Burning fire, or blowing wind;Starry night, or glowing sun:All these thou dost bring to mind,All these match thee, one by one:Ocean is thy name, most fair!Strangest name, for thee to bear.
Daughter of the sun, and childOf the wind upon the waste;Daughter of the field and wild:Thee, what oceans have embraced?What great waves have cradled thee,That thy name is of the sea?
In thy beauty, the red earth,Full of gold and jewel stone,Flames and burns: thy happy birthMade and marked thee for her own.Winds held triumph in the trees:Thou wast lying on earth's knees.
For thine ancient people keepStill their march from land to land:Ever upon earth they sleep,Woods and fields on either hand.Not upon the barren seaHave thy people dandled thee.
Closer they, than other men,To the heart of earth have come:First the wilderness, and thenField and forest, gave them home:All their days, their hearts, they mustGive to earth: and then their dust.
Was it, that they heard the seaIn the surging pinewood's voice:As they pondered names, for theeFair enough; so made their choice,Hailed thee Ocean, hailed thee queenOver glades of tossing green?
1888
To Manmohan Ghose.
Not in the crystal air of a Greek glen,Not in the houses of imperial Rome,Lived he, who wore this beauty among men:No classic city was his ancient home.What happy country claims his fair youth then,Her pride? and what his fortunate lineage?Here is no common man of every day,This man, whose full and gleaming eyes assuageNever their longing, be that what it may:Of dreamland only he is citizen,Beyond the flying of the last sea's foam.
Set him beneath the Athenian olive trees,To speak with Marathonians: or to taskThe wise serenity of Socrates;Asking, what other men dare never ask.Love of his country and his gods? Not theseThe master thoughts, that comfort his strange heart,When life grows difficult, and the lights dim:In him is no simplicity, but artIs all in all, for life and death, to him:And whoso looks upon that fair face, seesNo nature there: only a magic mask.
Or set this man beside the Roman lords,To vote upon the fate of Catiline;Or in a battle of stout Roman swords,Where strength and virtue were one thing divine:Or bind him to the cross with Punic cords.Think you, this unknown and mysterious manHad played the Roman, with that wistful smile,Those looks not moulded on a Roman plan,But full of witcheries and secret guile?Think you, those lips had framed true Roman words,Whose very curves have something Sibylline?
Thou wouldst but laugh, were one to question thee:Laugh with malign, bright eyes, and curious joy.Thou'rt fallen in love with thine own mystery!And yet thou art no Sibyl, but a boy.What wondrous land within the unvoyaged seaHaunts then thy thoughts, thy memories, thy dreams?Nay! be my friend; and share with me thy past:If haply I may catch enchaunting gleams,Catch marvellous music, while our friendship last:Tell me thy visions: though their true home beSome land, that was a legend in old Troy.
1890.
To Hugh Orange.
A man of marble holds the throne,With looks composed and resolute:Till death, a prince whom princes own,Draws near to touch the marble mute.
The play is over: good my friends!Murmur the pale lips:your applause!With what a grace the actor ends:How loyal to dramatic laws!
A brooding beauty on his brow;Irony brooding over sin:The next imperial actor nowBids the satiric piece begin.
To the Rev. Dr. William Barry.
Long Irish melancholy of lament!Voice of the sorrow, that is on the sea:Voice of that ancient mourning music sentFrom Rama childless: the world wails in thee.
The sadness of all beauty at the heart,The appealing of all souls unto the skies,The longing locked in each man's breast apart,Weep in the melody of thine old cries.
Mother of tears! sweet Mother of sad sighs!All mourners of the world weep Irish, weepEver with thee: while burdened time still runs,Sorrows reach God through thee, and ask for sleep.
And though thine own unsleeping sorrow yetLive to the end of burdened time, in pain:Still sing the song of sorrow! and forgetThe sorrow, in the solace, of the strain.
1893.
To Harold Child.
The wind, hark! the wind in the angry woods:And low clouds purple the west: there broodsThunder, thunder; and rain will fall;Fresh fragrance cling to the wind from allRoses holding water wells,Laurels gleaming to the gusty air;Wilding mosses of the dells,Drenched hayfields, and dripping hedgerows fair.
The wind, hark! the wind dying again:The wind's voice matches the far-off main,In sighing cadences: Pan will wake,Pan in the forest, whose rich pipes makeMusic to the folding flowers,In the pure eve, where no hot spells are:Those be favourable hoursHymned by Pan beneath the shepherd star.
1887.
The mountains, and the lonely death at lastUpon the lonely mountains: O strong friend!The wandering over, and the labour passed,Thou art indeed at rest:Earth gave thee of her best,That labour and this end.
Earth was thy mother, and her true son thou:Earth called thee to a knowledge of her ways,Upon the great hills, up the great streams: nowUpon earth's kindly breastThou art indeed at rest:Thou, and thine arduous days.
Fare thee well, O strong heart! The tranquil nightLooks calmly on thee: and the sun pours downHis glory over thee, O heart of might!Earth gives thee perfect rest:Earth, whom thy swift feet pressed:Earth, whom the vast stars crown.
1889.
Old age, that dwelt upon thy yearsWith softest and with stateliest grace,Hath sealed thine eyes, hath closed thine ears,And stilled the sweetness of thy face.
