and theeThe world may keep alway,When the still sunlight of her eyes shall beLost to the day,And even the fragrance of her memoryFading away."
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Amore Altiero
Since thou and I have wandered from the highwayAnd found with hearts rebornThis swift and unimaginable bywayUnto the hills of morn,Shall not our love disdain the unworthy usesOf the old time outworn?
I'll not entreat thy half unwilling gracesWith humbly folded palms,Nor seek to shake thy proud defended placesWith noise of vague alarms,Nor ask against my fortune's grim pursuingThe refuge of thy arms.
Thou'lt not withhold for pleasure vain and cruelThat which has long been mine,Nor overheap with briefly burning fuelA fire of flame divine,Nor yield the key for life's profaner voicesTo brawl within the shrine.
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But thou shalt tell me of thy queenly pleasureAll that I must fulfil,And I'll receive from out my royal treasureWhat golden gifts I will,So that two realms supreme and undisputedShall be one kingdom still.
And our high hearts shall praise the beauty hiddenIn starry-minded scornBy the same Lord who hath His servants biddenTo seek with eyes new-bornThis swift and unimaginable bywayUnto the hills of morn.
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The Pedlar's Song
I tramped among the townward throngA sultry summer's morn:They mocked me loud, they mocked me long,They laughed my pack to scorn.But a likely pedlar holds his peaceUntil the reckoning's told:—Merrily I to market went, tho' songs were all my gold.
At weary noon I left the town,I left the highway straight,I climbed the silent, sunlit downAnd stood by a castle gate.Never yet was a house too highWhen the pedlar's heart was bold:—Merrily I to market went, tho' songs were all my gold.
A lady leaned from her window thereAnd asked my wares to see;Her voice made rich the summer air,Richer my soul in me.She gave me only four little words,Words of a language old:—Merrily I from market came, for all my songs were sold.
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Benedick's Song
Though I see within thine eyesSudden frown of cloudy skies,Yet I bid them "merry morn"For they tell me Love is born.So ha-há! with há-ha-há!For they tell me Love is born.
Storms of mocking from thy lipsLash me still like airy whips;But to-day thy scorn I scornFor I know that Love is born.So ha-há! with há-ha-há!For I know that Love is born.
O the hail that rattles fierceThrough my hodden cloak to pierce!What care I if rags be torn?Love and I are beggars born!So ha-há! with há-ha-há!Love and I are beggars born.
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Love and Grief.
One day, when Love and Summer both were young,Love in a garden found my lady weeping;Whereat, when he to kiss her would have sprung,I stayed his childish leaping.
"Forbear," said I, "she is not thine to-day;Subdue thyself in silence to await her;If thou dare call her from Death's side awayThou art no Love, but traitor.
Yet did he run, and she his kiss received,"She is twice mine," he cried, "since she is troubled;I knew but half, and now I see her grievedMy part in her is doubled."
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Egeria's Silence
Her thought that, like a brook beside the way,Sang to my steps through all the wandering year,Has ceased from melody—O Love, allayMy sudden fear!
She cannot fail—the beauty of that browCould never flower above a desert heart—Somewhere beneath, the well-spring even nowLives, though apart.
Some day, when winter has renewed her fountWith cold, white-folded snows and quiet rain,O Love, O Love, her stream again will mountAnd sing again!
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Against Oblivion
Cities drowned in olden timeKeep, they say, a magic chimeRolling up from far belowWhen the moon-led waters flow.
So within me, ocean deep,Lies a sunken world asleep.Lest its bells forget to ring,Memory! set the tide a-swing!
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Fond Counsel
O youth, beside thy silver-springing fountain,In sight and hearing of thy father's cot,These and the morning woods, the lonely mountain,These are thy peace, although thou know'st it not.Wander not yet where noon's unpitying glareBeats down the toilers in the city bare;Forsake not yet, not yet, the homely plot,O Youth, beside thy silver-springing fountain.
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Youth
His song of dawn outsoars the joyful bird,Swift on the weary road his footfall comes;The dusty air that by his stride is stirredBeats with a buoyant march of fairy drums."Awake, O Earth! thine ancient slumber break;To the new day, O slumbrous Earth, awake!"
Yet long ago that merry march began,His feet are older than the path they tread;His music is the morning-song of man,His stride the stride of all the valiant dead;His youngest hopes are memories, and his eyesDeep with the old, old dream that never dies.
