Morning and eveningMaids heard the goblins cry:"Come buy our orchard fruits,Come buy, come buy:Apples and quinces,Lemons and oranges,Plump unpecked cherries,Melons and raspberries,Bloom-down-cheeked peaches,Swart-headed mulberries,Wild free-born cranberries,Crab-apples, dewberries,Pine-apples, blackberries,Apricots, strawberries;--All ripe togetherIn summer weather,--Morns that pass by,Fair eves that fly;Come buy, come buy:Our grapes fresh from the vine,Pomegranates full and fine,Dates and sharp bullaces,Rare pears and greengages,Damsons and bilberries,Taste them and try:Currants and gooseberries,Bright-fire-like barberries,Figs to fill your mouth,Citrons from the South,Sweet to tongue and sound to eye;Come buy, come buy."Evening by eveningAmong the brookside rushes,Laura bowed her head to hear,Lizzie veiled her blushes:Crouching close togetherIn the cooling weather,With clasping arms and cautioning lips,With tingling cheeks and finger-tips."Lie close," Laura said,Pricking up her golden head:"We must not look at goblin men,We must not buy their fruits:Who knows upon what soil they fedTheir hungry thirsty roots?""Come buy," call the goblinsHobbling down the glen."O," cried Lizzie, "Laura, Laura,You should not peep at goblin men."Lizzie covered up her eyes,Covered close lest they should look;Laura reared her glossy head,And whispered like the restless brook:"Look, Lizzie, look, Lizzie,Down the glen tramp little men.One hauls a basket,One bears a plate,One lugs a golden dishOf many pounds' weight.How fair the vine must growWhose grapes are so luscious;How warm the wind must blowThrough those fruit bushes.""No," said Lizzie, "no, no, no;Their offers should not charm us,Their evil gifts would harm us."She thrust a dimpled fingerIn each ear, shut eyes and ran:Curious Laura chose to lingerWondering at each merchant man.One had a cat's face,One whisked a tail,One tramped at a rat's pace,One crawled like a snail,One like a wombat prowled obtuse and furry,One like a ratel tumbled hurry-scurry.She heard a voice like voice of dovesCooing all together:They sounded kind and full of lovesIn the pleasant weather.Laura stretched her gleaming neckLike a rush-imbedded swan,Like a lily from the beck,Like a moonlit poplar branch,Like a vessel at the launchWhen its last restraint is gone.Backwards up the mossy glenTurned and trooped the goblin men,With their shrill repeated cry,"Come buy, come buy."When they reached where Laura wasThey stood stock still upon the moss,Leering at each other,Brother with queer brother;Signalling each other,Brother with sly brother.One set his basket down,One reared his plate;One began to weave a crownOf tendrils, leaves, and rough nuts brown(Men sell not such in any town);One heaved the golden weightOf dish and fruit to offer her:"Come buy, come buy," was still their cry.Laura stared but did not stir,Longed but had no money:The whisk-tailed merchant bade her tasteIn tones as smooth as honey,The cat-faced purr'd,The rat-paced spoke a wordOf welcome, and the snail-paced even was heard;One parrot-voiced and jollyCried "Pretty Goblin" still for "Pretty Polly";--One whistled like a bird.But sweet-tooth Laura spoke in haste:"Good folk, I have no coin;To take were to purloin:I have no copper in my purse,I have no silver either,And all my gold is on the furzeThat shakes in windy weatherAbove the rusty heather.""You have much gold upon your head,"They answered altogether:"Buy from us with a golden curl."She clipped a precious golden lock,She dropped a tear more rare than pearl,Then sucked their fruit globes fair or red:Sweeter than honey from the rock,Stronger than man-rejoicing wine,Clearer than water flowed that juice;She never tasted such before,How should it cloy with length of use?She sucked and sucked and sucked the moreFruits which that unknown orchard bore;She sucked until her lips were sore;Then flung the emptied rinds away,But gathered up one kernel stone,And knew not was it night or dayAs she turned home alone.
