University of Virginia Library

3. PART III

I—“THE PALLID WATCHER OF THE EASTERN SKIES”

The pallid watcher of the eastern skies
Who, through the suffering night, did wait forlorn,
When comes the first faint purple of the morn
Waiteth no longer. To his happy eyes
The promised near the promise following flies,
Nor is his soul with sullen anguish torn,
Nor curseth he the day when he was born.
From the damp ground he doth in wonder rise,
Firm set his face against the gathering glory—
So to be sure that this, at last, is this,
And not the ancient, bitter-lying story.
And now he prays for strength to bear the bliss,
While, bending o'er the mountain, red and hoary,
The morning crowns him with a golden kiss.

II—“MY LOVE FOR THEE DOTH MARCH LIKE ARMÈD MEN”

My love for thee doth march like armèd men,
Against a queenly city they would take.
Along the army's front its banners shake;
Across the mountain and the sun-smit plain
It stedfast sweeps as sweeps the stedfast rain;
And now the trumpet makes the still air quake,
And now the thundering cannon doth awake
Echo on echo, echoing loud again.
But, lo! the conquest higher than bard e'er sung:
Instead of answering cannon, proud surrender!
Joyful the iron gates are open flung
And, for the conqueror, welcome gay and tender!
O, bright the invader's path with tribute flowers,
While comrade flags flame forth on wall and towers!

III—“WHAT WOULD I SAVE THEE FROM?”

What would I save thee from, dear heart, dear heart?
Not from what Heaven may send thee of its pain;
Not from fierce sunshine or the scathing rain:
The pang of pleasure; passion's wound and smart;
Not from the long, glad anguish of thine art;
Nor loss of faithful friends, nor any gain
Of growth by grief; I would not thee restrain
From needful death. But O, thou other part
Of me!—through whom the whole world I behold,
As through the blue I see the stars above!
In whom the world I find, hid fold on fold!
Thee would I save from this—nay, do not move;
Fear not, it may not flash, the air is cold;
Save thee from this—the lightning of my love.

IV—“WHAT WOULD I WIN THEE TO?”

What would I win thee to? dear heart and true!
A thought of bliss, a thornless life? Ah no!
Through weeping pain, Love, I would let thee go;
Through weary days and widowed nights; yea, through
The Valley of the Shadow, without rue,
If thou couldst gain the goal, Love, even so.
I would not win thee to a fruitful woe;
To best of earth or best beyond the blue.
And most of all would thy true lover scorn
To win thee to himself; thou shalt be free
To have or hate! But O, my golden morn!
Behold thy lover's passionate bravery—
Mighty, unresting, stedfast, heaven-born—
To win thee to the light, which is—to thee!

V—“I WILL BE BRAVE FOR THEE”

I will be brave for thee, dear heart; for thee
My boasted bravery forego. I will
For thee be wise, or lose my little skill;
Coward or brave; wise, foolish; bond or free.
No grievous cost in anything I see
That brings thee bliss, or only keeps thee, still,
In painless peace. So Heaven thy cup but fill,
Be empty mine unto eternity!
Come to me, Love, and let me touch thy face!
Lean to me, Love; breathe on me thy dear breath!
Fly from me, Love, to some far hiding-place,
If thy one thought of me or hindereth
Or hurteth thy sweet soul—then grant me grace
To be forgotten, tho' that grace be death!

VI—“LOVE ME NOT, LOVE, FOR THAT I FIRST LOVED THEE”

Love me not, Love, for that I first loved thee;
Nor love me, Love, for thy sweet pity's sake,
In knowledge of the mortal pain and ache
Which is the fruit of love's blood-veinèd tree.
Let others for my love give love to me;
From other souls, O, gladly will I take,
This burning, heart-dry thirst of love to slake,
What seas of human pity there may be!
Nay, nay, I care no more how love may grow,
So that I hear thee answer to my call;
Love me because my piteous tears do flow,
Or that my love for thee did first befall.
Love me or late or early, fast or slow—
But love me, Love, for love is all in all!

VII—BODY AND SOUL

VIII—“THY LOVER, LOVE, WOULD HAVE SOME NOBLER WAY”

Thy lover, Love, would have some nobler way
To tell his love, his noble love to tell,
Than rhymes set ringing like a silver bell.
O, he would lead an army, great and gay,
From conquering to conquer, day by day!
And when the walls of a proud citadel
At summons of his guns far-echoing fell—
That thunder to his Love should murmuring say:
Thee only do I love, dear Love of mine!
And while men cried: Behold how brave a fight!
She should read well, O, well! each new emprize:
This to her lips, this to my lady's eyes!
And tho' the world were conquered, line on line,
Still would his love be speechless, day and night.