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The Wanderer
To Youth there comes a whisper out of the west:"O loiterer, hasten where there waits for theeA life to build, a love therein to nest,And a man's work, serving the age to be."
Peace, peace awhile! Before his tireless feetHill beyond hill the road in sunlight goes;He breathes the breath of morning, clear and sweet,And his eyes love the high eternal snows.
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The Adventurers
Over the downs in sunlight clearForth we went in the spring of the year:Plunder of April's gold we sought,Little of April's anger thought.
Caught in a copse without defenceLow we crouched to the rain-squall dense:Sure, if misery man can vex,There it beat on our bended necks.
Yet when again we wander onSuddenly all that gloom is gone:Under and over through the wood,Life is astir, and life is good.
Violets purple, violets white,Delicate windflowers dancing light,Primrose, mercury, moscatel,Shimmer in diamonds round the dell.
Squirrel is climbing swift and lithe,Chiff-chaff whetting his airy scythe,Woodpecker whirrs his rattling rap,Ringdove flies with a sudden clap.
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Rook is summoning rook to build,Dunnock his beak with moss has filled,Robin is bowing in coat-tails brown,Tomtit chattering upside down.
Well is it seen that every oneLaughs at the rain and loves the sun;We too laughed with the wildwood crew,Laughed till the sky once more was blue.
Homeward over the downs we wentSoaked to the heart with sweet content;April's anger is swift to fall,April's wonder is worth it all.
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To Clare
My Clare,—These tales were told, you know,In French, five hundred years ago,By old Sir John, whose heart's delightWas lady sweet and valiant knight.A hundred years went by, and thenA great lord told the tales again,When bluff King Hal desired his folkTo read them in the tongue they spoke.Last, I myself among them tookWhat I loved best and made this book.Great, lesser, less—these writers threeWorked for the days they could not see,And certes, in their work they knewNothing at all, dear child, of you.Yet is this book your own in truth,Because 'tis made for noble youth,And every word that's living thereMust die when Clares are no more Clare.
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The Return of Summer: An Eclogue
Persons: H.—A POET; C.—HIS DAUGHTER
H. Here then, if you insist, my daughter: still,I must confess that I preferred the hill.The warm scent of the pinewood seemed to meThe first true breath of summer; did you seeThe waxen hurt-bells with their promised fruitAlready purple at the blossom's root,And thick among the rusty bracken strownSunburnt anemones long overblown?Summer is come at last!
C. And that is whyMine is a better place than yours to lie.This dark old yew tree casts a fuller shadeThan any pine; the stream is simply madeFor keeping bottles cool; and when we've dinedI could just wade a bit while you . . . reclined.
H. Empty the basket then, without more words . . .But I still wish we had not left the birds.
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C. Father! you are perverse! Since when, I beg,Have forest birds been tethered by the leg?They're everywhere! What more can you desire?The cuckoo shouts as though he'd never tire,The nuthatch, knowing that of noise you're fond,Keeps chucking stones along a frozen pond,And busy gold-crest, somewhere out of sight,Works at his saw with all his tiny might.I do not count the ring-doves or the rooks,We hear so much about them in the booksThey're hardly real; but from where I sitI see two chaffinches, a long-tailed tit,A missel-thrush, a yaffle——
H. That will do:I may have overlooked a bird or two.Where are the biscuits? Are you getting crampDown by the water there—it must be damp?
C. I'm only watching till your bottle's cool:It lies so snug beneath this glassy pool,Like a sunk battleship; and overheadThe water-boatmen get their daily breadBy rowing all day long, and far belowTwo little eels go winding, winding slow . . .Oh! there's a shark!
H. A what?
C. A miller's thumb.Don't move, I'll tempt him with a tiny crumb.
H. Be quick about it, please, and don't forgetI am at least as dry as he is wet.
C. Oh, very well then, here's your drink.
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H. That's good!I feel much better now.