Lizzie met her at the gateFull of wise upbraidings:"Dear, you should not stay so late,Twilight is not good for maidens;Should not loiter in the glenIn the haunts of goblin men.Do you not remember Jeanie,How she met them in the moonlight,Took their gifts both choice and many,Ate their fruits and wore their flowersPlucked from bowersWhere summer ripens at all hours?But ever in the noonlightShe pined and pined away;Sought them by night and day,Found them no more, but dwindled and grew gray,Then fell with the first snow,While to this day no grass will growWhere she lies low:I planted daisies there a year agoThat never blow.You should not loiter so.""Nay, hush," said Laura:"Nay, hush, my sister:I ate and ate my fill,Yet my mouth waters still;To-morrow night I willBuy more,"--and kissed her."Have done with sorrow;I'll bring you plums to-morrowFresh on their mother twigs,Cherries worth getting;You cannot think what figsMy teeth have met in,What melons icy-coldPiled on a dish of goldToo huge for me to hold,What peaches with a velvet nap,Pellucid grapes without one seed:Odorous indeed must be the meadWhereon they grow, and pure the wave they drink,With lilies at the brink,And sugar-sweet their sap."Golden head by golden head,Like two pigeons in one nestFolded in each other's wings,They lay down in their curtained bed:Like two blossoms on one stem,Like two flakes of new-fallen snow,Like two wands of ivoryTipped with gold for awful kings.Moon and stars gazed in at them,Wind sang to them lullaby,Lumbering owls forbore to fly,Not a bat flapped to and froRound their rest:Cheek to cheek and breast to breastLocked together in one nest.
Early in the morningWhen the first cock crowed his warning,Neat like bees, as sweet and busy,Laura rose with Lizzie:Fetched in honey, milked the cows,Aired and set to rights the house,Kneaded cakes of whitest wheat,Cakes for dainty mouths to eat,Next churned butter, whipped up cream,Fed their poultry, sat and sewed;Talked as modest maidens should:Lizzie with an open heart,Laura in an absent dream,One content, one sick in part;One warbling for the mere bright day's delight,One longing for the night.At length slow evening came:They went with pitchers to the reedy brook;Lizzie most placid in her look,Laura most like a leaping flame.They drew the gurgling water from its deep;Lizzie plucked purple and rich golden flags,Then turning homeward said: "The sunset flushesThose furthest loftiest crags;Come, Laura, not another maiden lags,No wilful squirrel wags,The beasts and birds are fast asleep."But Laura loitered still among the rushesAnd said the bank was steep.
And said the hour was early still,The dew not fallen, the wind not chill:Listening ever, but not catchingThe customary cry,"Come buy, come buy,"With its iterated jingleOf sugar-baited words:Not for all her watchingOnce discerning even one goblinRacing, whisking, tumbling, hobbling;Let alone the herdsThat used to tramp along the glen,In groups or single,Of brisk fruit-merchant men.Till Lizzie urged: "O Laura, come;I hear the fruit-call, but I dare not look:You should not loiter longer at this brook:Come with me home.The stars rise, the moon bends her arc,Each glow-worm winks her spark,Let us get home before the night grows dark;For clouds may gatherThough this is summer weather,Put out the lights and drench us through;Then if we lost our way what should we do?"Laura turned cold as stoneTo find her sister heard that cry alone,That goblin cry,"Come buy our fruits, come buy."Must she then buy no more such dainty fruit?Must she no more such succous pasture find,Gone deaf and blind?Her tree of life drooped from the root:She said not one word in her heart's sore ache;But peering thro' the dimness, naught discerning,Trudged home, her pitcher dripping all the way;So crept to bed, and laySilent till Lizzie slept;Then sat up in a passionate yearning,And gnashed her teeth for balked desire, and weptAs if her heart would break.Day after day, night after night,Laura kept watch in vain,In sullen silence of exceeding pain.She never caught again the goblin cry:"Come buy, come buy";--She never spied the goblin menHawking their fruits along the glen:But when