IX—LOVE'S JEALOUSY

Of other men I know no jealousy,
Nor of the maid who holds thee close, O, close!
But of the June-red, summer-scented rose,
And of the barred and golden sunset sky
That wins the soul of thee through thy deep eye;
And of the breeze by thee beloved, that goes
O'er thy dear hair and brow; the song that flows
Into thy heart of hearts, where it may die.
I would I were one moment that sweet show
Of flower; or breeze beloved that toucheth all;
Or sky that through the summer eve doth burn.
I would I were the song thou lovest so,
At sound of me to have thine eyelids fall;—
But I would then to something human turn.

X—LOVE'S MONOTONE

Thou art so used, Love, to thine own bird's song,—
Sung to thine ear in love's low monotone,
Sung to thee only, Love, to thee alone
Of all the listening world,—that I among
My doubts find this the leader of the throng:
Haply the music hath accustomed grown
And no more music is to thee; my own
Too faithful argument works its own wrong.
Love, Love, and must I learn for thy sweet sake
The art of silence?—Ah, then hide the light
Of thy dear countenance, lest the music wake!
Yet should thy bird at last fall silent quite,
Would not thy heart an unused sorrow take?
Think not of me but of thyself to-night.

XI—“ONCE ONLY”

XII—DENIAL

When some new thought of love in me is born,
Then swift I seek a token fair and meet
That may unblamed thy blessèd vision greet;
Whether it be a rose, not bloodless torn
From that June tree which hideth many a thorn,
Or but a simple, loving message, sweet
With summer's heart and mine,—these at thy feet
I straightway fling; but all with maiden scorn
Thou spurnest. What to thee is token or sign,
Who dost deny the thing wherefor it stands!
Then I seem foolish in my sight and thine,
Like one who eager proffers empty hands.
Thou only callest these my gifts unfine,
While men are praising them in distant lands.

XIII—“ONCE WHEN WE WALKED WITHIN A SUMMER FIELD”

Once when we walked within a summer field
I pluckt the flower of immortality,
And said, “Dear Love of mine, I give to thee
This flower of flowers of all the round year's yield!”
'T was then thou stood'st, and with one hand didst shield
Thy sun-dazed eyes, and, flinging the other free,
Spurned from thee that white blossom utterly.
But, Love, the immortal cannot so be killed.
The generations shall behold thee stand
Against that western glow in grass dew-wet—
Lord of my life, and lady of the land.
Nor maid nor lover shall the world forget,
Nor that disdainful wafture of thy hand.
Thou scornful! sun and flower shall find thee yet.

XIV—SONG

XV—LISTENING TO MUSIC

When on that joyful sea
Where billow on billow breaks; where swift waves follow
Waves, and hollow calls to hollow;
Where sea-birds swirl and swing,
And winds through the rigging shrill and sing;
Where night is one vast starless shade;
Where thy soul not afraid,
Tho' all alone unlonely,
Wanders and wavers, wavers wandering;
On that accursèd sea
One moment only,
Forget one moment, Love, thy fierce content;
Back let thy soul be bent—
Think back, dear Love, O Love, think back to me!

XVI—“A SONG OF THE MAIDEN MORN”

XVII—WORDS IN ABSENCE

I would that my words were as my fingers,
So that my Love might feel them move
Slowly over her brow, as lingers
The sunset wind o'er the world of its love.
I would that my words were as the beating
Of her own heart, that keeps repeating
My name through the livelong day and the night;
And when my Love her lover misses,—
Longs for and loves in the dark and the light,—
I would that my words were as my kisses.
I would that my words her life might fill—
Be to her earth, and air, and skies.
I would that my words were husht and still—
Lost in the light of her eyes.

XVIII—SONG

The birds were singing, the skies were gay;
I looked from the window on meadow and wood,
On green, green grass that the sun made white;
Beyond the river the mountain stood—
Blue was the mountain, the river was bright;
I looked on the land and it was not good,
For my own dear Love she had flown away.