That gentle and that gracious lookSleeps now, and wears a marble calm:Death took no more away, but tookAll cares away, and left the balm
Of pure repose and peacefulnessUpon thy forehead touched by time:So shall I know thee, none the lessThan earth unwintered, come the prime.
Gone, the white snows, the lingering leaves,That once endeared the wintry days:But the new bloom of spring receivesThe old love, and has an equal praise.
Fare then thee well! In Winchester,Sleep thy last fearless sleep serene.Friends fail me not; but kindlierCan no friend be, than thou hast been.
The city that we two loved best,No fairer place of sleep for thee:There lay thee down, and take thy rest,And this farewell of love from me.
1888
To Walter Alison Phillips.
Ten years ago I heard; ten, have I loved;Thine haunting voice borne over the waste sea.Was it thy melancholy spirit movedMine, with those gray dreams, that invested thee?Or was it, that thy beauty first reprovedThe imperfect fancies, that looked fair to me?
Thou hast both secrets: for to thee are knownThe fatal sorrows binding life and death:And thou hast found, on winds of passage blown,That music, which is sorrow's perfect breath:So, all thy beauty takes a solemn tone,And art, is all thy melancholy saith.
Now therefore is thy voice abroad for me,When through dark woodlands murmuring sounds make way:Thy voice, and voices of the sounding sea,Stir in the branches, as none other may:All pensive loneliness is full of thee,And each mysterious, each autumnal day.
Hesperian soul! Well hadst thou in the WestThine hermitage and meditative place:In mild, retiring fields thou wast at rest,Calmed by old winds, touched with aerial grace:Fields, whence old magic simples filled thy breast,And unforgotten fragrance balmed thy face.
1889
To Theodore Peters.
Roses from Paestan rosaries!More goodly red and white was she:Her red and white were harmonies,Not matched upon a Paestan tree.
Ivories blaunched in Alban air!She lies more purely blaunched than you:No Alban whiteness doth she wear,But death's perfection of that hue.
Nay! now the rivalry is done,Of red, and white, and whiter still:She hath a glory from that sun,Who falls not from Olympus hill.
1893.
Dear Cousin: to be three years old,Is to have found the Age of Gold:That Age foregone! that Age foretold!What wondrous names, then, wait thy choice,High sounding for thine helpless voice!I choose instead: and hail in theeA queen of lilied Arcady,Or lady of Hesperides:Or, if Utopia lie near these,Utopian thou, by right divine,On whom all stars of favour shine.Vainly the cold Lycean sageWithheld his praise from childhood's age;Denied thine happiness to thee;Nor as a little child would be!Man to the world he could present,Magnanimous, magnificent:Children, he knew not: for of theeDreamed not his calm philosophy;Or Pythias was no Dorothy!Thou hast good right to laugh in scornAt us, of simple dreams forlorn:At us, whose disenchaunted eyesImagination dare despise.Thou hast that freshness, early born,Which roses have; or billowy corn,Waving, and washed in dews of morn:And yet, no flower of woodlands wild,But overwhelming London's child!About thy sleep are heard the feetAnd turmoil of the sounding street:Thou hearest not! The land of dreamsMore closely lies, and clearlier gleams.Thou watchest, with thy grave eyes gray,Our world, with looks of far away:Eyes, that consent to look on thingsUnlike their own imaginings;And, looking, weave round all, they see,Charms of their own sweet sorcery.Thus very London thou dost changeTo wonderland, all fair and strange:The ugliness and uproar seemTo soften, at a child's pure dream:And each poor dusty garden yieldsThe fresh delight of cowslip fields.What is the secret, and the spell?Thou knowest: for thou hast it well.Wilt thou not pity us, and breakThy silent dreaming, for our sake?Wilt thou not teach us, how to makeWorlds of delight from things of nought,Or fetched from faery land, and wroughtWith flowers and lovely imageries?Pity us! for such wisdom dies:Pity thyself! youth flies, youth flies.Thou comest to the desert plain,Where no dreams follow in thy train:They leave thee at the pleasaunce close;Lonely the haggard pathway goes.Thou wilt look back, and see them, deepIn the fair glades, where thou didst keepThy summer court, thy summer sleep:But thou wilt never see them more,Till death the golden dreams restore.Now, ere the hard, dull hours beginTheir sad, destroying work withinThy childhood's delicate memory,Wilt thou not tell us, Dorothy?Nay! thou art in conspiracyWith all those faeries, children styled,To keep the secret of the child.Ah! to be only three years old!That is indeed an Age of Gold:And, care not for mine idle fears!Thou need'st not lose it: the far years,Touching with love and gentle tearsThe treasures of thy memory,May mould them into poetry.Then, of those deep eyes, gray and grave,The world will be a willing slave:Then, all the dreams of dear dreamlandWait with their music at thine hand,And beauty come at thy command.But now, what counts the will of time?Enough, thou livest! And this rhyme,Unworthy of the Golden Age,Yet hails thee, in that heritage,Happy and fair: then, come what may,Thou hast the firstfruits of the day.Fair fall each morn to thee! And I,Despite all dark fates, Dorothy!Will prove me thine affectionateCousin, and loyal Laureate.
1889
To Dr. Douglas Hyde.
