Out-worn heart, in a time out-worn,Come clear of the nets of wrong and right;Laugh, heart, again in the gray twilight;Sigh, heart, again in the dew of the morn.
Your mother Eire is always young,Dew ever shining and twilight gray;Though hope fall from you and love decayBurning in fires of a slanderous tongue.
Come, heart, where hill is heaped upon hill;For there the mystical brotherhoodOf sun and moon and hollow and woodAnd river and stream work out their will;
And God stands winding His lonely horn;And time and the world are ever in flight,And love is less kind than the gray twilight,And hope is less dear than the dew of the morn.
W. B. Yeats.
This is a sacred city built of marvellous earth.Life was lived nobly here to give such beauty birth.
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Beauty was in this brain and in this eager hand:Death is so blind and dumb Death does not understand.Death drifts the brain with dust and soils the young limbs' glory,Death makes justice a dream, and strength a traveller's story.Death drives the lovely soul to wander under the sky.Death opens unknown doors. It is most grand to die.
John Masefield.
'Tis but a week since down the glenThe trampling horses came—Half a hundred fighting menWith all their spears aflame!They laughed and clattered as they went,And round about their wayThe blackbirds sang with one consentIn the green leaves of May.
Never again shall I see them pass;They'll come victorious never;Their spears are withered all as grass,Their laughter's laid for ever;And where they clattered as they went,And where their hearts were gay,The blackbirds sing with one consentIn the green leaves of May.
Gerald Gould.
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I love all beauteous things,I seek and adore them;God hath no better praise,And man in his hasty daysIs honoured for them.
I too will something makeAnd joy in the making;Altho' to-morrow it seemLike the empty words of a dreamRemembered on waking.
Robert Bridges.
I do not need the skies'Pomp, when I would be wise;For pleasaunce nor to useHeaven's champaign when I muse.One grass-blade in its veinsWisdom's whole flood contains;Thereon my foundering mindOdyssean fate can find.
O little blade, now vauntThee, and be arrogant!Tell the proud sun that heSweated in shaping thee;Night, that she did unvestHer mooned and argent breastTo suckle thee. Heaven fain
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Yearned over thee in rain,And with wide parent wingShadowed thee, nested thing,Fed thee, and slaved for thyImpotent tyranny.Nature's broad thews bentMeek for thy content.Mastering littlenessWhich the wise heavens confess,The frailty which doth drawMagnipotence to its law—These were, O happy one, theseThy laughing puissances!
Be confident of thought,Seeing that thou art naught;And be thy pride thou'rt allDelectably safe and small.Epitomized in theeWas the mysteryWhich shakes the spheres conjoint—God focussed to a point.
All thy fine mouths shoutScorn upon dull-eyed doubt.Impenetrable foolIs he thou canst not schoolTo the humilityBy which the angels see!Unfathomably framedSister, I am not shamed
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Before the cherubinTo vaunt my flesh thy kin.My one hand thine, and oneImprisoned in God's own,I am as God; alas,And such a god of grass!A little root clay-caught,A wind, a flame, a thought,Inestimably naught!
Francis Thompson.
What heart could have thought you?—Past our devisal(O filigree petal!)Fashioned so purely,Fragilely, surely,From what ParadisalImagineless metal,Too costly for cost?Who hammered you, wrought you,From argentine vapour?—"God was my shaper.Passing surmisal,He hammered, He wrought me,From curled silver vapour,To lust of His mind:—Thou couldst not have thought me!So purely, so palely,Tinily, surely,Mightily, frailly,
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Insculped and embossed,With His hammer of wind,And His graver of frost."
Francis Thompson.
Slight as thou art, thou art enough to hide,Like all created things, secrets from me,And stand a barrier to eternity.And I, how can I praise thee well and wide
From where I dwell—upon the hither side?Thou little veil for so great mystery,When shall I penetrate all things and thee,And then look back? For this I must abide,
Till thou shalt grow and fold and be unfurledLiterally between me and the world.Then I shall drink from in beneath a spring,
And from a poet's side shall read his book.O daisy mine, what will it be to lookFrom God's side even of such a simple thing?
Alice Meynell.
On a starred night Prince Lucifer uprose.Tired of his dark dominion swung the fiendAbove the rolling ball in cloud part screened,Where sinners hugged their spectre of repose.
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Poor prey to his hot fit of pride were those.And now upon his western wing he leaned,Now his huge bulk o'er Afric's sands careened,Now the black planet shadowed Arctic snows.Soaring through wider zones that pricked his scarsWith memory of the old revolt from Awe,He reached a middle height, and at the stars,Which are the brain of heaven, he looked, and sank.Around the ancient track marched rank on rank,The army of unalterable law.