the noon waxed brightHer hair grew thin and gray;She dwindled, as the fair full moon doth turnTo swift decay, and burnHer fire away.One day remembering her kernel-stoneShe set it by a wall that faced the south;Dewed it with tears, hoped for a root,Watched for a waxing shoot,But there came none;It never saw the sun,It never felt the trickling moisture run:While with sunk eyes and faded mouthShe dreamed of melons, as a traveller seesFalse waves in desert drouthWith shade of leaf-crowned trees,And burns the thirstier in the sandful breeze.She no more swept the house,Tended the fowls or cows,Fetched honey, kneaded cakes of wheat,Brought water from the brook:But sat down listless in the chimney-nookAnd would not eat.Tender Lizzie could not bearTo watch her sister's cankerous care,Yet not to share.She night and morningCaught the goblins' cry:"Come buy our orchard fruits,Come buy, come buy."Beside the brook, along the glen,She heard the tramp of goblin men,The voice and stirPoor Laura could not hear;Longed to buy fruit to comfort her,But feared to pay too dear.She thought of Jeanie in her grave,Who should have been a bride;But who for joys brides hope to haveFell sick and diedIn her gay prime,In earliest winter-time,With the first glazing rime,With the first snow-fall of crisp winter-time.Till Laura, dwindling,Seemed knocking at Death's door:Then Lizzie weighed no moreBetter and worse,But put a silver penny in her purse,Kissed Laura, crossed the heath with clumps of furzeAt twilight, halted by the brook;And for the first time in her lifeBegan to listen and look.Laughed every goblinWhen they spied her peeping:Came towards her hobbling,Flying, running, leaping,Puffing and blowing,Chuckling, clapping, crowing,Clucking and gobbling,Mopping and mowing,Full of airs and graces,Pulling wry faces,Demure grimaces,Cat-like and rat-like,Ratel and wombat-like,Snail-paced in a hurry,Parrot-voiced and whistler,Helter-skelter, hurry-skurry,Chattering like magpies,Fluttering like pigeons,Gliding like fishes,--Hugged her and kissed her;Squeezed and caressed her;Stretched up their dishes,Panniers and plates:"Look at our applesRusset and dun,Bob at our cherries,Bite at our peaches,Citrons and dates,Grapes for the asking,Pears red with baskingOut in the sun,Plums on their twigs;Pluck them and suck them,Pomegranates, figs.""Good folk," said Lizzie,Mindful of Jeanie,"Give me much and many";--Held out her apron,Tossed them her penny."Nay, take a seat with us,Honor and eat with us,"They answered grinning:"Our feast is but beginning.Night yet is early,Warm and dew-pearly,Wakeful and starry:Such fruits as theseNo man can carry;Half their bloom would fly,Half their dew would dry,Half their flavor would pass by.Sit down and feast with us,Be welcome guest with us,Cheer you and rest with us.""Thank you," said Lizzie; "but one waitsAt home alone for me:So, without further parleying,If you will not sell me anyOf your fruits though much and many,Give me back my silver pennyI tossed you for a fee."They began to scratch their pates,No longer wagging, purring,But visibly demurring,Grunting and snarling.One called her proud,Cross-grained, uncivil;Their tones waxed loud,Their looks were evil.Lashing their tailsThey trod and hustled her,Elbowed and jostled her,Clawed with their nails,Barking, mewing, hissing, mocking,Tore her gown and soiled her stocking,Twitched her hair out by the roots,Stamped upon her tender feet,Held her hands and squeezed their fruitsAgainst her mouth to make her eat.White and golden Lizzie stood,Like a lily in a flood,--Like a rock of blue-veined stoneLashed by tides obstreperously,--Like a beacon left aloneIn a hoary roaring sea,Sending up a golden fire,--Like a fruit-crowned orange-treeWhite with blossoms honey-sweetSore beset by wasp and bee,--Like a royal virgin townTopped with gilded dome and spireClose beleaguered by a fleetMad to tug her standard down.One may lead a horse to water,Twenty cannot make him drink.Though the goblins cuffed and caught her,Coaxed and fought her,Bullied and besought her,Scratched her, pinched her black as ink,Kicked and knocked her,Mauled and mocked her,Lizzie uttered not a word;Would not open