Poems Real and Ideal :: :: University of Virginia Library

Friend, when at Harrow twenty years ago,
Long ere my passion coveted the bays,
We wandered o'er the green hill's winding ways,
Our young hearts full of boyhood's eager glow,
We knew not what should be, nor sought to know:—
Now, somewhat of life's lengthening shadow strays
Across our path, and in the summer days
The perfume-laden winds more sadly blow.

But still the world is fair, though Harrow days
Are gone from us for ever; though no more
Will Isis break to silver at our oar
Or Cornish moorland purple meet our gaze.
Friend, let me give thee these my latest lays,
Full of old dreams of many a far-off shore.

MISCELLANEOUS SONNETS.

1882.

SONNET XIV. TO IRELAND.

O Ireland, Ireland,—and we love thee well!—
Lo! thy green meadows are made foul with red
Blood-stains by thine own sons' mad folly shed;
The land was heavenlike: thou hast made it hell.
Thou hast set murder on the lonely fell,
And filled the night with shadows of the dead,
And made the moonlight shudder at the tread
Of monstrous deeds too horrible to tell.

And this is love of Ireland! Pause and think.
Would not your love on nobler pinions soar
If it were taught from cowardly crimes to shrink,—
Murder to hate, injustice to abhor?
Ye your own chains are forging link by link,
And barring on yourselves your prison-door.

SONNET XVII. THE GHOSTLY ARMIES.

Over each city hangs a cloud of dead!—
Far more in number than our living faces
They fill with shadowy wings the crowded places,
By their old leaders gathered still and led.—
My eyes were opened. Lo! our parks were red
With troops that Wellington at Waterloo
Watched die before him:—Nelson I saw too,
And round him sailor-hosts in myriads sped.

And round fair Paris a great army stands:—
Paris is now besieged, and by an host
Outnumbering all the armies of live lands;
But every warrior is a bloodless ghost.
They mount guard o'er the Seine, these warrior-bands,
And dead Napoleon visits every post.

SONNET XIX. AN EASTERN YEARNING.

Oh, be thou just a rose! Why, thou canst kiss,
And is not that enough? This weary “soul”
That women cultivate, what heaven, what goal,
Can it supply as sweet as passion's bliss!
Half the delights of womanhood we miss
Here in the West.—Woman and flowers are one.
Instruct your flower:—flower-rapture all is done
Straightway, and you forget what woman is.

Oh, God deliver me from Western dreams
Of culture! Give me just an Arab tent,
And sweetly-moulded limbs within it pent,
And sun and flowers, and stars, and pale moon-beams:
This dark slave's shining bosom o'er me bent,
In that she cannot spell, more shapely seems.

SONNET XXI. GOD AND WOMAN.

God made a woman,—and he stood aghast
For very wonder. There she stood quite white,—
Naked and perfect. God's eyes waxèd bright;
Before him like a carven dream she passed.
Her black hair on the heaven-breeze floated light;
God watched her slowly vanish till at last
The soft superb shape glimmered out of sight:
Then on the trembling earth his tools he cast.

“Now do I for the first time envy Man”
He said: “The woman never will be mine;
Those dark thick tresses darker than the pine
And sweeter than the rose,—that body wan
And soft and scented like the dim woodbine,—
I cannot own for ever:—but he can.”

SONNET XXII. GOD.

Think you that God is moral? God is Love—
But Love that transcends every mortal law:—
The singer climbs with strange desire and awe
These low green misty earthly hills above
And sees the sun come nearer,—and he finds
That God is not as man;—He laughs to scorn
The petty creeds of petty fancies born,
And scatters all our goodness with his winds.

Oh, God is not as man! Love in God's sight
Is ever sweet, and passion ever pure:
The God who made the wild hedge-rose so white
Gave it besides the scent that doth allure;
There is a holiness in all delight;
The sweeter is the nobler law, be sure.

SONNET XXIII. FORSAKEN.

And shall thy sweetness wither, woman fair
Set in the midst of lonely desert days?
Dost thou lift up to heaven thy weary gaze
And see nought round thee but the void blue air?
Have no soft lips of lover kissed thine hair?
Hath thine hand never toyed with myrtle sprays?
Hast thou not wandered by the green-blue bays
In summer, full of mystic dreams and rare?

Oh, it were sin to leave thee blossoming so—
Alone, unplucked, unloved:—as great a sin
As to pass by some lily set within
A jungle,—where with heavy gait and slow
The loveless monstrous beasts lurch to and fro,
Piercing the rush-beds with their gaze unclean.

SONNET XXVII. THE SONG-BRIDE.