George Meredith.
If I have faltered more or lessIn my great task of happiness;If I have moved among my raceAnd shown no glorious morning face;If beams from happy human eyesHave moved me not; if morning skies,Books, and my food, and summer rainKnocked on my sullen heart in vain:—Lord, thy most pointed pleasure takeAnd stab my spirit broad awake;Or, Lord, if too obdurate I,Choose thou, before that spirit die,A piercing pain, a killing sin,And to my dead heart run them in!
Robert Louis Stevenson.
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'In no Strange Land'
O world invisible, we view thee,O world intangible, we touch thee,O world unknowable, we know thee,Inapprehensible, we clutch thee!
Does the fish soar to find the ocean,The eagle plunge to find the air—That we ask of the stars in motionIf they have rumour of thee there?
Not where the wheeling systems darken,And our benumbed conceiving soars!—The drift of pinions, would we hearken,Beats at our own clay-shuttered doors.
The angels keep their ancient places;—Turn but a stone, and start a wing!'Tis ye, 'tis your estranged faces,That miss the many-splendoured thing.
But (when so sad thou canst not sadder)Cry;—and upon thy so sore lossShall shine the traffic of Jacob's ladderPitched betwixt Heaven and Charing Cross.
Yea, in the night, my Soul, my daughter,Cry,—clinging Heaven by the hems;And lo, Christ walking on the waterNot of Gennesareth, but Thames!
Francis Thompson.
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The Lady Poverty was fair:But she has lost her looks of late,With change of times and change of air.Ah slattern! she neglects her hair,Her gown, her shoes; she keeps no stateAs once when her pure feet were bare.
Or—almost worse, if worse can be—She scolds in parlours, dusts and trims,Watches and counts. Oh, is this sheWhom Francis met, whose step was free,Who with Obedience carolled hymns,In Umbria walked with Chastity?
Where is her ladyhood? Not here,Not among modern kinds of men;But in the stony fields, where clearThrough the thin trees the skies appear,In delicate spare soil and fen,And slender landscape and austere.
Alice Meynell.
Of Courtesy it is much lessThan Courage of Heart or Holiness,Yet in my Walks it seems to meThat the Grace of God is in Courtesy.
On Monks I did in Storrington fall,They took me straight into their Hall;I saw Three Pictures on a wall,And Courtesy was in them all.
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The first the Annunciation;The second the Visitation;The third the Consolation,Of God that was Our Lady's Son.
The first was of Saint Gabriel;On Wings a-flame from Heaven he fell;And as he went upon one kneeHe shone with Heavenly Courtesy.
Our Lady out of Nazareth rode—It was her month of heavy load;Yet was Her face both great and kind,For Courtesy was in Her Mind.
The third, it was our Little Lord,Whom all the Kings in arms adored;He was so small you could not seeHis large intent of Courtesy.
Our Lord, that was Our Lady's Son,Go bless you, People, one by one;My Rhyme is written, my work is done.
Hilaire Belloc.
Peace waits among the hills;I have drunk peace,Here, where the blue air fillsThe great cup of the hills,And fills with peace.
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Between the earth and sky,I have seen the earthLike a dark cloud go by,And fade out of the sky;There was no more earth.
Here, where the Holy GraalBrought secret lightOnce, from beyond the veil,I, seeing no Holy Graal,See divine light.
Light fills the hills with God,Wind with his breath,And here, in his abode,Light, wind, and air praise God,And this poor breath.
Arthur Symons.
God who created meNimble and light of limb,In three elements free,To run, to ride, to swim:Not when the sense is dim,But now from the heart of joy,I would remember Him:Take the thanks of a boy.
Jesu, King and Lord,Whose are my foes to fight,
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Gird me with Thy sword,Swift and sharp and bright.Thee would I serve if I might;And conquer if I can,From day-dawn till night,Take the strength of a man.
Spirit of Love and Truth,Breathing in grosser clay,The light and flame of youth,Delight of men in the fray,Wisdom in strength's decay;From pain, strife, wrong to be free,This best gift I pray,Take my spirit to Thee.
Henry Charles Beeching.
She walks—the lady of my delight—A shepherdess of sheep.Her flocks are thoughts. She keeps them white;She guards them from the steep;She feeds them on the fragrant height,And folds them in for sleep.
