 | Carol and Cadence |  |
ALAS!
I saw a woman with your eyes to-day,
My love, long-lost unto my sorry sight;
Your graceful, tender, birdlike turn of head,
Your very same half-hesitating play
Of humour round the lips, your delicate
Rose-campion mouth and forehead wildflower-white,
Your dainty trick of speech, my love long dead,
Your very voice she had and kind child-air.
The same half-fluttering, half-lingering gait,
As of a linnet on the point of flight,
The same soft-scrolled volute of shimmering hair,
The same ineffable mysterious flame
In the shy glance, the same caressing light
In the faint smile, half frolicsome, half sad,
That none might see but needs withal must name
The April dawning's flush of rosy shame,
Your every fashion, every trait she had,
Nothing there lacked of all your grace. My dear,
It was yourself of many a bygone year.
My love, long-lost unto my sorry sight;
Your graceful, tender, birdlike turn of head,
Your very same half-hesitating play
Of humour round the lips, your delicate
Rose-campion mouth and forehead wildflower-white,
Your dainty trick of speech, my love long dead,
Your very voice she had and kind child-air.
The same half-fluttering, half-lingering gait,
As of a linnet on the point of flight,
The same soft-scrolled volute of shimmering hair,
The same ineffable mysterious flame
In the shy glance, the same caressing light
In the faint smile, half frolicsome, half sad,
That none might see but needs withal must name
The April dawning's flush of rosy shame,
Your every fashion, every trait she had,
Nothing there lacked of all your grace. My dear,
It was yourself of many a bygone year.
I deemed you dead and buried long ago,
Nought left of you except two words on stone
And in my heart a charact'ry of woe
And rapture for remembrance misery grown.
But there, before my waking sight, again,
In the sheer sunshine, — no mere phantom vain
From out the sorry storehouse of the Past,
On the blank night by mocking Memory cast,
To waken sorrow with its wavering show, —
In flesh and blood you stood and shone. Heigho!
I deemed you dead, my dear, and there you were,
Grown live and warm again and young and fair.
Nought left of you except two words on stone
And in my heart a charact'ry of woe
And rapture for remembrance misery grown.
But there, before my waking sight, again,
In the sheer sunshine, — no mere phantom vain
From out the sorry storehouse of the Past,
On the blank night by mocking Memory cast,
To waken sorrow with its wavering show, —
In flesh and blood you stood and shone. Heigho!
207
Grown live and warm again and young and fair.
But, when I moved to greet you and to ask
For tidings of the world from which you came, —
The world beyond the darkness and the day,
Of which this world is but the fleeting mask, —
When my lips parted with the lovely name
I knew you by, before you passed away,
You looked upon me with a blank dismay,
As one, accosted by a stranger, starts,
Amazed, affrighted at she knows not what
In one whose voice she doth not recognize.
In the far dream of death you had forgot
My face and all that was between our hearts
Of love; and from your dear-beloved eyes
A stranger soul looked out that knew me not.
For tidings of the world from which you came, —
The world beyond the darkness and the day,
Of which this world is but the fleeting mask, —
When my lips parted with the lovely name
I knew you by, before you passed away,
You looked upon me with a blank dismay,
As one, accosted by a stranger, starts,
Amazed, affrighted at she knows not what
In one whose voice she doth not recognize.
In the far dream of death you had forgot
My face and all that was between our hearts
Of love; and from your dear-beloved eyes
A stranger soul looked out that knew me not.
Five times five years, lapsed over my dismay,
Had softened down my sufferance to regret.
Still for the piteous Past I grieved and yet
I would not have the sad sweet days that were
Unlived, their sorrow was so far more fair
Than all Life's joys; nor would I fain forget
One single pain of all their sacred pains.
Grief, with the early and the latter rains,
Had mellowed down to somewhat far more rare
And sweet than joy, as, in the April lanes,
Rarer than roses is the violet.
In dreams, indeed, you have come back to me;
And sadder still you left me with the day:
Yet were you still yourself, to touch and see,
Not only such as you were wont to be
In flesh and blood; but in your eyes Love lay
Still lieger and in all your lips might say,
The old sweet harmony betwixt us two
Still stirred and showed in all that you might do.
Had softened down my sufferance to regret.
Still for the piteous Past I grieved and yet
I would not have the sad sweet days that were
Unlived, their sorrow was so far more fair
Than all Life's joys; nor would I fain forget
One single pain of all their sacred pains.
Grief, with the early and the latter rains,
Had mellowed down to somewhat far more rare
And sweet than joy, as, in the April lanes,
Rarer than roses is the violet.
In dreams, indeed, you have come back to me;
And sadder still you left me with the day:
Yet were you still yourself, to touch and see,
Not only such as you were wont to be
In flesh and blood; but in your eyes Love lay
Still lieger and in all your lips might say,
The old sweet harmony betwixt us two
Still stirred and showed in all that you might do.
208
Alack! What cruel hand this web of ours
Is it that weaves? What spirit of despite
Can it have been that stirred the cynic powers,
Who cast the courses of the day and night,
To raise you up again in the sun's sight
And the full face of stars and moon and flowers,
In the old semblance, but on inner wise
How different, alas! — my sorry eyes
To mock, to blow the embers of my grief,
Time-tempered, up into the old despair
And rob my sorrow of its sole relief,
The thought that, still, unchanged, however Death
May mangle this our life of mortal breath,
Your soul mine own awaiteth otherwhere?
Less woe it were to know you in the tomb,
With the old halo yet about your head,
Than see you walk the world in all your bloom
Of youth and sweetness, Time-untouched and whole,
Yet other than you were! For, you being dead,
I had not lost in you, as now, all part.
Your body lives, but by a stranger soul,
Whose heart no memory bindeth to my heart,
Alien to all our loves, inhabited.
Ah, sadder far than any death could be,
You live, but not, but not, alas! for me.
Is it that weaves? What spirit of despite
Can it have been that stirred the cynic powers,
Who cast the courses of the day and night,
To raise you up again in the sun's sight
And the full face of stars and moon and flowers,
In the old semblance, but on inner wise
How different, alas! — my sorry eyes
To mock, to blow the embers of my grief,
Time-tempered, up into the old despair
And rob my sorrow of its sole relief,
The thought that, still, unchanged, however Death
May mangle this our life of mortal breath,
Your soul mine own awaiteth otherwhere?
Less woe it were to know you in the tomb,
With the old halo yet about your head,
Than see you walk the world in all your bloom
Of youth and sweetness, Time-untouched and whole,
Yet other than you were! For, you being dead,
I had not lost in you, as now, all part.
Your body lives, but by a stranger soul,
Whose heart no memory bindeth to my heart,
Alien to all our loves, inhabited.
Ah, sadder far than any death could be,
You live, but not, but not, alas! for me.
| Carol and Cadence | |