Never forgetful silence fall on thee,Nor younger voices overtake thee,Nor echoes from thine ancient hills forsake thee;Old music heard by Mona of the sea:And where with moving melodies there break theePastoral Conway, venerable Dee.
Like music lives, nor may that music die,Still in the far, fair Gaelic places:The speech, so wistful with its kindly graces,Holy Croagh Patrick knows, and holy Hy:The speech, that wakes the soul in withered faces,And wakes remembrance of great things gone by.
Like music by the desolate Land's EndMournful forgetfulness hath broken:No more words kindred to the winds are spoken,Where upon iron cliffs whole seas expendThat strength, whereof the unalterable tokenRemains wild music, even to the world's end.
1887.
To John O'Leary.
A terrible and splendid trustHeartens the host of Inisfail:Their dream is of the swift sword-thrust,A lightning glory of the Gael.
Croagh Patrick is the place of prayers,And Tara the assembling place:But each sweet wind of Ireland bearsThe trump of battle on its race.
From Dursey Isle to Donegal,From Howth to Achill, the glad noiseRings: and the heirs of glory fall,Or victory crowns their fighting joys.
A dream! a dream! an ancient dream!Yet, ere peace come to Inisfail,Some weapons on some field must gleam,Some burning glory fire the Gael.
That field may lie beneath the sun,Fair for the treading of an host:That field in realms of thought be won,And armed minds do their uttermost:
Some way, to faithful Inisfail,Shall come the majesty and aweOf martial truth, that must prevailTo lay on all the eternal law.
1893.
To John Davidson.
Gather the people, for the battle breaks:From camping grounds above the valley,Gather the men-at-arms, and bid them rally:Because the morn, the battle, wakes.High throned above the mountains and the main,Triumphs the sun: far down, the pasture plainTo trampling armour shakes.
This was the meaning of those plenteous years,Those unarmed years of peace unbroken:Flashing war crowns them! Now war's trump hath spokenThis final glory in our ears.The old blood of our pastoral fathers nowRiots about our heart, and through our brow:Their sons can have no fears.
This was our whispering and haunting dream,When cornfields flourished, red and golden:When vines hung purple, nor could be withholdenThe radiant outburst of their stream.Earth cried to us, that all her laboured storeWas ours: that she had more to give, and more:For nothing, did we deem?
We give her back the glory of this hour.O sun and earth! O strength and beauty!We use you now, we thank you now: our dutyWe stand to do, mailed in your power.A little people of a favoured land,Helmed with the blessing of the morn we stand:Our life is at its flower.
Gather the people, let the battle break:An hundred peaceful years are over.Now march each man to battle, as a lover:For him, whom death shall overtake!Sleeping upon this field, about his gloomVoices shall pierce, to thrill his sacred tomb,Of pride for his great sake.
With melody about us: heart and feetResponding to one mighty measure;Glad with the splendour of an holy pleasure;Swayed, one and all, as wind sways wheat:Answering the sunlight with our eyes aglow;Serene, and proud, and passionate, we goThrough airs of morning sweet.
Let no man dare to be disheartened now!We challenge death beyond denial.Against the host of death we make our trial:Lord God of Hosts! do thou,Who gavest us the fulness of thy sunOn fields of peace, perfect war's work begun:Warriors, to thee we bow.
O life-blood of remembrance! Long agoThis land upheld our ancient fathers:And for this land, their land, our land, now gathersOne fellowship against the foe.The spears flash: be they as our mothers' eyes!The trump sounds: hearken to our fathers' cries!March we to battle so.
1889
To John O'Mahony.
Immemorial Holy Land!At thine hand, thy sons awaitAny fate: they understandThee, the all compassionate.
Be it death for thee, they grieveNought, to leave the fight aside:Thou their pride, they undeceiveDeath, by death unterrified.
Mother, dear and fair to us,Ever thus to be adored!Is thy sword grown timorous,Mother of misericord?
For thy dead is grief on thee?Can it be, thou dost repent,That they went, thy chivalry,Those sad ways magnificent?
What, and if their heart's blood flow?Gladly so, with love divine,Since not thine the overthrow,They thy fields incarnadine.
Hearts afire with one sweet flame,One loved name, thine host adores:Conquerors, they overcameDeath, high Heaven's inheritors.
For their loyal love, nought less,Than the stress of death, sufficed:Now with Christ, in blessedness,Triumph they, imparadised.
Mother, with so dear blood stained!Freedom gained through love befallThee, by thraldom unprofaned,Perfect and imperial!
Still the ancient voices ring:Faith they bring, and fear repel.Time shall tell thy triumphing,Victress and invincible!
1893.
To Vincent O'Sullivan.
I.
Sweet music lingersFrom her harpstrings on her fingers,When they rest in mine:And her clear glancesHelp the music, whereto dances,Trembling with an hope divine,Every heart: and chiefly mine.
Could she discoverAll her heart to any lover,She who sways them all?Yet her hand trembles,Laid in mine: and scarce dissembles,That its music looks to fallInto mine, and Love end all.
1889
II.
The airs, that best belong,Upon the strings devoutly playing,Your heart devoutly praying:Now sound your passion, full and strong,Past all her fond gainsaying.
First, strangely sweet and low,Slowly her careless ears entrancing:Then set the music dancing,And wild notes flying to and fro;Like spirited sunbeams glancing.