lip from lipLest they should cram a mouthful in;But laughed in heart to feel the dripOf juice that syrupped all her face,And lodged in dimples of her chin,And streaked her neck which quaked like curd.At last the evil people,Worn out by her resistance,Flung back her penny, kicked their fruitAlong whichever road they took,Not leaving root or stone or shoot.Some writhed into the ground,Some dived into the brookWith ring and ripple,Some scudded on the gale without a sound,Some vanished in the distance.In a smart, ache, tingle,Lizzie went her way;Knew not was it night or day;Sprang up the bank, tore through the furze,Threaded copse and dingle,And heard her penny jingleBouncing in her purse,--Its bounce was music to her ear.She ran and ranAs if she feared some goblin manDogged her with gibe or curseOr something worse:But not one goblin skurried after,Nor was she pricked by fear;The kind heart made her windy-pacedThat urged her home quite out of breath with hasteAnd inward laughter.She cried "Laura," up the garden,"Did you miss me?Come and kiss me.Never mind my bruises,Hug me, kiss me, suck my juicesSqueezed from goblin fruits for you,Goblin pulp and goblin dew.Eat me, drink me, love me;Laura, make much of me:For your sake I have braved the glenAnd had to do with goblin merchant men."Laura started from her chair,Flung her arms up in the air,Clutched her hair:"Lizzie, Lizzie, have you tastedFor my sake the fruit forbidden?Must your light like mine be hidden,Your young life like mine be wasted,Undone in mine undoingAnd ruined in my ruin,Thirsty, cankered, goblin-ridden?"She clung about her sister,Kissed and kissed and kissed her:Tears once againRefreshed her shrunken eyes,Dropping like rainAfter long sultry drouth;Shaking with aguish fear, and pain,She kissed and kissed her with a hungry mouth.Her lips began to scorch,That juice was wormwood to her tongue,She loathed the feast:Writhing as one possessed she leaped and sung,Rent all her robe, and wrungHer hands in lamentable haste,And beat her breast.Her locks streamed like the torchBorne by a racer at full speed,Or like the mane of horses in their flight,Or like an eagle when she stems the lightStraight toward the sun,Or like a caged thing freed,Or like a flying flag when armies run.Swift fire spread through her veins, knocked at her heart,Met the fire smouldering thereAnd overbore its lesser flame;She gorged on bitterness without a name:Ah! fool, to choose such partOf soul-consuming care!Sense failed in the mortal strife:Like the watch-tower of a townWhich an earthquake shatters down,Like a lightning-stricken mast,Like a wind-uprooted treeSpun about,Like a foam-topped water-spoutCast down headlong in the sea,She fell at last;Pleasure past and anguish past,Is it death or is it life?Life out of death.That night long Lizzie watched by her,Counted her pulse's flagging stir,Felt for her breath,Held water to her lips, and cooled her faceWith tears and fanning leaves:But when the first birds chirped about their eaves,And early reapers plodded to the placeOf golden sheaves,And dew-wet grassBowed in the morning winds so brisk to pass,And new buds with new dayOpened of cup-like lilies on the stream,Laura awoke as from a dream,Laughed in the innocent old way,Hugged Lizzie but not twice or thrice;Her gleaming locks showed not one thread of gray,Her breath was sweet as May,And light danced in her eyes.Days, weeks, months, yearsAfterwards, when both were wivesWith children of their own;Their mother-hearts beset with fears,Their lives bound up in tender lives;Laura would call the little onesAnd tell them of her early prime,Those pleasant days long goneOf not-returning time:Would talk about the haunted glen,The wicked, quaint fruit-merchant men,Their fruits like honey to the throat,But poison in the blood;(Men sell not such in any town;)Would tell them how her sister stoodIn deadly peril to do her good,And win the fiery antidote:Then joining hands to little handsWould bid them cling together,"For there is no friend like a sister,In calm or stormy weather,To cheer one on the tedious way,To fetch one if one goes astray,To lift one if one totters down,To strengthen whilst one stands."
