Poems and Sonnets :: :: University of Virginia Library

I am lying dead, deep down beneath the ground,
Choked out from hope of loving, or of living,
Hope of achieving aught, receiving, giving,
Cold, motionless, alone, in graveclothes bound,
All voiceless in a realm without a sound,
A flash of memory at times reminding
My soul with bitterness, black, biting, blinding,
Of joys that once alive on earth I found;
I sometimes seem to see the sky as clearly
As ever, a happy child, I used to do,
The birds and flies and flowers I loved so dearly,
The broad green seas of grass, the arch of blue,
The dream, departing, grazes me so nearly
'Tis hard to believe it baseless, bald, untrue;

256

I find that I can still rejoice a little,
Can still delight me in the life of others,
Warm souls upon the earth, my moving brothers,
In love the bubble, beautiful but brittle,
Can still take pleasure in the thought that ever
Life streameth onward, hurrying, loitering never,
Its surface bearing fair white lily kisses,
And sound of sighs and songs, and woes and blisses,
Fierce flame of battle, failure, strong endeavour,
Meetings that madden, partings souls that sever,
Glimpses of heaven, weeping, wild embraces,
Horrors of hell beneath, pale praying faces,
And gleams of light from distant dazzling places,
Glories that beckon onward, rainbow traces,
Free heights of ether, snowy mountainous spaces,
And Hope with wings, and eyes that smile for ever;

257

The stream flows on though I have ceased to be,
Flows over, under, through the conscious me,
Expanded, widened out upon the tide,
Free from encumbrance, fetterless, I ride,
And float towards the universal sea,
I feel the life of leaves, the grasses growing,
One with the sower, in the seed he's sowing,
Fulfilled with joy of harvest and of mowing,
Partaker of the May-fly's dance of glee,
I sip the honey with the humble bee,
An antelope, I leap along the sands,
And, like a lion, pace the lonely strands,
In death I've found at last to life the key,
One mighty blood pulse beats throughout the whole,
One Central Heart, one Universal Soul,
One Vital Force of all the lives that be;

258

Along the polished graven groove of space
In harmony the planets run their race,
And tides of suns and starry clusters roll,
The power that runs the race we call Free Force,
Limitless fields of ether form the course,
Each sun and moon a bounding burning horse
Moving melodiously beneath control,
A music sounds across from pole to pole,
Beating a burthen out of sultry sands,
Ringing the changes on the frozen lands,
Dissolving, forming, joining hands in hands,
Bringing the severed sons of men together,
The extreme southern shores of rainless weather,
The regions where the glittering iceberg stands,
In one soft silken Universal Tether
To link the scattered skeins of separate nations,
Their planet homes, their lands, their several stations,
Convolving into one triumphant whole,
As seethes the rich red wine within the bowl,
And foaming, flashing, slowly settles down;
The end is worthy, such an end shall crown

259

The writhing long-drawn serpent of the ages,
The many-volumed roll of history's pages,
Smoothing right out at last creation's frown!

II.

I wonder whether I shall ever arise,
And join the ranks of men that work and fight,
And reach again the region of delight?
Far off from me the land of labour lies,
Hope faints, and, fading into daylight, dies,
Once rosy as the sunset, and as bright
As the May moon that sails the seas of night,
At morn before the great sun frigate flies;

Though I am dead life flows around, above me,
I find some comfort in its ceaseless flow,
I hear the voices of the men that love me,
They reach me lying, silent, far below,
The grasses wave above my funeral mound,
And love bears blossoms even underground.

260

A COOL WET RIPPLE.

I lose myself in all the life around me,
A cool wet ripple adown the stream I go,
I widen out to meet the hills that bound me,
The horizon hills that bound my being's flow,
Softly I melt me out into the ether
All bathed about, without, within, with air,
And sink into the earth, and dive beneath her
Green surface-garden, blossoming, broad and fair,
Along the branches brown I stretch my fingers,
My finger tips pervade the points of leaves,
Awake, aware of the warm life that lingers
In the midst, the leafy soul that sings and grieves,
Stirring the sap within the various veins
With vegetable rapture, pangs and pains.

261

THE HOME OF LOVE.