She roams maternal hills and bright,Dark valleys safe and deep.Into that tender breast at nightThe chastest stars may peep.She walks—the lady of my delight—A shepherdess of sheep.
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She holds her little thoughts in sight,Though gay they run and leap.She is so circumspect and right;She has her soul to keep.She walks—the lady of my delight—A shepherdess of sheep.
Alice Meynell.
Many a flower have I seen blossom,Many a bird for me will sing.Never heard I so sweet a singer,Never saw I so fair a thing.
She is a bird, a bird that blossoms,She is a flower, a flower that sings;And I a flower when I behold her,And when I hear her, I have wings.
Mary E. Coleridge.
"Once . . . once upon a time . . ."Over and over again,Martha would tell us her stories,In the hazel glen.
Hers were those clear grey eyesYou watch, and the story seemsTold by their beautifulnessTranquil as dreams.
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She'd sit with her two slim handsClasped round her bended knees;While we on our elbows lolled,And stared at ease.
Her voice and her narrow chin,Her grave small lovely head,Seemed half the meaningOf the words she said.
"Once . . . once upon a time . . ."Like a dream you dream in the night,Fairies and gnomes stole outIn the leaf-green light.
And her beauty far awayWould fade, as her voice ran on,Till hazel and summer sunAnd all were gone:—
All fordone and forgot;And like clouds in the height of the sky,Our hearts stood still in the hushOf an age gone by.
Walter de la Mare.
All, that he came to give,He gave, and went again:I have seen one man live,I have seen one man reign,With all the graces in his train.
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As one of us, he wroughtThings of the common hour:Whence was the charmed soul brought,That gave each act such power;The natural beauty of a flower?
Magnificence and grace,Excellent courtesy:A brightness on the face,Airs of high memory:Whence came all these, to such as he?
Like young Shakespearian kings,He won the adoring throng:And, as Apollo sings,He triumphed with a song:Triumphed, and sang, and passed along.
With a light word, he tookThe hearts of men in thrall:And, with a golden look,Welcomed them, at his callGiving their love, their strength, their all.
No man less proud than he,Nor cared for homage less:Only, he could not beFar off from happiness:Nature was bound to his success.
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Weary, the cares, the jars,The lets, of every day,But the heavens filled with stars,Chanced he upon the way:And where he stayed, all joy would stay.
Now, when sad night draws down,When the austere stars burn:Roaming the vast live town,My thoughts and memories yearnToward him, who never will return.
Yet have I seen him live,And owned my friend, a king:All that he came to giveHe gave: and I, who singHis praise, bring all I have to bring.
Lionel Johnson.
Twilight it is, and the far woods are dim, and the rookscry and call.Down in the valley the lamps, and the mist, and a star over all,There by the rick, where they thresh, is the drone at an end,Twilight it is, and I travel the road with my friend.
I think of the friends who are dead, who were dearlong ago in the past,Beautiful friends who are dead, though I know thatdeath cannot last;
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Friends with the beautiful eyes that the dust has defiled,Beautiful souls who were gentle when I was a child.
John Masefield.
Good-bye; no tears nor criesAre fitting here, and long lament were vain.Only the last low words be softly said,And the last greeting given above the dead;For soul more pure and beautiful our eyesNever shall see again.
Alas! what help is it,What consolation in this heavy chance,That to the blameless life so soon laid lowThis was the end appointed long ago,This the allotted space, the measure fitOf endless ordinance?
Thus were the ancient daysMade like our own monotonous with grief;From unassuaged lips even thus hath flownPerpetually the immemorial moanOf those that weeping went on desolate ways,Nor found in tears relief.
For faces yet grow pale,Tears rise at fortune, and true hearts take fireIn all who hear, with quickening pulse's stroke,That cry that from the infinite people broke,When third among them Helen led the wailAt Hector's funeral pyre.
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And by the Latin beachAt rise of dawn such piteous tears were shed,When Troy and Arcady in long arrayFollowed the princely body on its way,And Lord Aeneas spoke the last sad speechAbove young Pallas dead.
Even in this English climeThe same sweet cry no circling seas can drown,In melancholy cadence rose to swellSome dirge of Lycidas or AstrophelWhen lovely souls and pure before their timeInto the dusk went down.
These Earth, the bounteous nurse,Hath long ago lapped in deep peace divine.Lips that made musical their old-world woeThemselves have gone to silence long ago,And left a weaker voice and wearier verse,O royal soul, for thine.
Beyond our life how farSoars his new life through radiant orb and zone,While we in impotency of the nightWalk dumbly, and the path is hard, and lightFails, and for sun and moon the single starHonour is left alone.