God hath his waters, and his winds and trees:
Think you that in God's eyes one single rose
Less beautiful and pure of petal blows
Because no mortal the bright blossom sees?
The haunt of every violet God's heart knows:
And all the golden gorse upon the leas
That loads with lavish scent the lingering breeze
For God in its rich glory of colour glows.

God hears all Nature singing unto him:—
And so the poet inwardly is 'ware
Of his own song's divine blue summer air,
And, though the world of man should wax quite dim,
Still would he stand triumphant,—for his Bride
Is his own song, for ever at his side.

SONNET XXVIII. ALONE.

Though England quite condemn me, yet am I
Very content in lonely calm to stand
Waiting,—my ceaseless lyre within my hand
And over me the uncondemning sky.
O England, England, England,—if we try
Our strange high visions unto thee to show,
'Tis ever the same answer—ever “No”!—
So one by one the baffled poets die.

Yet hold I fast my vision. Though not one
Were with me, I should hold it all the more.—
The spirit of Beauty at the heart of things
Is my one God, and till my life is done
I'll follow her moonlit feet along the shore
And mark the far faint glimmer of moonlit wings.

SONNET XXIX. RELIGION AND ART.

“Religion and Art are best kept apart, I think.”—

Ah!—Just so. Keep your God, and give me mine.
Keep you your Sunday God, black-coated, grim,—
Sever all Art and sweet delight from him,—
Sip in his name your sacramental wine.
My God is in these carven limbs that shine
Upon the smooth blue sea's soft buoyant rim;
My God is in these full rich lips that brim
With kisses sweeter than rain-washed woodbine.

Beauty is my God:—I am well content.
All wonder of form ye see not; ye are blind.
Pursue your road in peace,—ye were not meant
The tabernacle of my God to find.
My God is hidden from all your evil eyes
In dark-blue folds of thunder-guarded skies.

SONNET XXX. IN ST. JAMES'S PARK.

I watched the towers of Westminster shine grey
Across the Park, beneath an April sun:
The trees their first fresh verdure just had won:
I thought of all those silent towers could say;—
Of many a wild and blood-stained former day
And grim deeds by the Thames' grey margin done;
I called up English crowned heads one by one;
I thought of Whitehall: and of Fotheringay.

I mused:—Then lifted up my head and lo!
A girl was passing by, in jacket brown
Of soft stamped velvet,—she passed, looking down,
And towards historic Westminster did go:
After awhile I rose, and followed slow:
What drew me?—Westminster, or fluttering gown?

SONNETS XLIV., XLV., XLVI. A MORAL VICTORY: AND ITS RESULT.

I.

A lover conquered passion,—and he let
The great sweet chance slip through his fingers quite:
But was he closer unto God that night,
Knowing that passion's golden sun had set?
Did no wild storms of anguish and regret
Sweep o'er his lonely couch,—whereon a white
Soft figure should have lain?—the battle of right
Had been fought out—the victory won,—and yet....

All through that night he tossed about,—in dreams
Seeing a rose ungathered beckoning him:
Seeing the sudden flash of white that gleams
Above the bodice-lacework's loosened rim:
Waking and grasping—just the cold moonbeams!
Till morning broke,—rainy and weird and dim.

II.

Then forth he went and wandered by the sea:
The horizon cleared and the fair golden sun
Flashed on the waves that answered one by one,
And,—turning inland,—many a wet rose-tree
Flung rainbow dew-drops at him merrily.
The battle he the previous night had won
Seemed like a fierce defeat,—a hot race run
For worse than nothing: such strange beings are we!

“And she”—he thought—“my rose-bush all this night
Of perfect passionate summer left alone:
With never a kiss imprinted on the white
Rose-breast that might have been my own . . . my own . . .
To-night is left us still: the ways untrod
Shall ring to-night to passion's steeds,—by God!”

III.

And that night,—having sent a letter first,—
He waited her beside the blue still sea.
The ripples at his feet plashed tenderly,—
Now he was ready,—let Fate do its worst,
No night than last night could be more accursed!
Now he felt oneness with the rich rose-tree,
And watched the sunset,—and it did not flee,
Then passion grasped his throat with giant thirst.

He turned to meet her,—for the hour had come.
Then lo! a carriage by the sea-side wall,
And into his a woman's eyes once flashed;
Then on towards Venice the grey horses dashed.
He saw it now,—Last night or never at all:—
Aye—never, never, never!—till the tomb.

SONNET XLVII. ALL OVER AGAIN.

A poet thought:—“Ah! to start quite afresh!
To die to the old passions and begin
In some new city a new life to win!
To break from every old entangling mesh!
No more 'mid London's rough discordant din
To love,—but in white Paris or in Rome
Or Venice—anywhere far off from home—
To gather a golden new love-harvest in!