C. I thought you would (exit quietly).
H. How beautiful the world is when it breathesThe news of summer!—when the bronzy sheathesStill hang about the beech-leaf, and the oaksAre wearing still their dainty tasselled cloaks,While on the hillside every hawthorn paleHas taken now her balmy bridal veil,And, down below, the drowsy murmuring streamLulls the warm noonday in an endless dream.O little brook, far more thou art to meThan all the pageantry of field and tree:Es singen wohl die Nixen—ah! 'tis truth—Tief unten ihren Reih'n—but only YouthCan hear them joyfully, as once I layAnd heard them singing of the world's highway,Of wandering ended, and the maiden found,And golden bread by magic mill-wheel ground.Lost is the magic now, the wheel is still,And long ago the maiden left the mill:Yet once a year, one day, when summer dawns,The old, old murmur haunts the river-lawns,The fairies wake, the fairy song is sung,And for an hour the wanderer's feet are young (he dozes).
C. (returning) Father! I called you twice.
H. I did not know:Where have you been?
C. Oh, down the stream.
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H. Just so:Well, I wentup.
C. I wish you'd been with me.
H. When East is West, my daughter, that may be.
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Dream-Market
Scene. A LAWN IN THE COUNTESS OF PEMBROKE'S ARCADIA
Enter FLORA, Lady of Summer, with her maidens, PHYLLIS and AMARYLLIS. She takes her seat upon a bank, playing with a basket of freshly gathered flowers, one of which she presently holds up in her hand.
FLORA. Ah! how I love a rose! But come, my girls,Here's for your task: to-day you, Amaryllis,Shall take the white, and, Phyllis, you the red.Hold out your kirtles for them. White, red, white,Red, red, and white again. . . .Wonder you notHow the same sun can breed such different beauties?[She divides all her roses between them.Well, take them all, and go—scatter them wideIn gardens where men love me, and be sure
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Where even one flower falls, or one soft petal,Next year shall see a hundred.[As they turn to go, enter LUCIA in hunting dress,with bow in hand and a hound by her side. FLORArises to meet her, and recalls her maidens.]Stay! attend me.
LUCIA. Greeting, fair ladies; you, I think, must beDaughters of this green Earth, and one of youThe sweet Dame Flora.
FLORA. Your true servant, madam.But if my memory be not newly witheredI have not known the pleasure. . . .
LUCIA. Yes, you have seen me—At least, you might have seen me; I am Lucia,Lady of Moonlight, and I often huntThese downs of yours with all my nightly packOf questing beams and velvet-footed shadows.
FLORA. I fear at night. . . .
LUCIA. Oh, yes! at night you are sleeping!And I by day am always rather faint;So we don't meet; but sometimes your good folkHave torn my nets by raking in the water;And though their neighbours laughed, there are worse waysOf spending time, and far worse things to rake forThan silver lights upon a crystal stream.But come! My royal Sire, the Man in the Moon—Hehas been here?
FLORA. So many kings come here,I can't be sure; I've heard the Man in the Moon
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Did once come down and ask his way to Norwich.But that was years agone—hundreds of years—It may not be the same—I do not knowYou royal father's age. . . .
LUCIA. His age? Oh surely!He nevercanbe more than one month old.
FLORA. Yet he's your father!
LUCIA. Well, he is and is not;[Proudly] I am the daughter of a million moons.They month by month and year by circling year,From their celestial palace looking downOn your day-wearied Earth, have soothed her sleep,And rocked her tides, and made a magic worldFor all her lovers and her nightingales.You owe them much, my ancestors. No doubt,At times they suffered under clouds; at timesThey were eclipsed; yet in their brighter hoursThey were illustrious!
FLORA. And may I hopeYour present Sire, his present Serene Highness,Is in his brighter hours to-day?
LUCIA. Ah! no.Be sure he is not—else I had not leftMy cool, sweet garden of unfading starsFor the rank meadows of this sun-worn mould.
FLORA. Whatisyour trouble, then?
LUCIA. Although my fatherHas been but ten days reigning, he is sadWith all the sadness of a phantom realm,And all the sorrows of ten thousand years.
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We in our Moonland have no life like yours,No birth, no death: we live but in our dreams:And when they are grown old—these mortal visionsOf an immortal sleep—we seem to lose them.They are too strong for us, too self-sufficientTo live for us; they go their ways and leave us,Like shadows grown substantial.
FLORA. I have heardSomething on earth not unlike this complaint,But can I help you?
LUCIA. Lady, if you cannot,No one can help. In Moonland there is famine,We are losing all our dreams, and I come hitherTo buy a new one for my father's house.