A hundred, a thousand to one; even so;Not a hope in the world remained:The swarming, howling wretches belowGained and gained and gained.Skene looked at his pale young wife:--"Is the time come?"--"The time is come!"--Young, strong, and so full of life:The agony struck them dumb.Close his arm about her now,Close her cheek to his,Close the pistol to her brow--God forgive them this!"Will it hurt much?"--"No, mine own:I wish I could bear the pang for both.""I wish I could bear the pang alone:Courage, dear, I am not loth."Kiss and kiss: "It is not painThus to kiss and die.One kiss more."--"And yet one again."--"Good by."--"Good by."Note.--I retain this little poem, not as historically accurate,but as written and published before I heard the supposedfacts of its first verse contradicted.
Where sunless rivers weepTheir waves into the deep,She sleeps a charmèd sleep:Awake her not.Led by a single star,She came from very farTo seek where shadows areHer pleasant lot.She left the rosy morn,She left the fields of corn,For twilight cold and lornAnd water springs.Through sleep, as through a veil,She sees the sky look pale,And hears the nightingaleThat sadly sings.Rest, rest, a perfect restShed over brow and breast;Her face is toward the west,The purple land.She cannot see the grainRipening on hill and plain;She cannot feel the rainUpon her hand.Rest, rest, forevermoreUpon a mossy shore;Rest, rest at the heart's coreTill time shall cease:Sleep that no pain shall wake,Night that no morn shall break,Till joy shall overtakeHer perfect peace.
When I was dead, my spirit turnedTo seek the much-frequented houseI passed the door, and saw my friendsFeasting beneath green orange-boughs;From hand to hand they pushed the wine,They sucked the pulp of plum and peach;They sang, they jested, and they laughed,For each was loved of each.I listened to their honest chat:Said one: "To-morrow we shall bePlod plod along the featureless sands,And coasting miles and miles of sea."Said one: "Before the turn of tideWe will achieve the eyrie-seat."Said one: "To-morrow shall be likeTo-day, but much more sweet.""To-morrow," said they, strong with hope,And dwelt upon the pleasant way:"To-morrow," cried they, one and all,While no one spoke of yesterday.Their life stood full at blessed noon;I, only I, had passed away:"To-morrow and to-day," they cried;I was of yesterday.I shivered comfortless, but castNo chill across the table-cloth;I, all-forgotten, shivered, sadTo stay, and yet to part how loth:I passed from the familiar room,I who from love had passed away,Like the remembrance of a guestThat tarrieth but a day.
Go from me, summer friends, and tarry not:I am no summer friend, but wintry cold,A silly sheep benighted from the fold,A sluggard with a thorn-choked garden plot.Take counsel, sever from my lot your lot,Dwell in your pleasant places, hoard your gold;Lest you with me should shiver on the wold,Athirst and hungering on a barren spot.For I have hedged me with a thorny hedge,I live alone, I look to die alone:Yet sometimes when a wind sighs through the sedge,Ghosts of my buried years and friends come back,My heart goes sighing after swallows flownOn sometime summer's unreturning track.
I had a love in soft south land,Beloved through April far in May;He waited on my lightest breath,And never dared to say me nay.He saddened if my cheer was sad,But gay he grew if I was gay;We never differed on a hair,My yes his yes, my nay his nay.The wedding hour was come, the aislesWere flushed with sun and flowers that day;I pacing balanced in my thoughts,--"It's quite too late to think of nay."--My bridegroom answered in his turn,Myself had almost answered "yea":When through the flashing nave I heard.A struggle and resounding "nay."Bridemaids and bridegroom shrank in fear,But I stood high who stood at bay:"And if I answer yea, fair Sir,What man art thou to bar with nay?"He was a strong man from the north,Light-locked, with eyes of dangerous gray:"Put yea by for another timeIn which I will not say thee nay."He took me in his strong white arms,He bore me on his horse awayO'er crag, morass, and hair-breadth pass,But never asked me yea or nay.He made me fast with book and bell,With links of love he makes me stay;Till now I've neither heart nor powerNor will nor wish to say him nay.