The star that knows no set,But circles ever with a fixed desire,Watching Orion's armour all of gold;Watching and wearying not, till pale and coldDawn breaks, and the first shafts of morning fretThe east with lines of fire.
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But on the broad low plainWhen night is clear and windy, with hard frost,Such as had once the morning in their eyes,Watching and wearying, gaze upon the skies,And cannot see that star for their great painBecause the sun is lost.
Alas, how all our loveIs scant at best to fill so ample room!Image and influence fall too fast awayAnd fading memory cries at dusk of dayDeem'st thou the dust recks aught at all thereof,The ghost within the tomb?
For even o'er lives like hisThe slumberous river washes soft and slow;The lapping water rises wearily,Numbing the nerve and will to sleep; and weBefore the goal and crown of mysteriesFall back, and dare not know.
Only at times we know,In gyres convolved and luminous orbits whirledThe soul beyond her knowing seems to sweepOut of the deep, fire-winged, into the deep;As two, who loved each other here belowBetter than all the world,
Yet ever held apart,And never knew their own hearts' deepest things,After long lapse of periods, wandering farBeyond the pathways of the furthest star,Into communicable space might dartWith tremor of thunderous wings;
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Across the void might callEach unto each past worlds that raced and ran,And flash through galaxies, and clasp and kissIn some slant chasm and infinite abyssFar in the faint sidereal intervalBetween the Lyre and Swan.
J. W. Mackail.
So, without overt breach, we fall apart,Tacitly sunder—neither you nor IConscious of one intelligible Why,And both, from severance, winning equal smart.So, with resigned and acquiescent heart,Whene'er your name on some chance lip may lie,I seem to see an alien shade pass by,A spirit wherein I have no lot or part.Thus may a captive, in some fortress grim,From casual speech betwixt his warders, learnThat June on her triumphant progress goesThrough arched and bannered woodlands; while for himShe is a legend emptied of concern,And idle is the rumour of the rose.
William Watson.
A kiss, a word of thanks, awayThey're gone, and you forsaken learnThe blessedness of giving; they(So Nature bids) forget, nor turnTo where you sit, and watch, and yearn.
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And you (so Nature bids) would goThrough fire and water for their sake;Rise early, late take rest, to sowTheir wealth, and lie all night awakeIf but their little finger ache.
The storied prince with wondrous hairWhich stole men's hearts and wrought his bale,Rebelling, since he had no heir,Built him a pillar in the vale,—Absalom's—lest his name should fail.
It fails not, though the pillar liesIn dust, because the outraged one,His father, with strong agoniesCried it until the day was done—"O Absalom, my son, my son!"
So Nature bade; or might it beGod, who in Jewry once (they say)Cried with a great cry, "Come to me,Children," who still held on their way,Though He spread out His hands all day?
Henry Charles Beeching.
Where the thistle lifts a purple crownSix foot out of the turf,And the harebell shakes on the windy hill—O the breath of the distant surf!—
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The hills look over on the South,And southward dreams the sea;And with the sea-breeze hand in handCame innocence and she.
Where 'mid the gorse the raspberryRed for the gatherer springs,Two children did we stray and talkWise, idle, childish things.
She listened with big-lipped surprise,Breast-deep 'mid flower and spine;Her skin was like a grape, whose veinsRun snow instead of wine.
She knew not those sweet words she spake,Nor knew her own sweet way;But there's never a bird, so sweet a songThronged in whose throat that day.
Oh, there were flowers in StorringtonOn the turf and on the spray;But the sweetest flower on Sussex hillsWas the Daisy-flower that day!
Her beauty smoothed earth's furrowed face;She gave me tokens three:—A look, a word of her winsome mouth,And a wild raspberry.
A berry red, a guileless look,A still word,—strings of sand!And yet they made my wild, wild heartFly down to her little hand.
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For standing artless as the air,And candid as the skies,She took the berries with her hand,And the love with her sweet eyes.
The fairest things have fleetest end,Their scent survives their close;But the rose's scent is bitternessTo him that loved the rose.
She looked a little wistfully,Then went her sunshine way:—The sea's eye had a mist on it,And the leaves fell from the day.
She went her unremembering way,She went and left in meThe pang of all the partings gone,And partings yet to be.
She left me marvelling why my soulWas sad that she was glad;At all the sadness in the sweet,The sweetness in the sad.
Still, still I seemed to see her, stillLook up with soft replies,And take the berries with her hand,And the love with her lovely eyes.
