The Poetical Works of George Barlow :: :: University of Virginia Library

Letters mixed in strangest wild communion—
Was there ever such a wondrous heap?
There they lie, diverse, in seeming union:
Some in faded brown ink, some in deep.

Such a strange assortment! There, collected
Through the ups and downs of twenty years,
See them lying helpless,—disconnected
From the old joys that filled them and the fears.

Disconnected are they now for ever
From the hopes and fears of early days.
They will speak their ancient language never.
Can November sing one song of May's?

113

Can the winter with the spring hold parley?
Can the wild red poppies as they gleam,
Flashing through the wheat and tufted barley,
Ever of the frozen furrows dream?

No: to-day must face to-day's own troubles.
Of the old sorrows, some have past away:
Hopes have melted into air like bubbles;
Golden dreams have darkened into grey.

Ah! the twenty years, the myriad letters—
Some that pierced my very soul with pain:
Some that bound my heart in loving fetters
(Would that we could wear those bonds again!)

—Some from India, yet with memories in them
Of the dear old Isis' grassy banks!
If I once unfasten and begin them,
Ghostly thoughts will rise in endless ranks;

Thoughts of Oxford, of young days sun-lighted,
Of the swift boats racing past the shore;
Thoughts of early vows of friendship plighted:
Sounds will echo as of wave and oar.

114

If I open—Shall I open any?
Dreams are sometimes very sweet indeed,
Yet they weaken, when too sweet, too many;
Undermine the present strength we need.

II.

Letters some there are in boyish seasons
Written, when the unfeverish hours were fair;
Long ere passion's tenderness and treasons
Filled the skies of life with burning air.

Letters written in the days of rapture,
Days of merry gladness all unfeigned;
Days when very heaven it was to capture
Perch or roach, or whiting rosy-stained.

Days when butterflies before us flaming
Charmed us as with flash of fairy light,
Robed in magic hues past mortal naming,
Lustrous yellow, crimson, snowiest white.

Letters some there are that breathe of passion.
How their value lessens with the years!
Now we estimate in sober fashion
Sighs and kisses, burning words and tears.

115

Passion doubtless had its truths to teach us:
Sent from heaven, it teaches every one.
Passion dies—we think no light can reach us—
Yet God overtakes us with the sun.

Stars and sun again for us are shining;
All our sorrow darkens not the sea:
“Mortal,” God saith, “while thou wast repining,
See what treasures I kept back for thee!

“While thou dreamedst that the world was over,
Starlight, sunlight, storm and cloud and rain,
Golden waving corn and crimson clover,
All these came again and yet again.

“Though thy sullen vision thou wast sealing,
On the hedges miles of may were white:
Through the silent darkness slowly stealing
Came the moon, and silvered all the night.

“Let thy dream of passion fade behind thee
Like the tossing vapours seaward blown!
Let my comfort breathed through nature find thee:
While God liveth, thou art not alone.”

116

III.

Strange to think that all these hearts' outpouring
Will so soon be ashes...if I burn!
Thoughts that sought the blue sky wild and soaring:
Love that made the answering spirit yearn.

If I cast old letters in the ocean,
Trust them to the boundless waves to keep,
Will the waters thrill to man's emotion?
Can I trust my treasures to the deep?

If I fling them forth amid the clover
Or the fields where countless daisies grow,
Will the skylark care to con them over?
Will the clouded yellow care to know?

Here are letters full of love and tender,
Love that made life's morning like a dream—
Shall I cast them 'mid the golden splendour
Of the buttercups beside the stream?

Oft I think that sacred letters breathing
Love of mother, sweetheart, trusty friend,
Never ought to feel the hot flames wreathing
Round them, ought to find a nobler end.

117

Then I take the letters and I tear them
Sadly, gently, tearfully maybe,
And I let the loving west wind bear them,
Little white-sailed fragments, out to sea!

Or I cast them on the eddying river,
Watch them floating downward, one by one.
Some to starlight, trusting, I deliver:
Some I give to morning and the sun.

But I never can destroy quite tearless
What has cost the writers love and pain.
Letters of expostulation fearless,
Through my soul your accents ring again!

Letters some of love most sweet and simple
(These I'll keep for ever, close to me!)—
Not a fragment torn of these shall dimple
Softest bosom of the sunniest sea.

Even the buttercups shall never carry
Fragments to their sister-flowers to read:
Not one word of these shall ever tarry,
Adding sweetness to the scented mead.

118

While I tear—and sometimes not with sorrow—
Here a poet's, there a thinker's words,
These shall dwell with me for many a morrow,
Sweet and simple as the notes of birds.

Lo, this canon to the waves I scatter!
Burn this maundering prelate in his pride!
Rend this preacher's homily—small matter!
Love is far too rare to fling aside.

IV.

But alas! some writers' souls have floated
Farther than the letter-fragments sail.
Noble spirits, faithful and devoted,
Where are ye? Man's wondering thought turns pale.

Farther than the stars that watch me read them
Have the writers of some letters sped:
Angel hearts, it may be, love and heed them,
But for us they rank among the dead.

Past the goals of mortal joy and anguish,
Past our winters of the barren bough,
Hours of storm or summer days that languish,
Past all change of seasons are they now.

119

Some whose power had vanished of discerning
God behind his veil of purple air,
God behind his sunset-raiment burning,
God beyond the flowers he makes so fair,—

These have travelled into viewless regions:
Now, perhaps, God face to face they see,
Find the deathland holds its living legions,
Find how crowded is eternity.

Much they suffered, these, while life enchained them.
God, perhaps, whom they disdained to own,
Generous more than they, has not disdained them,
Given an audience unto each alone.

Has not God in whom their hearts found pleasure,
Though they called him by another name,
Said to each with love no words may measure,
“Heaven was very lonely till you came!”

As I read their loving simple letters
Oft I feel that though their creed was grim
They have grown to-day beyond its fetters,
Each has found God looking out for him.

120

Each has found that if the soul beseech him
Truly, in the tongue of any land,
Ever will its urgent crying reach him,
Ever will he stoop and understand.

V.

But—a sadder thought—some souls have wandered,
Though among the living yet they be,
Farther than the letter-fragments squandered
On the billows roaring in from sea.

Farther than the dead souls (love can perish
Never, though the loving hearts be dumb)—
Souls whom once our own souls loved to cherish,
Whom we think of when the roses bloom:

Whom we think of when the roses lavish
Scented flying petals on the gale:
Think of when the autumn wild winds ravish
Crimson leaves that down the eddies sail.

Farther than all thought or recollection
Even—for their minds have grown apart:
Death can bring deep sorrow and dejection,
But it never quite dismays the heart.

121

This dismays—that some are near us living,
Close beside our threshold it may be,
Whom we loved with all our power of giving,
Yet between us rolls a bridgeless sea!

Friends whose souls from ours the swift years sever,
Friends whose love is lost in starless gloom,
These indeed are lost to us for ever,
Buried deeplier than in any tomb.