Where is the home of Love? Upon the mountains
Amid the icy peaks and slopes of snow,
Or in the soft green valleys far below,
Where willows' tresses trail in crystal fountains?
Haunts he the homes that stud the sandy reaches,
The white-washed walls where fisher-folk abide,
Shaken at every rising of the tide,
The dim expanse of shore, the gravelly beaches?
Men seem uncertain; one there is that teaches
That “Love is of the valley,” I think rather
To every place and person he is father,
Though diverse are his forms, and ways, and speeches;

262

He dwells, methinks, in every bower of roses,
And peeps from out each petal of a flower,
Into the essence of the scent his power
Impressed pervades the waves and widths of air,
From point to point his balmy breath to bear,
Laden with sweets of all the world of posies;
Along the winding paths of woods he walks,
And with the strawberry gatherers he talks,
And hides himself within the yellow stalks
Of corn, in seas of grass his head reposes,
In petals of pimpernel his eyes he closes,
Atween the curtains red secure he dozes,
And all his panting pale pursuers balks;
I've seen him seated all the livelong day
Astride upon a scented seat of May
Thrilling right out from thence his roundelay,
And heard him in the night upon the seas
Laugh in the blithesome laughter of the breeze,
And shout a-sailing on the watery way,
When he will shine upon us none can say,
Nor where, 'tis “as his majesty doth please;”

263

Sometimes, upon some merry summer morn
From out a night of silvery silence born,
The hills are startled with his hunting horn
And all the crimson spaces of the dawn
With sounds of life and light are sudden filled,
While all the strings of melody are thrilled
That right across creation's gulf are drawn,
Like gossamer spiders' threads across a plain,
Or air-dividing tiny threads of rain,
Or streaks the canvas of the sky that stain
When sunset's scarlet flames have riven and torn
Its smooth white surface; sometimes in the night
When all the waves are dancing, laughing light
Melodious music underneath the moon,
Ripple after ripple melting into tune,
Love sends upon the soul a sudden swoon,
And, losing self, across the seas one goes,
While all the life of love about one flows,
Along the veins in giant throbs and throes

264

The hot blood pulsing, at one gasp of sight
This Universe of mute mysterious might
Flaming across one's vision, all the ages
Read by the light of lightning, history's pages
An open scroll, all wisdom of all sages,
The sources whence pale Passion's river rages,
The roots of that Great Tree whose leaf assuages
Our mortal agonies, and for ever wages
With evil one continual winning war;

In slow procession through our eyelid portals
The story of the loves and hates of mortals
Streams endlessly, and all the loves that are
And shall be, piercing through the silent spaces
Our eyes behold at once the world's embraces,
The hands that pray, the passion of all faces,
The circle of caresses, tear-drop traces,
Hope's chariot around the world that chases
The steeds of dark Despair, the wars of races,
We hear the sound of kisses in all places;

265

And, hand in hand with Love, from star to star
We dance along the railroad rays of light,
Cleaving, as if with arrow's fiery flight,
The abysmal sacred silences of Night,
Finding in every moon the self-same story,
With golden sheaf of similar human glory
The glorious heads of solar systems crowned,
We span the spaces star from star that sunder,
And all the cloudy home of Monarch Thunder
And bright-eyed Lady Lightning his fair spouse,
[The Queen of those that kiss—her kisses slay,]
Lies bare before us, in the air around
Mighty orchestral choruses resound,
From off the surfaces of spheres that bound
Alive along the windy ways of space
Flung loudly and triumphantly; they rouse
The sleeping white-enfolded form of Day,
Who casts aside with rosy fluttering fingers
The star-bespangled robe of Night that lingers

266

Still here and there about the western sky,
And, opening wide his single sunny eye,
Across the fields of ether far and nigh
Sends glances hot the dews of dark to dry,
And gladden into scent the flowers that sigh
For his sweet coming, into song the birds,
And into motion musical the herds,
Smiling upon them with his festive face.

267

THE POET'S BRIDE.