“Oh, I could love”—he thought—“as though I ne'er
Had loved before,—within me doth remain
Limitless youth: I could meet woman's eyes
As a glad boy of fourteen meets June skies
Upon a holiday morning:—in the air
Of Italy I could love all over again!”

SONNET LI. FORGOTTEN JESUS.

I stood beside the Galilean Lake
And what was left of Jesus?—Bright and blue
Just as in the old days they used to do
The ripples laughed, and soft mist flake on flake
Brooded above the rushes in the brake,—
Yet every human face I met was new:—
Ah me! The world has never yet been true
For any woman's love or hero's sake!

Christ was forgotten of the hills and skies!—
New fishermen their brown nets dragged and flung
Within the waters,—and their chants they sung
Towards other dark-skinned maidens' answering eyes
Than those who in the far-off summers hung
On Jesus' lips, and harkened to his sighs.

SONNET LIV. THE COQUETTE-WORLD.

The world is a coquette. She kissed, and clung
Round Jesus as an actress clings around
Her long-lost lover on a sudden found,—
And over him her tearful hands she wrung.
For nineteen centuries round his tomb she sung
And her strong passion seemed to know no bound:—
White craving supple lithesome arms she wound
About the throat that on the black cross hung.

What was it worth?—She hath a new love now,
A young love,—and she marks within his eyes
The far-off light of summers of new skies,
And flowers unfaded ring his lineless brow:—
Christ and his centuries pass,—and, laughing, she
Flings white arms round the Twentieth Century.

SONNET LVII. HEAVEN AND WOMAN.

And what are twenty centuries unto God!
Just one swift starry night, and nothing more;
Just one light speedy footfall on the floor
Of time: one summer blossoming the sod.
So mused I in Bond Street: and the ceaseless roar
Of carriages seemed like the centuries wheeling
Red ranks round God's throne, with wet eyes appealing
For pity,—crime on crime and war on war.

Through the blue sky I gazed as in a dream:—
Then my eyes fell, and in a carriage lo!
An olive-skinned clear face and lips that glow
With loveliest power of passion, and a gleam
Of Italy in the eyes, and forehead low
And shapely.—How far-off those star-thoughts seem!

102

SONNET LIX. LOST RICHES.

O riches of all the ages we have missed!—
Dark eyes, dark tresses, in old Eastern lands,—
Wonderful thrilling of electric hands,—
Lips fairer than all flowers, alas! unkissed.
Blue tender veins on Cleopatra's wrist,—
Eyes gazing over red burnt Indian sands,—
Eyes sweeter than the blue sea that expands
Round Venice;—oh, the long heart-piercing list!—

And whom of all that long list have we seen?
Poets, who have the eternal heart of Time
Mixed with your own in magnitude sublime,
Ye have kissed the lips it may be of one queen
Of love and song, and crowned her in your rhyme,—
One!—yet red lips are numberless, I ween!

104

SONNET. IN BOHEMIA: A CONTRAST.

A scanty room:—poor furniture indeed:
Just one thin-blanketed small tressel-bed,
And over it a washed-out grey shawl spread;
Wall-paper showing some green wide-branched weed.
Cracked low discoloured ceiling overhead
And on the floor a rug,—no carpet there;
A picture opposite that seemed to stare,
Full of great colour-blots of blue and red.

Such was the bower of love:—and on the bed
A woman, beautiful as early morn.
Soft cool lips, full of love, or full of scorn,
And breast whose sweet touch might awake the dead.
No golden palace,—yet within this place
More than a Cleopatra's eyes and face.

May, 1882.

107

SONNETS.

1876, 1877.

109

IV. THE ONE STAR.

There are sad places where no star-beam shines,
Waste desolate abysses of the dark,
Where no glad light the wandering soul may mark,—
Whereover the black waves in stormy lines
Pour ceaselessly:—spots where no angel's foot
Has trodden; lurid as deep deadly mines:
Hell-pits wherein the lingering captive pines;
Devoid of buds and flowers and gracious fruit.

What star can light them, or what step traverse
These regions branded with a mystic curse?
What help can reach the prisoners therein bound,—
Cold pulses there shall throb at what glad sound?
What flame, what fire, can comfort there impart?
Only the sweet fire of a woman's heart.

125

THY SPANISH LOVES.

(To Alfred de Musset.)

Ah yes! thy Spanish loves, O sweet-lipped brother poet—
I know their glory well.
What poet ever loved dark eyes, and does not know it,—
And knowing it, now knows not heaven, and hell?