The melodies will stirSpirits of love, that still attend her:That able are to bend her,By subtile arts transforming her;And all their wisdom fend her.
Last, loud and resolute,Ring out a triumph and a greeting!No call for sad entreating,For she will grant you all your suit,Her song your music meeting.
1889
To Frederic Herbert Trench.
Calmly, breathe calmly all your music, maids!Breathe a calm music over my dead queen.All your lives long, you have nor heard, nor seen,Fairer than she, whose hair in sombre braidsWith beauty overshadesHer brow, broad and serene.
Surely she hath lain so an hundred years:Peace is upon her, old as the world's heart.Breathe gently, music! Music done, depart:And leave me in her presence to my tears,With music in mine ears;For sorrow hath its art.
Music, more music, sad and slow! she liesDead: and more beautiful, than early morn.Discrowned am I, and of her looks forlorn:Alone vain memories immortalizeThe way of her soft eyes,Her musical voice low-borne.
The balm of gracious death now laps her round,As once life gave her grace beyond her peers.Strange! that I loved this lady of the spheres,To sleep by her at last in common ground:When kindly sleep hath boundMine eyes, and sealed mine ears.
Maidens! make a low music: merely makeSilence a melody, no more. This day,She travels down a pale and lonely way:Now, for a gentle comfort, let her takeSuch music, for her sake,As mourning love can play.
Holy my queen lies in the arms of death:Music moves over her still face, and ILean breathing love over her. She will lieIn earth thus calmly, under the wind's breath:The twilight wind, that saith:Rest! worthy found, to die.
1889
To Lord Alfred Douglas.
With faces bright, as ruddy corn,Touched by the sunlight of the morn;With rippling hair; and gleaming eyes,Wherein a sea of passion lies;Hair waving back, and eyes that gleamWith deep delight of dream on dream;With full lips, curving into song;With shapely limbs, upright and strong:The youths on holy service throng.
Vested in white, upon their browsAre wreaths fresh twined from dewy boughsAnd flowers they strow along the way,Still dewy from the birth of day.So, to each reverend altar come,They stand in adoration: someSwing up gold censers; till the airIs blue and sweet, with smoke of rareSpices, that fetched from Egypt were.
In voices of calm, choral tone,Praise they each God, with praise his own:As children of the Gods, is seenTheir glad solemnity of mien:So fair a spirit of the skiesIs in their going: and their eyesLook out upon the peopled earth,As theirs were some diviner birth:And clear and courtly is their mirth.
Lights of the labouring world, they seem:Or, to the tired, like some fresh stream.Their dignity of perfect youthCompels devotion, as doth truth:So right seems all, they do, they are.Old age looks wistful, from afar,To watch their beauty, as they go,Radiant and free, in ordered row;And fairer, in the watching, grow.
Fair though it be, to watch uncloseThe nestling glories of a rose,Depth on rich depth, soft fold on fold:Though fairer be it, to beholdStately and sceptral lilies breakTo beauty, and to sweetness wake:Yet fairer still, to see and sing,One fair thing is, one matchless thing:Youth, in its perfect blossoming.
The magic of a golden graceBrings fire and sweetness on each face:Till, from their passage, every heartTakes fire, and sweetness in the smart:Till virtue lives, for all who ownTheir majesty, in them alone:Till careless hearts, and idle, takeDelight in living, for their sake;Worship their footsteps, and awake.
Beside the tremulous, blue sea,Clear at sunset, they love to be:And they are rarely sad, but then.For sorrow touches them, as men,Looking upon the calm of things,That pass, and wake rememberingsOf holy and of ancient awe;The charm of immemorial Law:What we see now, the great dead saw!
Upon a morn of storm, a swan,Breasting the cold stream, cold and wan,Throws back his neck in snowy lengthBetween his snowy wings of strength:Against him the swift river flows,The proudlier he against it goes,King of the waters! For his prideBears him upon a mightier tide:May death not be by youth defied?
But the red sun is gone: and gleamsOf delicate moonlight waken dreams,Dreams, and the mysteries of peace:Shall this fair darkness ever cease?Here is no drear, no fearful Power,But life grows fuller with each hour,Full of the silence, that is best:Earth lies, with soothed and quiet breast,Beneath the guardian stars, at rest.
At night, behold them! Where lights burnBy moonlit olives, see them turnFull faces toward the sailing moon,Nigh lovelier than beneath high noon!Throw back their comely moulded throats,Whence music on the night wind floats!And through the fragrant hush of nightTheir lustrous eyes make darkness bright:Their laugh loads darkness with delight.
Almost the murmuring sea is still:Almost the world obeys their will.Such youth moves pity in stern Fates,And sure death wellnigh dominates:Their passion kindles such fair flame,As from divine Achilles came:A vehement ardour thrills their breasts,And beauty's benediction restsOn earth, and on earth's goodliest guests.
The music of their sighing partsA silence: and their beating heartsBeat to a measure of despair:Ah! how the fire of youth is fair?Yet may not be for ever young!But night hath yielded; there hath sprungMorning upon the throne of night:Day comes, with solemnizing light:Consuming sorrows take to flight.