FLORA. To buy a dream?
LUCIA. Some little darling dreamThat will be always with us, night and day,Loving and teasing, sailing light of heartOver our darkest deeps, reminding usOf our lost childhood, playing our old games,Singing our old songs, asking our old riddles,Building our old hopes, and with our old gustoRehearsing for us in one endless actThe world past and the world to be.
FLORA. Oh! nowI see your meaning. Yes, I have indeedPlenty of such sweet dreams:wecall them children.They areourdreams too, and though they are born of us,Truly in them we live. But, dearest lady,We do not sell them.
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LUCIA. Do you mean you will not?Not one? Could you notlendme one—just one?
FLORA. Ah! but to lend what cannot be returnedIs merely giving—who can bring againInto the empty nest those wingèd years?Still, there are children here well worth your hopes,And you shall venture: if there be among themOne that your heart desires, and she consent,Take her and welcome—for the will of LoveIs the wind's will, and none may guess his going.
LUCIA. O dearest Lady Flora!
FLORA. Stay! they are here,Mad as a dance of May-flies.
[The children run in dancing and singing.
Shall we sitAnd watch these children?Phyllis, bid them play,And let them heed us no more than the treesThat girdle this green lawn with whispering beauty.[The children play and sing at their games, till at aconvenient moment the LADY FLORA holds up her hand.]
FLORA. Now, Amaryllis, stay the rushing stream,The meadows for this time have drunk enough.[To LUCIA.] And you, what think you, lady, of these maids?Has their sweet foolish singing moved your heartTo choose among them?
LUCIA. I have heard them gladly,And if I could, would turn them all to elves,That if they cannot live with me, at least
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I might look down when our great galleon sailsClose over earth, and see them always hereDancing upon the moonlit shores of night.But how to choose!—and though they are young and fairTheir every grace foretells the fatal change,The swift short bloom of girlhood, like a flowerPassing away, for ever passing away.Have you not one with petals tenderer yet,More deeply folded, further from the hourWhen the bud dies into the mortal rose?
FLORA [pointing.]Thereis my youngest blossom and my fairest,But my most wilful too—you'll pluck her notWithout some aid of magic.
LUCIA. Time has beenWhen I have known even your forest treesSway to a song of moonland. I will try it.
[She sings and dances a witching measure.]
(To an air by HENRY LAWES, published in 1652)
The flowers that in thy garden rise,Fade and are gone when Summer flies,And as their sweets by time decay,So shall thy hopes be cast away.
The Sun that gilds the creeping mossStayeth not Earth's eternal loss:He is the lord of all that live,Yet there is life he cannot give.
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The stir of Morning's eager breath—Beautiful Eve's impassioned death—Thou lovest these, thou lovest well,Yet of the Night thou canst not tell.
In every land thy feet may tread,Time like a veil is round thy head:Only the land thou seek'st with meNever hath been nor yet shall be.
It is not far, it is not near,Name it hath none that Earth can hear;But there thy Soul shall build againMemories long destroyed of men,And Joy thereby shall like a riverWander from deep to deep for ever.
[When she has finished the child runs into her arms.]
FLORA. Your spell has won her, and I marvel not:She was but half our own.[To the Child] Farewell, dear child,'Tis time to part, you with this lovely ladyTo dance in silver halls, and gather starsAnd be the dream you are: while we returnTo the old toil and harvest of the Earth.Farewell! and farewell all!
ALL. Farewell! farewell!
[Exeunt omnes.
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The Cicalas: An Idyll
Scene: AN ENGLISH GARDEN BY STARLIGHT
Persons: A LADY AND A POET
Dimly I see your face: I hear your breathSigh faintly, as a flower might sigh in deathAnd when you whisper, you but stir the airWith a soft hush like summer's own despair.
THE LADY (aloud)
O Night divine, O Darkness ever blest,Give to our old sad Earth eternal rest.Since from her heart all beauty ebbs away,Let her no more endure the shame of day.
A thousand ages have not made less brightThe stars that in this fountain shine to-night:Your eyes in shadow still betray the gleamThat every son of man desires in dream.
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Yes, hearts will burn when all the stars are cold;And Beauty lingers—but her tale is told:Mankind has left her for a game of toys,And fleets the golden hour with speed and noise.