First heaven, then hell,—and heaven and hell again and so on.
When dark eyes are in vogue
Satan wakes up and calls his carriage. What will go on
He knows full well,—the rogue!

134

Dark eyes and coal-black hair,—and murder and adultery
And other suchlike things.
Love stops at nothing in Spain. The Spanish skies are sultry
And,—God! how sweetly a Spanish soft laugh rings!

Blue eyes mean nothing much; but dark eyes mean the devil,—
The devil and all his train.
They mean long nights when wild loosehaired mad sweet dreams revel
Till morning blushes at the pane!

And when the Spanish eyes and Spanish locks in London
Gleam tenderly, good Lord!
All sober vows and strict resolves are straightway undone.
Does conscience speak? You pink him with your sword!

135

If Spanish eyes and hair could madden a French poet
In France or sunny Spain
They madden thrice as much in this pale land,—I know it,
And give us thrice the pleasure, and thrice the pain.

Dec., 1882.

136

SEVEN SONNETS.

[_]

(These Sonnets were first published in the “Echo”.)

147

II. CAPITAL PUNISHMENT.

“Vengeance is mine.” So saith the mighty Lord.
“Vengeance is mine; deliver unto me
The man—I claim him. He is not for thee,
Thou land of his, to slay. Mine is the sword
Of vengeance. Put by that accursed cord,
And hack to pieces that black gallows-tree;—
Murder no murderer; let the creature be;
Mine are the gates of death,”—so saith the Lord.

“The spirit he hath slain is in my hand;
I will judge justly, punish and requite;
But purge this stain of blood from out the land.
The dawn is waiting, but its golden light
Trembles, for in its path your gibbets stand,
Still clothed about with horrors of the night.”

April 18, 1882.

149

IV. THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING: AFTER THE EGYPTIAN WAR OF 1882.

Thank God for what, ye clerical conclave?
For corpses piled beneath the Eastern sky,
And wounded men whose one prayer is to die?
For blood and wrath and battle and the grave?
Now from church aisle and arched cathedral nave
Must sound of triumph-hymning float on high?
Nay, rather close the red book with a sigh,
And seek in sober calm the land to save.

Ye priests, who now would make God such as ye,
Refrain,—and let the pale dead sleep in peace.
Let the white Eastern moon soar silently
Over the bloodied plains; let shouting cease.
Think you the hearts of watching angels glowed
When through dark ranks wet bayonets rent their road?

Sept. 23, 1882.

151

VI. FOR VICTOR HUGO'S EIGHTY-FIRST BIRTHDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 1883.

The skies have had their poets, and the flowers
Have had their poets, and the sea has heard
Passionate singing louder than of bird
Who chants amid the night's dim throbbing bowers.
Poets have sung of love's absorbing hours,
And battle has put in its fiery word,
And sorrow itself to sweetest song has spurred;—
The storms have had their singers, and the showers.

But only one great soul has sung the whole
Of Nature and of Man, commensurate
With both of these, and touched song's loftiest goal;
One man has challenged Time and conquered Fate:
Hugo—who saw the century's sunrise glow,
Eighty and one majestic years ago.

153

VII. WILLIAM GOULDSTONE.

The man “sees red”. A man who slays wholesale—
Makes his own hearthstone run with dripping gore,
And, having killed three children, seeks for more
To slaughter, doing a deed which turneth pale
E'en Love and Mercy 'neath the eternal veil
Of cloud whence white-winged pity and healing soar;
A man who brings the ravage of red war
Into his peaceful home, and then can hail
His own fierce-eyed intolerable deed
As a deliverance from his pressing woe;
The man who, when his own five children bleed
Before him, thinks that he has holpen so
Their mother:—if thou hang “till he be dead”
This madman, England—then thine eyes “see red!”

Sept. 20, 1883.

This unfortunate man, in a fit of homicidal frenzy, killed three of his children, and violently attacked and injured the remaining two. His life was subsequently spared on the ground of insanity.

154

A WINTER VISION.

I

When Winter round us throws
His mantle of white snows
And dimmer
The fog-bound daylight grows
Nor glimmer
Is with us of red rose
Nor swimmer
Through the blue water goes,—

163

II

Where are we then to find
Rest for the weary mind?—
No splendour
Of green hills where the wind
Wails tender
Through avenues black-pined
Can render
Our worn-out hearts resigned!

III

Where the grand sunsets red
Above the lake were shed
Till rushes
Amid the water bled
And bushes
Waved many a golden head,
Now blushes
No sky-cheek: all is dead.