Magnificent in early bloom,Like Gods, they triumph over gloom:All things desirable are theirs,Of beauty and of wonder, heirs:Their cities, vassals are, which giveThem thanks and praise, because they live:Strong, they are victors of dismay;Fair, they serve beauty every day;Young, the sun loves to light their way.
Where now is death? Where that gray land?Those fearless eyes, those white brows grand,That take full sunlight and sweet airWith rapture true and debonair,These have not known the touch of death!The world hath winds: these forms have breath,But, should death come, should dear life set,Calm would each go:Farewell! forgetMe dead: live you serenely yet.
See them! The springing of the palmIs nought, beside their gracious calm:The rippling of cool waters diesTo nought, before their clear replies:The smile, that heralds their bright thought,Brings down the splendid sun to nought.See them! They walk the earth in state:In right of perfect youth, held great:On whom the powers of nature wait.
No sceptre theirs, but they are kings:Their forms and words are royal things.Their simple friendship is a court,Whither the wise and great resort.No homage of the world, they claim:But in all places lives their fame.Sun, moon, and stars; the earth, the sea;Yea! all things, that of beauty be,Honour their true divinity.
1889
To Arthur Galton.
How shall I praise thee, Caesar? Thou art he,Through whom all Europe's greatness came to beAnd the world's central crime is thy swift death.And thou too, Cicero! the voice of Rome!The listening world is thy perpetual home:Earth's plain, thy floor; the embracing sky, thy dome.No greater things than these, great history saith:Caesarian sword, and Ciceronian breath.
You were no friends: but you are brothers now:Equal, the laurels on each victor's brow:Triumphing generations throng each car.This night, I hear those measured tides of sound,Surging above that crownless king discrowned,Dead on that sacred senatorial ground:Low in the dark hangs, burning from afar,With pale and solemn fires, the Julian Star.
1889
At early morning, clear and cold,Still in her English harbour layThe long, white ship: while winter goldShone pale upon her outward way.
Slowly she moved, slowly she stirred,Stately and slow, she went away:Sounds of farewell, the harbour heard;Music on board began to play.
Old, homely airs were thine, great ship!Breaking from laughter into tears:And through them all good fellowshipSpoke of a trust beyond all fears.
Still, as the gray mists gathered round,Embracing thee, concealing thine;Still, faintly from the Outward BoundCame melodies ofAuld Lang Syne.
Oh, sad to part! Oh, brave to goBetween the Piers of Hercules,And through the seas of fame, and soMeet eastern sun on eastern seas!
O richly laden! swiftly bear,And surely, thy two thousand men;Till round them burn the Indian air:And English lips will hail them then.
NEW YEAR'S DAY: 1890.
To Olivier Georges Destrée.
In Merioneth, over the sad moorDrives the rain, the cold wind blows:Past the ruinous church door,The poor procession without music goes.
Lonely she wandered out her hour, and died.Now the mournful curlew criesOver her, laid down besideDeath's lonely people: lightly down she lies.
In Merioneth, the wind lives and wails,On from hill to lonely hill:Down the loud, triumphant gales,A spirit cries Be strong! and cries Be still!
1887.
To the Earl Russell.
I.
Deep music of the ancient forest!Through glades and coverts with thy magic winding;And in the silence of our hushed hearts findingTremulous echoes of thy murmur,Unshapen thoughts thronging and throbbing:O music of the mystery, that embracesAll forest depths, and footless far-off places!Thou art the most high voice of nature,Thou art the voice of unseen singers,Vanishing ever deeper through the clingingThickets, and under druid branches wingingA flight, that draws our eyes to follow:Yet, following, find they only forest;But lonely forest, stately melancholy,A consecrated stillness, old and holy;Commanding us to hail with homagePowers, that we see not, hid in beauty:A majesty immeasurable; a gloriousConclave of angels: wherewithal victorious,The Lord of venerable forests,Murmuring sanctuaries and cloisters,Proclaims his kingdom over our emotion:Even as his brother Lord of the old oceanThunders tremendous laws, in tempestEmbattled between winds and waters.O mighty friendship of mysterious forces,O servants of one Will! Stars in their courses,Flowers in their fragrance, in their musicWinged winds, and lightnings in their fierceness!These are the world's magnalities and splendours:At touch of these, the adoring spirit rendersGlory, and praise, and passionate silence.
1886.
II.
The moon labours through black cloud,Through the vast night, dark and proud:The windy wood dances.Still the massed heavens drive along:And, of all night's fiery throng,The moon alone glances.
How the lights are wild and strange!Only one light doth not change,From living fires flowing:Where, on fragrant banks of fern,Steadily and stilly burnThe greenwood worms glowing.
Going down the forest side,The night robs me of all pride,By gloom and by splendour.High, away, alone, afar,Mighty wills and workings are:To them I surrender.
The processions of the night,Sweeping clouds and battling light,And wild winds in thunder,Care not for the world of man,Passionate on another plan:O twin worlds of wonder!
Ancients of dark majesty!Priests of splendid mystery!The Powers of Night cluster:In the shadows of the trees,Dreams, that no man lives and sees,The dreams! the dreams! muster.
Move not! for the night wind stirs:And the night wind ministersTo dreams, and their voices:Ah! the wild moon earthward bowedFrom that tyranny of cloud:The dim wood rejoices.