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Nothing begins, and nothing ends,That is not paid with moan;For we are born in other's pain,And perish in our own.
Francis Thompson.
O, men from the fields!Come gently within.Tread softly, softly,O! men coming in.
Mavourneen is goingFrom me and from you,Where Mary will fold himWith mantle of blue!
From reek of the smokeAnd cold of the floor,And the peering of thingsAcross the half-door.
O, men from the fields!Soft, softly come thro'.Mary puts round himHer mantle of blue.
Padraic Colum.
Perfect little body, without fault or stain on thee,With promise of strength and manhood full and fair!
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Though cold and stark and bare,The bloom and the charm of life doth awhile remain on thee.
Thy mother's treasure wert thou;—alas! no longerTo visit her heart with wondrous joy; to beThy father's pride;—ah, heMust gather his faith together, and his strength make stronger.
To me, as I move thee now in the last duty,Dost thou with a turn or gesture anon respond;Startling my fancy fondWith a chance attitude of the head, a freak of beauty.
Thy hand clasps, as 'twas wont, my finger, and holds it:But the grasp is the clasp of Death, heartbreaking and stiff;Yet feels to my hand as if'Twas still thy will, thy pleasure and trust that enfolds it.
So I lay thee there, thy sunken eyelids closing,—Go, lie thou there in thy coffin, thy last little bed!—Propping thy wise, sad head,Thy firm, pale hands across thy chest disposing.
So quiet! doth the change content thee?—Death,whither hath he taken thee?To a world, do I think, that rights the disaster of this?
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The vision of which I miss,Who weep for the body, and wish but to warm theeand awaken thee?
Ah! little at best can all our hopes avail usTo lift this sorrow, or cheer us, when in the dark,Unwilling, alone we embark,And the things we have seen and have known andhave heard of, fail us.
Robert Bridges.
I never shall love the snow againSince Maurice died:With corniced drift it blocked the lane,And sheeted in a desolate plainThe country side.
The trees with silvery rime bedightTheir branches bare.By day no sun appeared; by nightThe hidden moon shed thievish lightIn the misty air.
We fed the birds that flew aroundIn flocks to be fed:No shelter in holly or brake they found,The speckled thrush on the frozen groundLay frozen and dead.
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We skated on stream and pond; we cutThe crinching snowTo Doric temple or Arctic hut;We laughed and sang at nightfall, shutBy the fireside glow.
Yet grudged we our keen delights beforeMaurice should come.We said, "In-door or out-of-doorWe shall love life for a month or more,When he is home."
They brought him home; 'twas two days lateFor Christmas Day:Wrapped in white, in solemn state,A flower in his hand, all still and straightOur Maurice lay.
And two days ere the year outgaveWe laid him low.The best of us truly were not brave,When we laid Maurice down in his graveUnder the snow.
Robert Bridges.
Francis M. W. M.
This labouring, vast, Tellurian galleon,Riding at anchor off the orient sun,Had broken its cable, and stood out to spaceDown some frore Arctic of the aërial ways:
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And now, back warping from the inclement main,Its vaporous shroudage drenched with icy rain,It swung into its azure roads again;When, floated on the prosperous sun-gale, youLit, a white halcyon auspice, 'mid our frozen crew.
To the Sun, stranger, surely you belong,Giver of golden days and golden song;Nor is it by an all-unhappy planYou bear the name of me, his constant Magian.Yet ah! from any other that it came,Lest fated to my fate you be, as to my name.When at the first those tidings did they bring,My heart turned troubled at the ominous thing:Though well may such a title him endower,For whom a poet's prayer implores a poet's power.The Assisian, who kept plighted faith to three,To Song, to Sanctitude, and Poverty,(In two alone of whom most singers proveA fatal faithfulness of during love!)He the sweet Sales, of whom we scarcely kenHow God he could love more, he so loved men;The crown and crowned of Laura and Italy;And Fletcher's fellow—from these, and not from me,Take you your name, and take your legacy!
Or, if a right successive you declareWhen worms, for ivies, intertwine my hair,Take but this Poesy that now followethMy clayey best with sullen servile breath,Made then your happy freedman by testating death.
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My song I do but hold for you in trust,I ask you but to blossom from my dust.When you have compassed all weak I began,Diviner poet, and ah! diviner man;The man at feud with the perduring childIn you before Song's altar nobly reconciled;From the wise heavens I half shall smile to seeHow little a world, which owned you, needed me.If, while you keep the vigils of the night,For your wild tears make darkness all too bright,Some lone orb through your lonely window peeps,As it played lover over your sweet sleeps;Think it a golden crevice in the sky,Which I have pierced but to behold you by!