164

IV

Where the white lilies grew
And harebells, dainty-blue,
And flowers
Diverse in scent and hue,
And bowers
The August sun flamed through,
And towers
Of greenery draped in dew,

V

The weary white wet snow
Before the wind doth blow
And eddy:
Homeward we have to go,
And ready
We find our books a-row;
With steady
Gaze we glance to and fro;—

165

VI

And in a moment we
Forget the snow-clad lea:
The glory
Of Guinevere we see,
And hoary
Breakers that burst and flee,
And gory
Knights battling knee to knee.

VII

Or else in Fairyland
With Spenser's self we stand,
Or follow
The pious Latian band
O'er hollow
Sea-gulfs from strand to strand:—
Apollo
Next takes us by the hand.

166

VIII

Through Italy we go
With hearts and souls a-glow,—
The thunder
Of Dante's rhythmic flow
Doth sunder
The heavens with throb and throe,
And wonder
On wonder doth forthshow.

IX

With Hugo next we tread
Through streets and alleys red,—
Are taken
To haunts of the great dead;
Heart-shaken
We bow before his head
Forsaken
Full oft of those it led.

167

X

With Keats we thread the deep
Dream-land of love and sleep,
And fancies
Bright-winged around us leap
With glances
That make the spirit weep
And lances
That the old-world forests sweep.

XI

And Wordsworth makes the air
With mountain-sweetness fair,
And gracious
With song of rivers rare,
And spacious,—
The mountain-valleys bear
Capacious
Woods nestling everywhere.

168

XII

And Shakespeare with the eyes
That saw all storms and skies
And lifted
Man heavenward in strange wise,
God-gifted
Now doth before us rise:—
Time's shifted,—
Behold, dull Winter flies!

Dec., 1881.

169

A WINTER SONG.

I

Lo! the snow
On the roofs rests, dreary white:
Was the glow
Of Love's beauty ever bright?

II

Green, serene,
Were sweet gardens ever fair?
Did love lean
Downward through the enchanted air?

170

III

Soft and oft
Did the touch of Venus come?
Now aloft
Hangs alone the snow's cold bloom!

IV

Rose, where glows
All thy June-glad beauty now?
Hoar-frost throws
Its wild web o'er every bough!

V

Death, whose breath
Through the green glad year delayed,
Twines his wreath
Now within the hawthorn shade.

171

VI

Bowers and flowers
All have vanished, all are gone:
Dreary hours
Crown us with their chaplets wan.

VII

Cold doth hold
Hand and heart and harp and lyre:
Young and old
Huddle round the heaped-up fire.

VIII

Art hath part
Never with the dreary cold:
All his heart
Yearns towards Summer's hair of gold!

172

IX

Eyes like skies
Hath he,—large and deepest blue:
Now he flies
With drooped wings the raw air through!

X

Now his brow
Lowereth,—and his eyes are dull,
Wondering how
Grass can edge the frozen pool!

XI

Night is bright
Only in the theatre:
There we might
Find Art's Bride, and gaze at her!

173

XII

Gain the Fane
Of life's wintry Art, and there,
Loud, amain,
Music thrills the lighted air!

XIII

Clear and dear,
Soft Ophelia's voice is heard,
Hovering near,
Lute-sweet as a summer bird!

XIV

Death Macbeth
Plans for king and guest and friend:
Hamlet saith
Words that haunt us to the end.

174

XV

Blind we find
Aged Lear,—we watch and weep
As the wind
Roars round many a castled steep.

XVI

Fair the hair
Of pale Desdemona gleams:
Through the air
Of still night we watch her dreams.

XVII

Gaunt the vaunt
Of Othello breaks the hush.
Fairies haunt
Brake and mere and blossomed bush:

175

XVIII

Oberon's robe
Glitters in the leafy glen;
Many a globe
Of white dew-drops sparkles then!

XIX

Here the clear
Voice of Art in winter sounds,
Far and near
Thrilling all the forest-bounds!

XX

Winter thin,
Peaked of face and sharp of hand,
Treads not in
That enchanted viewless land.

176

XXI

There the air
Ever full of high romance
Shines June-fair,—
And blue streams for ever dance

XXII

'Tween the green
Sweet unfrozen mellow fields,
And gold sheen
Strikes on strong knights' sunlit shields.

Dec., 1881.

177

AND YET.

All seemed forlorn: bright hope had died away,—
The waves were grey,
And sullen waters on the shore-banks beat;
The heaven I once desired had vanished quite
And all its light—
And yet the world was sweet!

Death and the end of all things hasteneth on,—
Soon are we gone,—
The gaudy-winged reproachful years are fleet;

178

A flower no sooner bloometh soft and fair
Than comes despair—
And yet earth's skies are sweet!