What do I here? What am I,Who may comprehend nor sky,Nor trees, nor dreams thronging?Over moonlight dark clouds drive:The vast midnight is aliveWith magical longing.
1889.
III.
Through the fresh woods there fleetFawns, with bright eyes, light feet:Bright eyes, and feet that spurnThe pure green fern.
Headed by leaping does,The swift procession goesThrough thickets, over lawns:Followed by fawns.
Over slopes, over glades,Down dells and leafy shades,Away the quick deer troop:A wildwood group.
Under the forest airs,A life of grace is theirs:Courtly their look; they seemThings of a dream.
Some say, but who can say?That a charmed troop are they:Once youths and maidens white!These may be right.
IV.
Over me, beeches broad beneath blue skyIn light winds through their cooling leaves rejoice:Now, the red squirrel, lithe and wild, runs by;Anon the wood dove from deep glades, with voiceOf mellow music, lulls the air:All murmurs of the forest, stirs and cries,Come stilly down green coverts; the high fernSmells of rich earth aglow from burning skies.Hither my greenwood ways love best to turn:Hither my lone hours gladliest fare.
But not for melancholy solitude;Not for the fond delight of loneliness:Though here nor voice, nor alien feet, intrude.Lone am I: but what lone dreams dare repressHigh presences of vanished days?Long billowy reaches of unnumbered treesRoll downward from this haunt, and break at lengthAgainst such walls, as no man unmoved sees,But hails the past of splendour and of strength:And heights of immemorial praise.
That Castle gray, marvellous with mighty years,Crowning the forest deeps in pride of place:Towers, royal in their histories of tears,And royal in their chronicles of grace:Am I alone, beholding those?The solitary forest bowers me round:Yet companies august go through the glade,Crowned and resplendent! stately and discrowned!All, solemn from the tragedies they played:Remembering, each the doom, the close.
Alone! Nay, but almost, would that I wereAlone: too high are these great things for me.Immeasurable glooms and splendours hereUsurp the calm noon, where my rest should be:O proud, O ancient Towers! farewell.I turn from you, and take the world of men:Gladly I mix me with the common day:But should they vex me with their tumult: then,Hither my feet will find the accustomed way;Then cast once more your heightening spell.
1889
To Percy Addleshaw.
The night is full of stars, full of magnificence:Nightingales hold the wood, and fragrance loads the dark.Behold, what fires august, what lights eternal! Hark,What passionate music poured in passionate love's defence!Breathe but the wafting wind's nocturnal frankincense!Only to feel this night's great heart, only to markThe splendours and the glooms, brings back the patriarch,Who on Chaldaean wastes found God through reverence.
Could we but live at will upon this perfect height,Could we but always keep the passion of this peace,Could we but face unshamed the look of this pure light,Could we but win earth's heart, and give desire release:Then were we all divine, and then were ours by rightThese stars, these nightingales, these scents: then shame would cease.
1890.
To the Rev. Father Goldie, S. J.
Deficit inter tenebras cor triste:Unde fulgebit mihi lux petita?O cor infidum! Nonne dicis, Christe!Ego sum Via, et Veritas, et Vita.
Via amara Tu, Veritas dura,Vita difficilis, tremende Deus!Deliciarum Via, Veritas pura,Vita vitarum Tu, et amor meus!
Non Te relinquam, carae Dator crucis,Rex caritatis, Domine dolorum!Splendet longinqua mihi patria lucis,Et diadema omnium amorum.
1893.
To the Rev. Stewart Headlam.
Praise ye Him, with virginals and organs:Praise ye Him, with timbrel and flute!Come from the field, glorify His temple,With red corn, with the ripe first fruit.
He is God, who brought us out from Egypt,Gave us lands of vineyard and oil:He is God, who made the Kings of Canaan,Made their kingdoms, to be our spoil.
Praise ye Him, with psaltery and cymbal:Praise ye Him, with viol and harp!Through the Wilderness, through the rough places,Led He us, for whom Death grew sharp.
Sinai, with thunders and with voices,Praised our God, the Giver of Law:Jordan stayed the rushing of his waters;Israel passed over, and saw:
Saw the plenty, saw the Land of Promise,Saw, and praised Him, the Lord of lords:King of armies, terrible and holy;Light to our eyes, and strength to our swords.
Where be now the gods of all the nations?Where is Baal? Where Ashtaroth?Fallen! fallen! before the God of Jacob:None withstood the day of His wrath.
Praise ye Him, with virginals and organs:Praise ye Him, with music and voice!Praise the Name of the Lord God Jehovah:Praise Him, praise Him, ye Tribes His choice!
1889
Dark Angel, with thine aching lustTo rid the world of penitence:Malicious Angel, who still dostMy soul such subtile violence!
Because of thee, no thought, no thing,Abides for me undesecrate:Dark Angel, ever on the wing,Who never reachest me too late!
When music sounds, then changest thouIts silvery to a sultry fire:Nor will thine envious heart allowDelight untortured by desire.
Through thee, the gracious Muses turnTo Furies, O mine Enemy!And all the things of beauty burnWith flames of evil ecstasy.
Because of thee, the land of dreamsBecomes a gathering place of fears:Until tormented slumber seemsOne vehemence of useless tears.