And when, immortal mortal, droops your head,And you, the child of deathless song, are dead;Then, as you search with unaccustomed glanceThe ranks of Paradise for my countenance,Turn not your tread along the Uranian sodAmong the bearded counsellors of God;For if in Eden as on earth are we,I sure shall keep a younger company:Pass where beneath their ranged gonfalonsThe starry cohorts shake their shielded suns,The dreadful mass of their enridged spears;Pass where majestical the eternal peers,The stately choice of the great Saintdom, meet—A silvern segregation, globed completeIn sandalled shadow of the Triune feet;Pass by where wait, young poet-wayfarer,
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Your cousined clusters, emulous to shareWith you the roseal lightnings burning 'mid their hair;Pass the crystalline sea, the Lampads seven:—Look for me in the nurseries of Heaven.
Francis Thompson.
When June is come, then all the dayI'll sit with my love in the scented hayAnd watch the sunshot palaces high,That the white clouds build in the breezy sky.
She singeth, and I do make her a song,And read sweet poems the whole day long:Unseen as we lie in our hay-built home.Oh, life is delight when June is come.
Robert Bridges.
In misty blue the lark is heardAbove the silent homes of men;The bright-eyed thrush, the little wren,The yellow-billed sweet-voiced blackbirdMid sallow blossoms blond as curdOr silver oak boughs, carollingWith happy throat from tree to tree,Sing into light this morn of springThat sang my dear love home to me.
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Be starry, buds of clustered white,Around the dark waves of her hair!The young fresh glory you prepareIs like my ever-fresh delightWhen she comes shining on my sightWith meeting eyes, with such a cheekAs colours fair like flushing tipsOf shoots, and music ere she speakLies in the wonder of her lips.
Airs of the morning, breathe aboutKeen faint scents of the wild wood sideFrom thickets where primroses hideMid the brown leaves of winter's rout.Chestnut and willow, beacon outFor joy of her, from far and nigh,Your English green on English hills:Above her head, song-quivering sky,And at her feet, the daffodils.
Because she breathed, the world was more,And breath a finer soul to use,And life held lovelier hopes to choose;But O, to-day my heart brims o'er,Earth glows as from a kindled core,Like shadows of diviner thingsAre hill and cloud and flower and tree—A splendour that is hers and spring's,—-The day my love came home to me.
Laurence Binyon.
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The fountain murmuring of sleep,A drowsy tune;The flickering green of leaves that keepThe light of June;Peace, through a slumbering afternoon,The peace of June.
A waiting ghost, in the blue sky,The white curved moon;June, hushed and breathless, waits, and IWait, too, with June;Come, through the lingering afternoon,Soon, love, come soon.
Arthur Symons.
"What of vile dust?" the preacher said.Methought the whole world woke,The dead stone lived beneath my foot,And my whole body spoke.
"You that play tyrant to the dust,And stamp its wrinkled face,This patient star that flings you notFar into homeless space,
"Come down out of your dusty shrineThe living dust to see,The flowers that at your sermon's endStand blazing silently,
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"Rich white and blood-red blossom; stones,Lichens like fire encrust;A gleam of blue, a glare of gold,The vision of the dust.
"Pass them all by; till, as you comeWhere, at a city's edge,Under a tree—I know it well—.Under a lattice ledge,
"The sunshine falls on one brown head.You, too, O cold of clay,Eater of stones, may haply hearThe trumpets of that day
"When God to all his paladinsBy his own splendour sworeTo make a fairer face than heaven,Of dust and nothing more."
G. K. Chesterton.
Awake, my heart, to be loved, awake, awake!The darkness silvers away, the morn doth break,It leaps in the sky: unrisen lustres slakeThe o'ertaken moon. Awake, O heart, awake!
She too that loveth awaketh and hopes for thee;Her eyes already have sped the shades that flee,
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Already they watch the path thy feet shall take:Awake, O heart, to be loved, awake, awake!
And if thou tarry from her,—if this could be,—She cometh herself, O heart, to be loved, to thee;For thee would unashamed herself forsake:Awake to be loved, my heart, awake, awake!
Awake! the land is scattered with light, and see,Uncanopied sleep is flying from field and tree:And blossoming boughs of April in laughter shake;Awake, O heart, to be loved, awake, awake!
Lo all things wake and tarry and look for thee:She looketh and saith, "O sun, now bring him to me.Come more adored, O adored, for his coming's sake,And awake my heart to be loved: awake, awake!"