Every valley drinks,Every dell and hollow:Where the kind rain sinks and sinks,Green of Spring will follow.Yet a lapse of weeksBuds will burst their edges,Strip their wool-coats, glue-coats, streaks,In the woods and hedges;Weave a bower of loveFor birds to meet each other,Weave a canopy aboveNest and egg and mother.But for fattening rainWe should have no flowers,Never a bud or leaf againBut for soaking showers;Never a mated birdIn the rocking tree-tops,Never indeed a flock or herdTo graze upon the lea-crops.Lambs so woolly white,Sheep the sun-bright leas on,They could have no grass to biteBut for rain in season.We should find no mossIn the shadiest places,Find no waving meadow-grassPied with broad-eyed daisies;But miles of barren sand,With never a son or daughter,Not a lily on the land,Or lily on the water.
Why were you born when the snow was falling?You should have come to the cuckoo's calling,Or when grapes are green in the cluster,Or, at least, when lithe swallows musterFor their far off flyingFrom summer dying.Why did you die when the lambs were cropping?You should have died at the apples' dropping,When the grasshopper comes to trouble,And the wheat-fields are sodden stubble,And all winds go sighingFor sweet things dying.
As rivers seek the sea,Much more deep than they,So my soul seeks theeFar away:As running rivers moanOn their course aloneSo I moanLeft alone.As the delicate roseTo the sun's sweet strengthDoth herself unclose,Breadth and length:So spreads my heart to theeUnveiled utterly,I to theeUtterly.As morning dew exhalesSunwards pure and free,So my spirit failsAfter thee:As dew leaves not a traceOn the green earth's face;I, no traceOn thy face.Its goal the river knows,Dewdrops find a way,Sunlight cheers the roseIn her day:Shall I, lone sorrow past,Find thee at the last?Sorrow past,Thee at last?
"Now did you mark a falcon,Sister dear, sister dear,Flying toward my windowIn the morning cool and clear?With jingling bells about her neck,But what beneath her wing?It may have been a ribbon,Or it may have been a ring."--"I marked a falcon swoopingAt the break of day:And for your love, my sister dove,I 'frayed the thief away."--"Or did you spy a ruddy hound,Sister fair and tall,Went snuffing round my garden bound,Or crouched by my bower wall?With a silken leash about his neck;But in his mouth may beA chain of gold and silver links,Or a letter writ to me."--"I heard a hound, high-born sister,Stood baying at the moon:I rose and drove him from your wallLest you should wake too soon."--"Or did you meet a pretty pageSat swinging on the gate;Sat whistling, whistling like a bird,Or may be slept too late:With eaglets broidered on his cap,And eaglets on his glove?If you had turned his pockets out,You had found some pledge of love."--"I met him at this daybreak,Scarce the east was red:Lest the creaking gate should anger you,I packed him home to bed."--"O patience, sister. Did you seeA young man tall and strong,Swift-footed to uphold the rightAnd to uproot the wrong,Come home across the desolate seaTo woo me for his wife?And in his heart my heart is locked,And in his life my life."--"I met a nameless man, sister,Who loitered round our door:I said: Her husband loves her much.And yet she loves him more."--"Fie, sister, fie, a wicked lie,A lie, a wicked lie;I have none other love but him,Nor will have till I die.And you have turned him from our door,And stabbed him with a lie:I will go seek him thro' the worldIn sorrow till I die."--"Go seek in sorrow, sister,And find in sorrow too:If thus you shame our father's nameMy curse go forth with you."