When sunlight glows upon the flowers,Or ripples down the dancing sea:Thou, with thy troop of passionate powers,Beleaguerest, bewilderest, me.
Within the breath of autumn woods,Within the winter silences:Thy venomous spirit stirs and broods,O Master of impieties!
The ardour of red flame is thine,And thine the steely soul of ice:Thou poisonest the fair designOf nature, with unfair device.
Apples of ashes, golden bright;Waters of bitterness, how sweet!O banquet of a foul delight,Prepared by thee, dark Paraclete!
Thou art the whisper in the gloom,The hinting tone, the haunting laugh:Thou art the adorner of my tomb,The minstrel of mine epitaph.
I fight thee, in the Holy Name!Yet, what thou dost, is what God saith:Tempter! should I escape thy flame,Thou wilt have helped my soul from Death
The second Death, that never dies,That cannot die, when time is dead:Live Death, wherein the lost soul cries,Eternally uncomforted.
Dark Angel, with thine aching lust!Of two defeats, of two despairs:Less dread, a change to drifting dust,Than thine eternity of cares.
Do what thou wilt, thou shalt not so,Dark Angel! triumph over me:Lonely, unto the Lone I go;Divine, to the Divinity.
1893.
His are the whitenesses of soul,That Virgil had: he walks the earthA classic saint, in self-control,And comeliness, and quiet mirth.
His presence wins me to repose:When he is with me, I forgetAll heaviness: and when he goes,The comfort of the sun is set.
But in the lonely hours I learn,How I can serve and thank him best:God! trouble him: that he may turnThrough sorrow to the only rest.
1894.
Clad in a vestment wrought with passion-flowers;Celebrant of one Passion; called by namePassionist: is thy world, one world with ours?Thine, a like heart? Thy very soul, the same?
Thou pleadest an eternal sorrow: wePraise the still changing beauty of this earth.Passionate good and evil, thou dost see:Our eyes behold the dreams of death and birth.
We love the joys of men: we love the dawn,Red with the sun, and with the pure dew pearledThy stern soul feels, after the sun withdrawn,How much pain goes to perfecting the world.
Canst thou be right? Is thine the very truth?Stands then our life in so forlorn a state?Nay, but thou wrongest us: thou wrong'st our youth,Who dost our happiness compassionate.
And yet! and yet! O royal Calvary!Whence divine sorrow triumphed through years past:Could ages bow before mere memory?Those passion-flowers must blossom, to the last.
Purple they bloom, the splendour of a King:Crimson they bleed, the sacrament of Death:About our thrones and pleasaunces they cling,Where guilty eyes read, what each blossom saith.
1888.
To the Rev. Radclyffe Dolling.
Et cherubim et seraphim descendit Rex:Caelos caelorum linquit salvaturus nos.Deserit, ne per saecula stet mortis lex,Angelos Deus noster et Archangelos.
Tu, miserator! Tu, Christe misericors!Tu, peccatores nos qui solus redimis:Ut caeli gaudeant, ut moriatur mors,Veni cum Angelis et cum Archangelis!
1890.
To Viscount St. Cyres.
A crown of roses and of thorns;A crown of roses and of bay:Each crown of loveliness adornsAssisi, gleaming far awayOn Umbrian heights, in Umbrian day.
One bloomed, when Cynthia's lover sangCynthia, and revelry, and Rome:And one his wounded hands did hang,Whose heart was lovelier Love's dear home;And his, an holier martyrdom.
Are the spring roses round thine head,Propertius! as they were of old?In the gray deserts of the dead,Glows any wine in cups of gold?Not all the truth, dead Cynthia told!
And round thine head, so lowly fair,Saint Francis! thorns no longer close:Paradise roses may be there,And Mary lilies: only those.Thy sister, Death, hurt not thy rose.
We to thy shade, with song and wine,Libation make, Propertius!While suns or stars of summer shine,Thy passionate music thrills through us:Hail to thee, hail! We crown thee, thus.
But when our hearts are chill and faint,Pierced with true sorrow piteous:Francis! our brother and God's Saint,We worship thee, we hail thee, thus:Praying,Sweet Francis! pray for us.
O city on the Umbrian hills:Assisi, mother of such sons!What glory of remembrance fillsThine heart, whereof the legend runs:These are among my vanished ones.
1890.
To Charles Mulvany.
Those angry fires, that clove the air,Heavy with Rome's imperial lust:Those bitter fires, that burn and flareUnquenched, above their kindler's dust:Aquinum can their birth declare.
The wicked splendours of old time,Juvenal! stung thy passionate heart.Wrath learned of thee a scorn sublime;The Muses, a prophetic art:Yet pride and lust kept still their prime.
A greater birth, Aquinum knows:Rank upon rank, in stately wise;Rank upon rank, in ordered rows;Like sacred hosts and hierarchies,The march of holy science goes.
Vain, a man's voice, to conquer men!Rome fell: Rome rose: Aquinum lentThe world her greater citizen:Armed for Rome's war, Saint Thomas went,Using God's voice: they listened, then.
Ah, Juvenal! thy trumpet sound:Woe for the fallen soul of Rome!But the high saint, whose music foundThe altar its eternal home,Sang:Lauda Sion!heavenward bound.