The old hope has fled with swift resounding wings;
No glad voice sings;
Dreams silver-plumed and tender-lipped retreat;
To-day we live,—to-morrow our spent breath
Is still in death—
And yet the streams sound sweet!

The summer mocks us with its wealth of blue
And wondrous hue
And fervent fierce unsympathetic heat;
The blossoms mock us with their wealth of sheen,
Gay midst the green—
Yet starlit nights are sweet!

179

Places where love in old bright days was fair
And joys that were
The one same swift despairing chant repeat;
The grass will shortly wave above our tomb
With green wild bloom—
And yet the grass is sweet!

Women are frail, and not so true as fair;
Their gold bright hair
Withers, as withers the rich auburn wheat;
They pass,—yea, all things pass; the loveliest things
Have readiest wings—
Yet lovely things are sweet!

Love and all tender joys will soon be o'er
And we no more
Shall thrill at the approach of woman's feet;

180

Quiet we soon in the chill earth shall lie,
My love and I—
And yet my love is sweet!

June, 1881.

181

MIRROR AND ROSE.

“When visiting the sea, he takes his microscope,
And all his passion of soul is centred in the hope
That he may find a prize
Amid the pallid weeds and slimy shelly things:
In butterflies he loves the scales upon their wings,—
He never sees the skies.

“He never sees the waves whose shining squadrons break
On moonlit shining shores; blue ripples of the lake
Are nothing unto him:

205

Here am I, woman-ripe and splendid (am I fair?
Oh answer me, soft eyes of mirror over there?)—
But still his eyes are dim!

“Not all men's eyes are dim! Not every man is blind:
Am I (I wonder much?) a sinner if I find
Man's gracious homage sweet?
Am I (I question much?) a sinner if I pour
What he will never seek some other soul before,—
Yea, at another's feet?

“Through all these weary years my soul hath lived alone:
Sometimes it hath endured,—and sometimes made its moan
To stars and midnight breeze:—
He never thinks me fair,—he never thinks me sweet,—
(Slide off, thou foolish gown—so—rustle to my feet!
What is't the mirror sees?

206

“Ah! . . . Lo! before the glass unclothed, a woman white,
I stand: ah, now I know:—but never till this night
Deemed I that I was fair.
How the strange scent from that just-gathered dewy rose
Like fragrance in a dream all round about me goes,—
Like love's own fatal air!

“Ah! some one said to-night . . . what was it? . . . that my hair
Was beautiful: rush round my shining shoulder bare,—
Twine serpent-like—ah! so:
And if my lover's face shone fair within the glass,
Red lips you'd forward lean? Or would you let it pass?—
Tongue,—would you whisper, ‘No!’)

“Hark! on the stairs a step—Gown, hasten on again;
If he should find you thus, how he would stare amain
This white soft shape to see.

207

To him it would mean less—a whole world less indeed—
Than snowy plume of some tide-tangled gummy weed
Or sea-anemone!

“He'd think I was bewitched: I've half a mind—but no!
Only the eyes that love must ever see me so;
Only those eyes of grey!
And the dear mirror's eyes,—now, mirror, be discreet!
Remember that you saw just nothing but my feet!
Rose, thou wilt not betray?

“His feet upon the stairs,—his hand upon the door;
This brooch,—and all is then just as it was before:
Remember, mirror and rose!”—
“Quick, Maggie! run and fetch the table and the lamp;
This seaweed must be searched while still the fronds are damp;—
How bright that pier-glass glows!”

March, 1882.

210

THE KING.

The king had but to stretch his hand forth and they brought him
Fair women. All the queens of all the far lands sought him.
He sent through land and sea
For dark-eyed dark-haired brides to add to his harem's treasures:
Just as he sank on cushions, sank he amid pleasures:
Life seemed for him just one long blossoming tree.

Loves came from North and South; from Eastern and Western cities:
At night the feast was spread, and amorous hymns and ditties
Rose up to the moonlit air.

214

Then the still dark was lit by white arms and embraces,
And the rich blossoms' scent crept round about close faces,—
And each night some unkissed new mouth was there.

If in the streets he saw some maiden or some married
Dark eyes desirable, his strong men straightway carried
The woman to the high
White palace-walls: and there on silken cushions seated,
Soft curtains hanging around, blue, gold, and crimson-pleated,
She waited, the king's august couch anigh.

But one day, found in some far-off dim wind-swept island
Where the wan mist-wreaths dwell and crown each granite highland,
A grey-eyed maid was brought
Captive to the great king; and she the night he sought her
By her own dagger fled, the intrepid Northland's daughter,
And passed beyond the reach of hand or thought.