Think you the human heart no longer feelsBecause it loves the swift delight of wheels?And is not Change our one true guide on earth,The surest hand that leads us from our birth?
Change were not always loss, if we could keepBeneath all change a clear and windless deep:But more and more the tides that through us rollDisturb the very sea-bed of the soul.
The foam of transient passions cannot fretThe sea-bed of the race, profounder yet:And there, where Greece and her foundations are,Lies Beauty, built below the tide of war.
So—to the desert, once in fifty years—Some poor mad poet sings, and no one hears:But what belated race, in what far clime,Keeps even a legend of Arcadian time?
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Not ours perhaps: a nation still so young,So late in Rome's deserted orchard sprung,Bears not as yet, but strikes a hopeful rootTill the soil yield its old Hesperian fruit.
Is not the hour gone by? The mystic strain,Degenerate once, may never spring again.What long-forsaken gods shall we invokeTo grant such increase to our common oak?
Yet may the ilex, of more ancient birth,More deeply planted in that genial earth,From her Italian wildwood even nowRevert, and bear once more the golden bough.
A poet's dream was never yet less greatBecause it issued through the ivory gate!Show me one leaf from that old wood divine,And all your ardour, all your hopes are mine.
May Venus bend me to no harder task!For—Pan be praised!—I hold the gift you ask.The leaf, the legend, that your wish fulfils,To-day he brought me from the Umbrian hills.
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Your young Italian—yes! I saw you standAnd point his path across our well-walled land:A sculptor's model, but alas! no god:These narrow fields the goat-foot never trod!
Yet from his eyes the mirth a moment glancedTo which the streams of old Arcadia danced;And on his tongue still lay the childish loreOf that lost world for which you hope no more.
Tell me!—from where I watched I saw his face,And his hands moving with a rustic grace,Caught too the alien sweetness of his speech,But sound alone, not sense, my ears could reach.
He asked if we in England ever heardThe tiny beasts, half insect and half bird,That neither eat nor sleep, but die contentWhen they in endless song their strength have spent.
Cicalas! how the name enchants me backTo the grey olives and the dust-white track!Was there a story then?—I have forgot,Or else by chance my Umbrians told it not.
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Lover of music, you at least should knowThat these were men in ages long ago,—Ere music was,—and then the Muses came,And love of song took hold on them like flame.
Yes, I remember now the voice that speaks—Most living still of all the deathless Greeks—Yet tell me—how they died divinely mad,And of the Muses what reward they had.
They are reborn on earth, and from the firstThey know not sleep, they hunger not nor thirstSummer with glad Cicala's song they fill,Then die, and go to haunt the Muses' Hill.
They are reborn indeed! and rightly youThe far-heard echo of their music knew!Pray now to Pan, since you too, it would seem,Were there with Phaedrus, by Ilissus' stream.
Beloved Pan, and all ye gods whose graceFor ever haunts our short life's resting-place,Outward and inward make me one true whole,And grant me beauty in the inmost soul!
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And thou, O Night, O starry Queen of Air,Remember not my blind and faithless prayer!Let me too live, let me too sing again,Since Beauty wanders still the ways of men.
{186}
The Faun
Yesterday I thought to roamIdly through the fields of home,And I came at morning's endTo our brook's familiar bend.There I raised my eyes, and there,Shining through an ampler air,Folded in by hills of blueSuch as Wessex never knew,Changed as in a waking dreamFlowed the well-remembered stream.
Now a line of wattled paleFenced the downland from the vale,Now the sedge was set with reedsFitter for Arcadian meads,And where I was wont to findOnly things of timid kind,Now the Genius of the poolMocked me from his corner cool.Eyes he had with malice quick,Tufted hair and ears a-prick,And, above a tiny chin,Lips with laughter wide a-grin.
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Therewithal a shaggy flankIn the crystal clear he sank,And beneath the unruffled tideA little pair of hooves I spied.
Yet though plainly there he stood,Creature of the wave and wood,Under his satyric graceSomething manlike I could trace,And the eyes that mocked me thereLike a gleam of memory were.
"So," said I at last to him,Frowning from the river's brim,"This is where you come to play,Heedless of the time of day."
"Nay," replied the youthful god,Leaning on the flowery sod,"Here there are no clocks, and soTime can neither come nor go."