Frost-locked all the winter,Seeds, and roots, and stones of fruits,What shall make their sap ascendThat they may put forth shoots?Tips of tender green,Leaf, or blade, or sheath;Telling of the hidden lifeThat breaks forth underneath,Life nursed in its grave by Death.Blows the thaw-wind pleasantly,Drips the soaking rain,By fits looks down the waking sun:Young grass springs on the plain;Young leaves clothe early hedgerow trees;Seeds, and roots, and stones of fruits,Swollen with sap, put forth their shoots;Curled-headed ferns sprout in the lane;Birds sing and pair again.There is no time like Spring,When life's alive in everything,Before new nestlings sing,Before cleft swallows speed their journey backAlong the trackless track,--God guides their wing,He spreads their table that they nothing lack,--Before the daisy grows a common flower,Before the sun has powerTo scorch the world up in his noontide hour.There is no time like Spring,Like Spring that passes by;There is no life like Spring-life born to die,--Piercing the sod,Clothing the uncouth clod,Hatched in the nest,Fledged on the windy bough,Strong on the wing:There is no time like Spring that passes by,Now newly born, and nowHastening to die.
The upland flocks grew starved and thinned:Their shepherds scarce could feed the lambsWhose milkless mothers butted them,Or who were orphaned of their dams.The lambs athirst for mother's milkFilled all the place with piteous sounds:Their mothers' bones made white for milesThe pastureless wet pasture grounds.Day after day, night after night,From lamb to lamb the shepherds went,With teapots for the bleating mouthsInstead of nature's nourishment.The little shivering gaping thingsSoon knew the step that brought them aid,And fondled the protecting hand,And rubbed it with a woolly head.Then, as the days waxed on to weeks,It was a pretty sight to seeThese lambs with frisky heads and tailsSkipping and leaping on the lea,Bleating in tender, trustful tones,Resting on rocky crag or mound,And following the beloved feetThat once had sought for them and found.These very shepherds of their flocks,These loving lambs so meek to please,Are worthy of recording wordsAnd honor in their due degrees:So I might live a hundred years,And roam from strand to foreign strand,Yet not forget this flooded springAnd scarce-saved lambs of Westmoreland.
My heart is like a singing birdWhose nest is in a watered shoot;My heart is like an apple-treeWhose boughs are bent with thick-set fruit;My heart is like a rainbow shellThat paddles in a halcyon sea;My heart is gladder than all theseBecause my love is come to me.Raise me a dais of silk and down;Hang it with vair and purple dyes;Carve it in doves and pomegranates,And peacocks with a hundred eyes;Work it in gold and silver grapes,In leaves and silver fleurs-de-lys;Because the birthday of my lifeIs come, my love is come to me.
Remember me when I am gone away,Gone far away into the silent land;When you can no more hold me by the hand,Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.Remember me when no more, day by day,You tell me of our future that you planned:Only remember me; you understandIt will be late to counsel then or pray.Yet if you should forget me for a whileAnd afterwards remember, do not grieve:For if the darkness and corruption leaveA vestige of the thoughts that once I had,Better by far you should forget and smileThan that you should remember and be sad.
The curtains were half drawn, the floor was sweptAnd strewn with rushes, rosemary and mayLay thick upon the bed on which I lay,Where through the lattice ivy-shadows crept.He leaned above me, thinking that I sleptAnd could not hear him; but I heard him say:"Poor child, poor child": and as he turned awayCame a deep silence, and I knew he wept.He did not touch the shroud, or raise the foldThat hid my face, or take my hand in his,Or ruffle the smooth pillows for my head:He did not love me living; but once deadHe pitied me; and very sweet it isTo know he still is warm though I am cold.
Love, strong as Death, is dead.Come, let us make his bedAmong the dying flowers:A green turf at his head;And a stone at his feet,Whereon we may sitIn the quiet evening hours.He was born in the Spring,And died before the harvesting:On the last warm summer dayHe left us; he would not stayFor autumn twilight, cold and gray.Sit we by his grave, and singHe is gone away.To few chords and sad and lowSing we so:Be our eyes fixed on the grassShadow-veiled as the years pass,While we think of all that wasIn the long ago.