215

And ever till he died the great king pined and maddened,
And 'mid the cushions bright his tarnished sick soul saddened:
For, though he had all things
And all the women of all the land at his disposal,
Yet just the one he sought had shirked her royal espousal
And in the desert spread a sea-bird's wings.

This glimpse was all he had of woman's soul. Thereafter
Through every embrace he heard the Western girl's clear laughter
As out the dagger flew:—
And when the lips of slaves upon his lips were lavish
He longed for that one mouth no king or God could ravish
And yearned for those unconquered eyes grey-blue.

Sept., 1882.

216

TWO SONNETS.

I. TO-NIGHT.

To-night I claim thee, lady—claim thy soul.
Give all thou canst with lavish hands away,
All that I covet, suffer for, will stay—
Far, far it is even out of thy control.
Now on the closing of thy marriage-day
As it were, I come to thee, and would unveil
With tender solemn speed thy beauty pale,
And gaze deep in thine eyes of marvellous grey.

Deep, deep, and ever deeper I would gaze,
Till on this evening of thy day of days
I draw thee forth, as from his very embrace:
Yea, strenuous arms of his shall tremble, and part,
Till, heeding not the prison where thou art,
I weeping, kiss thee on the weeping face.

April 27, 1876.

232

II. ALONE.

Yea, next, my love shall come to me alone,
Dividing herself from all friends and kin:
So passion's supreme pleasure we shall win,
And watch God, without trembling, on his throne.
Then shalt thou be, my lady sweet, mine own;—
Then all the fierce sad seasons that have been,
Heavy with sorrow, dark or red with sin,
Shall vanish, like pale mists to nightward blown.

All these, thy friends of youth, thou shalt forsake,—
Husband and home, and mother,—and shalt take
Thine own sweet soul, that only, in thine hand:—
This shalt thou in the far sure future do;
Ages may pass-yet God's word shall come true;
One day thou shalt arise at Love's command.

April 27, 1876.

233

A RUSSIAN WOMAN TO A RUSSIAN NIHILIST.

I love thy red right hand. I love thy reckless daring:
Thine eyes with half the fire of some fierce tiger's glaring.
I love thy strength and zeal.
If thou wert quite alone, and all the world united
Against thee, thou wouldst be (I know!) the more delighted:
With lonely rapture brain and heart would reel.

Yes, thou art wicked, love. Thou art a malefactor.
Thine own hands do dark deeds: thou art no sluggish actor
In all this century's strife.

241

The hand that I have kissed upon the dagger closes
With deadly iron grip. I gather harmless roses:
But thou dost gather with red pruning-knife.

Thou hast no mercy of heart nor pity of soul within thee:
Only a vast wild flame, consuming, wrathful, in thee;
Canst thou love, sweetheart, me?
Nay, I am but a river; my banks are full of flowers:
My hair is full of scent of honey-suckle bowers:
Thou art the tidal cruel desperate sea.

Thou art the sea—but red: not blue or sweet or quiet.
I know thee. Through thy brain wild deeds in maddest riot
Roar on their lonely way.
Thou art the sea. I am the gentle-souled calm river
Along whose banks the reeds in their green squadrons quiver.
I meet thee,—then am tinged with blood-shot spray.

242

I meet thee. Then with joy of every pulse that tingles
My calm white river-soul with thy red spirit mingles
And with thy fury of heart.
I cast for wreaths and crowns my river-flowers upon thee
And cast my whole rapt soul in love and worship on thee;
Then watch thee for some fiery deed depart.

Thy vast tides crimson-stained flow half way up the river,
O sea-love, making all my bank-side poplars shiver
With awe at the strange red:—
And I,—I bring thee down a flower or two with laughter
From far-off inland meads which thou shalt wear hereafter,
Lover, when I am lost in thee and dead.

Thou hast made women weep. I love thee better for it.
Their lovers hast thou slain? I care not for their florid
Display of tears and woe.

243

Or—if their woe be real—is not my joy still plainer
That follows on their grief as watchful-eyed retainer
And dogs them with its steady footstep slow?

Thou: thou wouldst battle, strong and iron-armed and fearless,
Against great hosts of stars,—and I could watch thee, tearless,
Yea revelling, O my lord,
In thy stern wrath as through the golden serried legions
Summoned by bugle of God from far blue pathless regions
Flickered the quick sheen of thy dripping sword.

Thou hast no pity of heart. I know and I have said it.
Thy pitiless strong soul—I know nor do I dread it
Though it should cast off me!
What is a soft stream worth whose ripples dance and revel
Compared to the great force that fears not God or devil,—
The sea-like monstrous furious force of thee?