Pleasant it is beneath a tree to lie
And, gazing upward, see the turquoise sky
Broken across by moving emeralds green,
Emeralds all blazing with the golden sheen
The sunlight casts upon them, every leaf
Of colour, green and gold, a shining sheaf,
Shining against the broad background of blue
That burns above and, parted, glistens through,
As though ten thousand maidens' bright blue eyes
Were peeping through the leaves in soft surprise,
Or eyes of fairies in a virtuous glow
Of anger at the mortal stretched below,
Inquisitive to search the mysteries
Deep hidden within the leafy hearts of trees;

268

Pleasant again to stretch one's being wide,
Unclothed, unfettered, out from side to side,
And, lengthening long arms, oneself at rest
In some soft, grassy, flower-scented nest,
To embrace the whole wide earth in clasp of love,
And feel her green arms slowly close above
Your sinking head, feeling as if you were
Slow-sinking in some scented sea of air,
Or rosy summer-quiet sunset-sea,
Clothed all about with mists of ecstasy;

Yea, the Earth is indeed the poet's bride,
A Queen for ever seated at his side.
Upon the fair broad billow of her breast
His head falls heavily and sinks to rest,
And she bends over him, his hot brow bathing
In her cool ether breath, his limbs enswathing
In wreaths of long-leaved blossoming grass and flowers,
Cooling her hero with the sound of showers

269

Down-shaken in the distance, breathing rest
In every rising of her gentle breast
And happiness in the downfall, now she twines
About his brow a bower of eglantines,
Or places underneath his sleeping head
Soft cushions woven of roses white and red,
Smoothing with gentle hands his grassy bed,
Now all her art for him the Earth combines
That scents of all her choicest garden flowers
By savour sweet may soothe his sleeping hours,
Building about him misty perfume bowers
From off the universe of blossoms shed;

O great Earth-Goddess, happy indeed is he
That man to whom thy beauties wedded be,
Though all men scorn him, Thou, the Earth, art wide,
And his alone art Thou from side to side,
For him buds, blossoms, flowers and fruits are born,
Wave goldenly for him long leagues of corn,

270

Forests and rivers, lakes and silent seas,
All shower drops, every whisper of a breeze,
The whole world's wealth of beauty, forms and flowers,
Sweet sounds and scents and sights and woven bowers
Of all fair colours interlaced together,
With all white wild delights of winter weather,
And bare-browed summer revelry, and spring's
Soft ecstasy when all the greenwood rings
With loud love songs of every bird that sings
And happy voices of ten thousand things
Bursting aside their ice-bound wintry tether;
All these are his, the Earth-Queen's bridal dower,
Her secrets all are in the poet's power,
Placed by her gently in his humble hands,
Sweet secrets that he only understands
Of all men, silent secrets of the sea,
Sad secrets some of things that hidden be,
And secrets soft hidden in the hearts of roses,
Others the deep green forest soul discloses,

271

Others again that smile from out the sky
When sunsets of November seem to dye
The clouds in scarlet, fading with a sigh
Of low wind bitter-breathed across the wold,
Like some bright meteor-life whose tale is told,
Into cold calm-eyed distances of grey,
Hot blue-robed summer secrets of the day,
And secrets of the night his Queen unfolds
To the poet, over him her white hand holds
The great unspeakable silence of the Dark,
Sacred, as some sweet maiden you may mark
From sunlight strong to shield her lover's head
Low lying beside her; from his happy bed
At dawn the Queen awakes him, from her breast
Raising him, right content therein to rest
For ever, and across the world she takes
His soul in great grand glimpses, lonely lakes
He sees beset by snowy mountains tall,
A blue sky burning constant over all,

272

And wide dim reaches of hot yellow sand,
And flowery visions of a verdant land,
Well watered, smiling, rich from side to side,
Intense in colour, next the dreamers ride
Along the edges of a creeping tide,
Out and away blue distances of sea
Into the infinite ether seem to flee
That sits upon the horizon like a throne
And claims the land and seascape for its own
Brooding above the whole, along the edge
Towers a wave-clomb, black-browed, beetlingledge
Of cliff, kissed here and there by lights of green
And white, deep-carven clefts pierce in between
As where some giant's chisel erst has been
Shining with soothing sound and silver sheen
Of rivulets drawn from out the rocky wedge;
At last he sinks into her arms and sleeps,
And she bends over him, and smiles and weeps,
Soft tears and smiles of Beauty born together
Like rain and sunshine in uncertain weather

273

Making a beaming rainbow of her face,
White arms she winds about him that embrace
His form as lovingly as arms of roses
Whose wealth of tenderness some wall encloses
With wreaths of flowers and leaves and rich perfume,
Or dark green ivy clusters that entomb
The trunk of some great weary prostrate tree,
She holds her servant safe from harm, and he,
Half conscious of the embraces of his bride,
Floats dimly down the sleepy fast-flowing tide
That runs to meet the quiet dreamful wide
Illimitable haven of the sea.