Robert Bridges.
Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,Enwrought with golden and silver light,The blue and the dim and the dark clothsOf night and light and the half light,I would spread the cloths under your feet:But I, being poor, have only my dreams;I have spread my dreams under your feet;Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
W. B. Yeats.
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I have seen dawn and sunset on moors and windy hillsComing in solemn beauty like slow old tunes of Spain:I have seen the lady April bringing the daffodils,Bringing the springing grass and the soft warm April rain.
I have heard the song of the blossoms and the old chant of the sea,And seen strange lands from under the arched white sails of ships;But the loveliest things of beauty God ever has showed to me,Are her voice, and her hair, and eyes, and the dear red curveof her lips.
John Masefield.
Trusty, dusky, vivid, true,With eyes of gold and bramble-dew,Steel-true and blade-straight,The great artificerMade my mate.
Honour, anger, valour, fire;A love that life could never tire,Death quench or evil stir,The mighty masterGave to her.
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Teacher, tender, comrade, wife,A fellow-farer true through life,Heart-whole and soul-freeThe august fatherGave to me.
Robert Louis Stevenson.
Shy as the squirrel and wayward as the swallow,Swift as the swallow along the river's lightCircleting the surface to meet his mirrored winglets,Fleeter she seems in her stay than in her flight.Shy as the squirrel that leaps among the pine-tops,Wayward as the swallow overhead at set of sun,She whom I love is hard to catch and conquer,Hard, but O the glory of the winning were she won!
* * * * * *
Heartless she is as the shadow in the meadowsFlying to the hills on a blue and breezy noon.No, she is athirst and drinking up her wonder:Earth to her is young as the slip of the new moon.Deals she an unkindness, 'tis but her rapid measure,Even as in a dance; and her smile can heal no less:Like the swinging May-cloud that pelts the flowers with hailstonesOff a sunny border, she was made to bruise and bless.
* * * * * *
Stepping down the hill with her fair companions,Arm in arm, all against the raying West,
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Boldly she sings, to the merry tune she marches,Brave is her shape, and sweeter unpossessed.Sweeter, for she is what my heart first awakingWhispered the world was; morning light is she.Love that so desires would fain keep her changeless;Fain would fling the net, and fain have her free.
* * * * * *
Happy, happy time, when the white star hoversLow over dim fields fresh with bloomy dew,Near the face of dawn, that draws athwart the darkness,Threading it with colour, like yewberries the yew.Thicker crowd the shades as the grave East deepens,Glowing, and with crimson a long cloud swells.Maiden still the morn is; and strange she is, and secret;Strange her eyes; her cheeks are cold as cold sea-shells.
* * * * * *
Peering at her chamber the white crowns the red rose,Jasmine winds the porch with stars two and three.Parted is the window; she sleeps; the starry jasmineBreathes a falling breath that carries thoughts of me.Sweeter unpossessed, have I said of her my sweetest?Not while she sleeps: while she sleeps the jasmine breathes,Luring her to love; she sleeps; the starry jasmineBears me to her pillow under white rose-wreaths.
George Meredith.
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Oh, not more subtly silence straysAmongst the winds, between the voices,Mingling alike with pensive lays,And with the music that rejoices,Than thou art present in my days.
My silence, life returns to theeIn all the pauses of her breath,Hush back to rest the melodyThat out of thee awakeneth;And thou, wake ever, wake for me!
Thou art like silence all unvexed,Though wild words part my soul from thee.Thou art like silence unperplexed,A secret and a mysteryBetween one footfall and the next.
Most dear pause in a mellow lay!Thou art inwoven with every air.With thee the wildest tempests play,And snatches of thee everywhereMake little heavens throughout a day.
Darkness and solitude shine, for me.For life's fair outward part are rifeThe silver noises; let them be.It is the very soul of lifeListens for thee, listens for thee.
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O pause between the sobs of cares;O thought within all thought that is;Trance between laughters unawares:Thou art the shape of melodies,And thou the ecstasy of prayers!
Alice Meynell.
When you are old and gray and full of sleep,And nodding by the fire, take down this book,And slowly read, and dream of the soft lookYour eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;
How many loved your moments of glad grace,And loved your beauty with love false or true;But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,And loved the sorrows of your changing face.
And bending down beside the glowing barsMurmur, a little sadly, how love fledAnd paced upon the mountains overheadAnd hid his face amid a crowd of stars.