Hear now a curious dream I dreamed last night,Each word whereof is weighed and sifted truth.I stood beside Euphrates while it swelledLike overflowing Jordan in its youth:It waxed and colored sensibly to sight,Till out of myriad pregnant waves there welledYoung crocodiles, a gaunt blunt-featured crew,Fresh-hatched perhaps and daubed with birthday dew.The rest if I should tell, I fear my friend,My closest friend, would deem the facts untrue;And therefore it were wisely left untold;Yet if you will, why, hear it to the end.Each crocodile was girt with massive goldAnd polished stones, that with their wearers grew:But one there was who waxed beyond the rest,Wore kinglier girdle and a kingly crown,Whilst crowns and orbs and sceptres starred his breast.All gleamed compact and green with scale on scale,But special burnishment adorned his mail,And special terror weighed upon his frown;His punier brethren quaked before his tail,Broad as a rafter, potent as a flail.So he grew lord and master of his kin:But who shall tell the tale of all their woes?An execrable appetite arose,He battened on them, crunched, and sucked them in.He knew no law, he feared no binding law,But ground them with inexorable jaw:The luscious fat distilled upon his chin,Exuded from his nostrils and his eyes,While still like hungry death he fed his maw;Till every minor crocodile being deadAnd buried too, himself gorged to the full,He slept with breath oppressed and unstrung claw.O marvel passing strange which next I saw:In sleep he dwindled to the common size,And all the empire faded from his coat.Then from far off a wingèd vessel came,Swift as a swallow, subtle as a flame:I know not what it bore of freight or host,But white it was as an avenging ghost.It levelled strong Euphrates in its course;Supreme yet weightless as an idle moteIt seemed to tame the waters without forceTill not a murmur swelled or billow beat:Lo, as the purple shadow swept the sands,The prudent crocodile rose on his feetAnd shed appropriate tears and wrung his hands.What can it mean? you ask. I answer notFor meaning, but myself must echo, What?And tell it as I saw it on the spot.
O roses for the flush of youth,And laurel for the perfect prime;But pluck an ivy branch for meGrown old before my time.O violets for the grave of youth,And bay for those dead in their prime;Give me the withered leaves I choseBefore in the old time.
BRIDE.O love, love, hold me fast,--He draws me away from thee;I cannot stem the blast,Nor the cold strong sea:Far away a light shinesBeyond the hills and pines;It is lit for me.BRIDEGROOM.I have thee close, my dear,No terror can come near;Only far off the northern light shines clear.GHOST.Come with me, fair and false,To our home, come home.It is my voice that calls:Once thou wast not afraidWhen I wooed, and said,"Come, our nest is newly made,"--Now cross the tossing foam.BRIDE.Hold me one moment longer,He taunts me with the past,His clutch is waxing stronger,Hold me fast, hold me fast.He draws me from thy heart,And I cannot withhold:He bids my spirit departWith him into the cold:--O bitter vows of old!BRIDEGROOM.Lean on me, hide thine eyes:Only ourselves, earth and skies,Are present here: be wise.GHOST.Lean on me, come away,I will guide and steady:Come, for I will not stay:Come, for house and bed are ready.Ah, sure bed and house,For better and worse, for life and death:Goal won with shortened breath:Come, crown our vows.BRIDE.One moment, one more word,While my heart beats still,While my breath is stirredBy my fainting will.O friend forsake me not,Forget not as I forgot:But keep thy heart for me,Keep thy faith true and bright;Through the lone cold winter nightPerhaps I may come to thee.BRIDEGROOM.Nay, peace, my darling, peace:Let these dreams and terrors cease:Who spoke of death or change or aught but ease?GHOST.O fair frail sin,O poor harvest gathered in!Thou shalt visit him againTo watch his heart grow cold;To know the gnawing painI knew of old;To see one much more fairFill up the vacant chair,Fill his heart, his children bear:--While thou and I togetherIn the outcast weatherToss and howl and spin.