A fourfold music of the Host,He sang: the open Heavens shone plain.Then back he turned him to his post,And opened heavenly Laws again,From first to last, both least and most.
O little Latin town! rejoice,Who hast such motherhood, as this:Through all the worlds of faith one voiceChaunts forth the truth; yet stays not his,Whose anger made a righteous choice.
1890
To William Nash.
I.
Visions, to sear with flame his worn and haunted eyes,Throng him: and fears unknown invest the black night hours.His royal reason fights with undefeated Powers,Armies of mad desires, legions of wanton lies;His ears are full of pain, because of their fierce cries:Nor from his tended thoughts, for all their fruits and flowers,Comes solace: for Philosophy within her bowersFalls faint, and sick to death. Therefore Lucretius dies.
Dead! And his deathless death hath him, so still and stark!No change upon the deep, no change upon the earth,None in the wastes of nature, the starred wilderness.Wandering flames and thunders of the shaken dark:Among the mountain heights, winds wild with stormy mirth:These were before, and these will be: no more, no less.
1890.
II.
Lucretious! King of men, that areNo more, they think, than men:Who, past the flaming walls afar,Find nought within their ken:
The cruel draught, that wildered thee,And drove thee upon sleep,Was kinder than Philosophy,Who would not let thee weep.
Thou knowest now, that life and deathAre wondrous intervals:The fortunes of a fitful breath,Within the flaming walls.
Without them, an eternal plan,Which life and death obey:Divinity, that fashions man,Its high, immortal way.
Or was he right, thy past compare,Thy one true voice of Greece?Then, whirled about the unconscious air,Thou hast a vehement peace.
No calms of light, no purple lands,No sanctuaries sublime:Like storms of snow, like quaking sands,Thine atoms drift through time.
1889.
III.
Mightiest-minded of the Roman race,Lucretius!In thy predestined, purgatory place,Where thou and thine Iphigenia wait:What think'st thou of the Vision and the Fate,Wherewith the Christ makes all thine outcries vain?Art learning Christ through sweet and bitter pain,Lucretius?
Heaviest-hearted of the sons of men,Lucretius!Well couldst thou justify severe thoughts then,Considering thy lamentable Rome:But thou wilt come to an imperial home,With walls of jasper, past the walls of fire:To God's proud City, and thine heart's desire,Lucretius!
1887.
To the Rev. Percy Dearmer.
Let your swords flash, and wound the golden air of God:Bright steel, to meet and cleave the splendour of His sun!Now is a war of wars in majesty begun:Red shall the cornfields ripen, where our horses trod,Where scythe nor sickle swept, but smote war's iron rod:Where the stars rose and set, and saw the blood still run.So shall men tell of us, and dread our deeds, though done:New annals yet shall praise time's fiercest period.
Let your swords flash, and wound the glowing air: now playA glorious dance of death, with clash and gleam of sword.Did Syrian sun and moon stand still on Israel's day?Those orbs halt over Ajalon at Joshua's word?Of us, who ride for God, shall Christian children say:To battle, see! flash by armed angels of the Lord.
1891.
To Laurence Binyon.
Man is a shadow's dream!Opulent Pindar saith:Yet man may win a gleamOf glory, before death.
Saith golden Shakespeare:ManIs a dream's shadow!Yet,Though death do all death can,His soul toward life is set.
I, living with delightThis rich autumnal day,Mark the gulls' curving flightAcross the black-girt bay.
And the sea's working men,The fisher-folk, I markHaul down their boats, and thenLaunch for the deep sea dark.
Far out the strange ships go:Their broad sails flashing redAs flame, or white as snow:The ships, as David said.
Winds rush and waters roll:Their strength, their beauty, bringsInto mine heart the wholeMagnificence of things:
That men are counted worthA part upon this sea,A part upon this earth,Exalts and heartens me.
Ah, Glaucus, soul of man!Encrusted by each tide,That, since the seas began,Hath surged against thy side:
Encumbering thee with weed,And tangle of the wave!Yet canst thou rise at need,And thy strong beauty save!
Tides of the world in vainDesire to vanquish thee:Prostrate, thou canst againRise, lord of earth and sea:
Rise, lord of sea and earth,And winds, and starry night.Thine is the greater birthAnd origin of light.
1892.
II.
My windows open to the autumn night,In vain I watched for sleep to visit me:How should sleep dull mine ears, and dim my sight,Who saw the stars, and listened to the sea?
Ah, how the City of our God is fair!If, without sea, and starless though it be,For joy of the majestic beauty there,Men shall not miss the stars, nor mourn the sea.
1892.
III.
Mary Star of the Sea!Look on this little place:Bless the kind fisher race,Mary Star of the Sea!
Send harvest from the deep,Mary Star of the Sea!Mary Star of the Sea!Let not these women weep.
Mary Star of the Sea!Give wife and mother joyIn husband and in boy:Mary Star of the Sea!
With intercession save,Mary Star of the Sea!Mary Star of the Sea!These children of the wave.
Mary Star of the Sea!Pour peace upon the wildWaves, make their murmurs mild:Mary Star of the Sea!
Now in thy mercy pray,Mary Star of the Sea!Mary Star of the Sea!For sailors far away.
Mary Star of the Sea!Now be thy great prayers saidFor all poor seamen dead:Mary Star of the Sea!
1892