W. B. Yeats
I will not let thee go.Ends all our month-long love in this?Can it be summed up so,Quit in a single kiss?I will not let thee go.
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I will not let thee go.If thy words' breath could scare thy deeds,As the soft south can blowAnd toss the feathered seeds,Then might I let thee go.
I will not let thee go.Had not the great sun seen, I might:Or were he reckoned slowTo bring the false to light,Then might I let thee go.
I will not let thee go.The stars that crowd the summer skiesHave watched us so belowWith all their million eyes,I dare not let thee go.
I will not let thee go.Have we not chid the changeful moon,Now rising late, and nowBecause she set too soon,And shall I let thee go?
I will not let thee go.Have not the young flowers been content,Plucked ere their buds could blow,To seal our sacrament?I cannot let thee go.
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I will not let thee go.I hold thee by too many bands:Thou sayest farewell, and lo!I have thee by the hands,And will not let thee go.
Robert Bridges.
Farewell to one now silenced quite,Sent out of hearing, out of sight,—My friend of friends, whom I shall miss.He is not banished, though, for this,—Nor he, nor sadness, nor delight.
Though I shall talk with him no more,A low voice sounds upon the shore.He must not watch my resting-place,But who shall drive a mournful faceFrom the sad winds about my door?
I shall not hear his voice complain,But who shall stop the patient rain?His tears must not disturb my heart,But who shall change the years, and partThe world from every thought of pain?
Although my life is left so dim,The morning crowns the mountain-rim;Joy is not gone from summer skies,Nor innocence from children's eyes,And all these things are part of him.
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He is not banished, for the showersYet wake this green warm earth of ours.How can the summer but be sweet?I shall not have him at my feet,And yet my feet are on the flowers.
Alice Meynell.
Assemble, all ye maidens, at the door,And all ye loves, assemble; far and wideProclaim the bridal, that proclaimed beforeHas been deferred to this late eventide:For on this night the bride,The days of her betrothal over,Leaves the parental hearth for evermore;To-night the bride goes forth to meet her lover.
Reach down the wedding vesture, that has lainYet all unvisited, the silken gown:Bring out the bracelets, and the golden chainHer dearer friends provided: sere and brownBring out the festal crown,And set it on her forehead lightly:Though it be withered, twine no wreath again;This only is the crown she can wear rightly.
Cloak her in ermine, for the night is cold,And wrap her warmly, for the night is long;In pious hands the flaming torches hold,While her attendants, chosen from among
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Her faithful virgin throng,May lay her in her cedar litter,Decking her coverlet with sprigs of gold,Roses, and lilies white that best befit her.
Sound flute and tabor, that the bridal beNot without music, nor with these alone;But let the viol lead the melody,With lesser intervals, and plaintive moanOf sinking semitone;And, all in choir, the virgin voicesRest not from singing in skilled harmonyThe song that aye the bridegroom's ear rejoices.
Let the priests go before, arrayed in white,And let the dark-stoled minstrels follow slow,Next they that bear her, honoured on this night,And then the maidens, in a double row,Each singing soft and low,And each on high a torch upstaying:Unto her lover lead her forth with light,With music, and with singing, and with praying.
'Twas at this sheltering hour he nightly came,And found her trusty window open wide,And knew the signal of the timorous flame,That long the restless curtain would not hideHer form that stood beside;As scarce she dared to be delighted,Listening to that sweet tale, that is no shameTo faithful lovers, that their hearts have plighted.
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But now for many days the dewy grassHas shown no markings of his feet at morn:And watching she has seen no shadow passThe moonlit walk, and heard no music borneUpon her ear forlorn.In vain she has looked out to greet him;He has not come, he will not come, alas!So let us bear her out where she must meet him.
Now to the river bank the priests are come:The bark is ready to receive its freight:Let some prepare her place therein, and someEmbark the litter with its slender weight:The rest stand by in state,And sing her a safe passage over;While she is oared across to her new home,Into the arms of her expectant lover.
And thou, O lover, that art on the watch,Where, on the banks of the forgetful streams,The pale indifferent ghosts wander, and snatchThe sweeter moments of their broken dreams,—Thou, when the torchlight gleams,When thou shalt see the slow procession,And when thine ears the fitful music catch,Rejoice, for thou art near to thy possession.
Robert Bridges.
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Here lies a most beautiful lady,Light of step and heart was she;I think she was the most beautiful ladyThat ever was in the West Country.But beauty vanishes; beauty passes;However rare—rare it be;And when I crumble, who will rememberThis lady of the West Country?
Walter de la Mare.