XIX—THISTLE-DOWN

XX—“O SWEET WILD ROSES THAT BUD AND BLOW”

XXI—THE RIVER

I know thou art not that brown mountain-side,
Nor the pale mist that lies along the hills
And with white joy the deepening valley fills;
Nor yet the solemn river moving wide
Into that valley, where the hills abide
But whence those morning clouds on noiseless wheels
Shall lingering lift and, as the moonlight steals
From out the heavens, so into the heavens shall glide.
I know thou art not this gray rock that looms
Above the water, fringed with scarlet vine;
Nor flame of burning meadow; nor the sedge
That sways and trembles at the river's edge.
But through all these, dear heart! to me there comes
Some melancholy, absent look of thine.

XXII—THE LOVER'S LORD AND MASTER

I pray thee, dear, think not alone of me,
But sometimes think of my great master, Love;
His faithful slave he is so far above
That for his sake I would forgotten be—
Tho' well I know that hidden thus from thee
Not far away my image then might rove,
And his sweet, heavenly countenance would move
Ever thy soul to gentler charity.
So when thy lover's self leaps from his song
Thou him may love not less for his fair Lord.
But that thy love for me grow never small
(As bow long bent twangs not the arrowed cord,
And he doth lose his star who looks too long),
Sometimes, dear heart, think not of me at all.

XXIII—SONG

My love grew with the growing night,
And dawned with the new daylight.

XXIV—“A NIGHT OF STARS AND DREAMS”

A night of stars and dreams, of dreams and sleep;
A waking into another empty day—
But not unlovely all, for then I say:
“To-morrow!” Through the hours this light doth creep
Higher in the heavens, as down the heavenly steep
Sinks the slow sun. Another evening gray,
Made glorious by the morn that comes that way;
Another night, and then To-day doth leap
Upon the world! O, quick the hours do fly,
Of that new day which brings the moment when
We meet at last! Swift up the shaking sky
Rushes the sun from out its dismal den;
And then the wisht for time doth yearn more nigh;
A white robe glimmering in the dark—and then!

XXV—A BIRTHDAY SONG

XXVI—“WHAT CAN LOVE DO FOR THEE, LOVE?”

What can love do for thee, Love?
Can it make the green fields greener;
Bluer the skies, and bluer
The eyes of the blue-eyed flowers?
Can it make the May-day showers
More warm and sweet; serener
The heavens after the rain?
The sunset's radiant splendor
More exquisite and tender?
The Northern Star more sure?
Can it take the pang from pain?
(O Love, remember the curtain
Of cloud that lifted last night
And showed the silver light
Of a star!) Can it make more certain
The heart of the heart of all,
The good that works at the root—
The singing soul of love
That throbs in flower and fruit,
In man and earth and brute,
In hell, and heaven above?
Can its low voice musical
Make dear the day and the night?

XXVII—“THE SMILE OF HER I LOVE”

The smile of her I love is like the dawn
Whose touch makes Memnon sing.
O, see where wide the golden sunlight flows—
The barren desert blossoms as the rose!
The smile of her I love—when that is gone,
O'er all the world Night spreads her shadowy wing.

XXVIII—FRANCESCA AND PAOLO

Within the second dolorous circle where
The lost are whirled, lamenting—thou and I
Stood, Love, to-day with Dante. Silently
We looked upon the black and trembling air;
When lo! from out that darkness of despair
Two shadows, light upon the wind, drew nigh,
Whose very motion seemed to breathe a sigh—
And there Francesca, and her lover there.
These when we saw, the wounds whereat they bled,
Their love which was not with their bodies slain—
These when we saw, great were the tears we shed;
As, Love, for thee and me love's tears shall rain—
The mortal agony; the nameless dread;
The longing, and the passion, and the pain.

XXIX—THE UNKNOWN WAY

XXX—THE SOWER

XXXI—“WHEN THE LAST DOUBT IS DOUBTED”

INTERLUDE

As melting snow leaves bare the mountain-side
In spaces that grow wider and more wide,
So melted from the sky the cloudy veil
That hid the face of sunrise. Land and ledge
And waste of glittering waters sent a glare
Back to the smiting sun. The trembling air
Lay, sea on sea, along the horizon's edge;
And on that upper ocean, clear as glass,
The tall ships followed with deep-mirrored sail
Like clouds wind-moved that follow and that pass;
And on that upper ocean, far and fair,
Floated low islands all unseen before.
Green grew the ocean shaken through with light,
And blue the heavens faint-fleckt with plumy white.
Like pennants on the wind, from o'er the rocks
The birds whirled seaward in shrill-piping flocks—
And through the dawn, as through the shadowy night,
The sound of waves that break upon the shore!