"Little goat," said I, "you're late,And your dinner will not wait:If to-day you wish to eat,Trust me, you must find your feet."
"Father," said the little goat,"Do you know that I can float?
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Do you know that I can diveAs deep as any duck alive?Would you like to see me dropOut of yonder willow's top?"
Sternly I replied again,"You may spare your boasting vain;All that you can do I didWhen I was myself a kid."Laughter followed such as pealedThrough the first unfurrowed field."Then what mother says is true,And your hoof is cloven too!"
Ah!—but that irreverent mirth,Learnt of the primeval earth,Surely was with magic fraughtThat upon my pulses wrought:I too felt the air of JuneHumming with a merry tune,I too reckoned, like a boy,Less of Time and more of Joy:Till, as homeward I was wending,I perceived my back unbending,And before the mile was doneRan beside my truant son.
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Fidele's Grassy Tomb
The Squire sat propped in a pillowed chair,His eyes were alive and clear of care,But well he knew that the hour was comeTo bid good-bye to his ancient home.
He looked on garden, wood, and hill,He looked on the lake, sunny and still:The last of earth that his eyes could seeWas the island church of Orchardleigh.
The last that his heart could understandWas the touch of the tongue that licked his hand"Bury the dog at my feet," he said,And his voice dropped, and the Squire was dead.
Now the dog was a hound of the Danish breed,Staunch to love and strong at need:He had dragged his master safe to shoreWhen the tide was ebbing at Elsinore.
From that day forth, as reason would,He was named "Fidele," and made it good:When the last of the mourners left the doorFidele was dead on the chantry floor.
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They buried him there at his master's feet,And all that heard of it deemed it meet:The story went the round for years,Till it came at last to the Bishop's ears.
Bishop of Bath and Wells was he,Lord of the lords of Orchardleigh;And he wrote to the Parson the strongest screedThat Bishop may write or Parson read.
The sum of it was that a soulless houndWas known to be buried in hallowed ground:From scandal sore the Church to saveThey must take the dog from his master's grave.
The heir was far in a foreign land,The Parson was wax to my Lord's command:He sent for the Sexton and bade him makeA lonely grave by the shore of the lake.
The Sexton sat by the water's brinkWhere he used to sit when he used to think:He reasoned slow, but he reasoned it out,And his argument left him free from doubt.
"A Bishop," he said, "is the top of his trade;But there's others can give him a start with the spade:Yon dog, he carried the Squire ashore,And a Christian couldn't ha' done no more."
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The grave was dug; the mason cameAnd carved on stone Fidele's name;But the dog that the Sexton laid insideWas a dog that never had lived or died.
So the Parson was praised, and the scandal stayed,Till, a long time after, the church decayed,And, laying the floor anew, they foundIn the tomb of the Squire the bones of a hound.
As for the Bishop of Bath and WellsNo more of him the story tells;Doubtless he lived as a Prelate and Prince,And died and was buried a century since.
And whether his view was right or wrongHas little to do with this my song;Something we owe him, you must allow;And perhaps he has changed his mind by now.
The Squire in the family chantry sleeps,The marble still his memory keeps:Remember, when the name you spell,There rest Fidele's bones as well.
For the Sexton's grave you need not search,'Tis a nameless mound by the island church:An ignorant fellow, of humble lot—But he knew one thing that a Bishop did not.
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Moonset
Past seven o'clock: time to be gone;Twelfth-night's over and dawn shivering up:A hasty cut of the loaf, a steaming cup,Down to the door, and there is Coachman John.
Ruddy of cheek is John and bright of eye;But John it appears has none of your grins and winks;Civil enough, but short: perhaps he thinks:Words come once in a mile, and always dry.
Has he a mind or not? I wonder; but soonWe turn through a leafless wood, and there to the right,Like a sun bewitched in alien realms of night,Mellow and yellow and rounded hangs the moon.
Strangely near she seems, and terribly great:The world is dead: why are we travelling still?Nightmare silence grips my struggling will;We are driving for ever and ever to find a gate.
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"When you come to consider the moon," says John at last,And stops, to feel his footing and take his stand;"And then there's some will say there's never a handThat made the world!"A flick, and the gates are passed.
Out of the dim magical moonlit park,Out to the workday road and wider skies:There's a warm flush in the East where day's to rise,And I'm feeling the better for Coachman John's remark.
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A Song of Exmoor
The Forest above and the Combe below,On a bright September morn!He's the soul of a clod who thanks not GodThat ever his body was born!So hurry along, the stag's afoot,The Master's up and away!Halloo! Halloo! we'll follow it throughFrom Bratton to Porlock Bay!
So hurry along, the stag's afoot,The Master's up and away!Halloo! Halloo! we'll follow it throughFrom Bratton to Porlock Bay!
Hark to the tufters' challenge true,'Tis a note that the red-deer knows!His courage awakes, his covert he breaks,And up for the moor he goes!He's all his rights and seven on top,His eye's the eye of a king,And he'll beggar the pride of some that rideBefore he leaves the ling!
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Here comes Antony bringing the pack,Steady! he's laying them on!By the sound of their chime you may tell that it's timeTo harden your heart and be gone.Nightacott, Narracott, Hunnacott's passed,Right for the North they race:He's leading them straight for Blackmoor Gate,And he's setting a pounding pace!
We're running him now on a breast-high scent,But he leaves us standing still;When we swing round by Westland PoundHe's far up Challacombe Hill.The pack are a string of struggling ants,The quarry's a dancing midge,They're trying their reins on the edge of the ChainsWhile he's on Cheriton Ridge.
He's gone by Kittuck and Lucott Moor,He's gone by Woodcock's Ley;By the little white town he's turned him down,And he's soiling in open sea.So hurry along, we'll both be in,The crowd are a parish away!We're a field of two, and we've followed it throughFrom Bratton to Porlock Bay!
So hurry along, we'll both be in,The crowd are a parish away!We're a field of two, and we've followed it throughFrom Bratton to Porlock Bay!
{196}
Master and Man
Do ye ken hoo to fush for the salmon?If ye'll listen I'll tell ye.Dinna trust to the books and their gammon,They're but trying to sell ye.Leave professors to read their ain cackleAnd fush their ain style;Come awa', sir, we'll oot wi' oor tackleAnd be busy the while.
'Tis a wee bit ower bright, ye were thinkin'?Aw, ye'll no be the loser;'Tis better ten baskin' and blinkin'Than ane that's a cruiser.If ye're bent, as I tak it, on slatter,Ye should pray for the droot,For the salmon's her ain when there's watter,But she's oors when it's oot.
Ye may just put your flee-book behind ye,Ane hook wull be plenty;If they'll no come for this, my man, mind ye,They'll no come for twenty.
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Ay, a rod; but the shorter the strangerAnd the nearer to strike;For myself I prefare it nae langerThan a yard or the like.
Noo, ye'll stand awa' back while I'm creepin'Wi' my snoot i' the gowans;There's a bonny twalve-poonder a-sleepin'I' the shade o' yon rowans.Man, man! I was fearin' I'd stirred her,But I've got her the noo!Hoot! fushin's as easy as murrderWhen ye ken what to do.
Na, na, sir, I doot na ye're willin'But I canna permit ye,For I'm thinkin' that yon kind o' killin'Wad hardly befit ye.And some work is deefficult hushin',There'd be havers and chaff:'Twull be best, sir, for you to be fushin'And me wi' the gaff.
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Gavotte
Memories long in music sleeping,No more sleeping,No more dumb:Delicate phantoms softly creepingSoftly back from the old-world come.
Faintest odours around them straying,Suddenly strayingIn chambers dim;Whispering silks in order swaying,Glimmering gems on shoulders slim:
Courage advancing strong and tender,Grace untenderFanning desire;Suppliant conquest, proud surrender,Courtesy cold of hearts on fire—
Willowy billowy now they're bending,Low they're bendingDown-dropt eyes;Stately measure and stately ending,Music sobbing, and a dream that dies.
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Imogien
Ladies, where were your bright eyes glancing,Where were they glancing yesternight?Saw ye Imogen dancing, dancing,Imogen dancing all in white?Laughed she not with a pure delight,Laughed she not with a joy serene,Stepped she not with a grace entrancing,Slenderly girt in silken sheen?
All through the night from dusk to daytimeUnder her feet the hours were swift,Under her feet the hours of playtimeRose and fell with a rhythmic lift:Music set her adrift, adrift,Music eddying towards the daySwept her along as brooks in MaytimeCarry the freshly falling May.