244

I am thy river-bride. But thou art oceanic
And limitless and fierce, steel-sinewed and Titanic,—
A very god to me.
Full of the singing strength of all the white-waved water:
I am the golden sunlight's flower-engendering daughter;
Thou art the offspring of the flowerless sea.

Thou fearest hardly God. If God were king and tyrant
Thine would be the first sword, swift, eager, and aspirant
That tyrant-God to slay.
Thou hast the strength of will of God himself within thee,
And that is why my soul so longs, O love, to win thee,
And why my fingers in thy black locks play.

If God were tyrant here, thou wouldst be calm—no bragger.
But out would leap thy keen bright-polished trusty dagger
And straight to the very heart

245

God thou wouldst stab.—And lo! his blood would flow around thee
And it would be as if a red sunset had crowned thee
Painted in heaven by thy swift splashing dart.

How I would love thee then!—From river-side and hollow
I'd bring thee violets then, and thy strong footstep follow
O lover, O my sea,
Soft, flower-sweet, flower-divine,—thy soft companion truly;
The one soul in the world who understands thee duly
And worships the enormous force in thee.

I pray for thee. (So strange is woman's complex passion!)
I pray for thee in true deep-yearning woman's fashion:
Yet thou art God and lord
To me,—and I would kiss in holy sacramental
Calm tearless fearless wise, with loving lips and gentle,
The blade, yet reeking, of thy yet warm sword.

246

What is a woman's love but love for strength and power?
Just the strange love of some poor simple stream-side flower
For the vast power and might
That fills the sea with strength, and fills the heavens with burning
Vast quenchless ever-new, at each new dawn returning,
Unfathomable wonderful sunlight.

Thou art the sea and sun. I lose in thee my being,
Some far-off high divine fair consummation seeing
When thou and I made one
Shall pass along the ranks of fiery-winged immortals
And through eternal life's irrevocable portals,
For thou art God: God is the sea and sun.

April, 1883.

247

POETRY AND SCIENCE.

Not all the songs of stars and starry wild embraces
Are worth the very least and worst of human faces:
Not all the suns can shine
Like one true human heart that glows with loving-kindness:
Gaze through your telescopes till ye be stricken with blindness;
Not all your lore is worth one golden line!

What is it unto man to know the leagues that sever
Our patient green-grassed earth for ever and for ever
From Sirius or from Mars?

248

What is it unto us to know that three-ringed Saturn
Is uncompleted yet, a laggard and a slattern,
For all his moons, amid the elder stars!

What is it unto us to gaze till brain grows dizzy
At the wild golden ants who make the heaven so busy
As over it they creep?
If unto us the heaven were opened, and we knew them,
Gold star by star, and could, long rank by rank, review them,
Would it be worth one gift of white-armed sleep?

Would it be worth the sleep that Love pours o'er the pillow
When the soft rest succeeds to passion's wild fierce billow?
Would all the starry lore
Be worth two star-like eyes, and mouth so sweet and tender
Its warm close touch outweighs the cold sidereal splendour?
Love gives us all things. Can the stars do more?

249

What is it worth to man to thread the chill star-spaces?
Oh here on earth are warm white passionate embraces!
Thou needst not seek the sky!
Lo! very near and sweet the flowers of earth surround thee.
If woman's lips have touched and woman's love hath crowned thee
Thou hast thine heaven of suns and stars,—close by.

In traversing the air one grows quite cold and chilly!
Far, far, beyond all rocks and cliffs and uplands hilly
The eyes of Science seek.
Then back to earth they turn; and yet the glow within them
Is not what we should see (and see with gladness) in them
Had Love once touched cold Science' frigid cheek!

The old warm myths of Greece had far more life and glory
Than Science e'er will have, though she wax old and hoary
And wise beyond her dream.

250

The moon and sun were gods. We could not do without them.
Our misery is now we know too much about them.
We analyse Apollo's golden beam.

We analyse all things, and push too far inquiry.—
The rainbow is mere light. The sun is but a fiery
Vast glowing blazing orb.
Oh, better far than this through the green woods to wander
And meet a white-robed sweet great-eyed grand goddess yonder
And let her beauty all your soul absorb!

It was far better—yes!—to meet a woodland fairy
Than to sail forth throughout the blue void regions airy
With Tyndall by your side!
I'd choose—yes, I would choose!—had I the choice, to follow
Along the gold-flowered mead the footsteps of Apollo
Rather than Proctor's,—though his path be wide!

251

Give me the days of faith, and not the days of Science,
Where fancy is concerned. Each new exact appliance
Leaves still less room to dream.
The fairies, like the wolves that haunted forest-marches,
Are disappearing fast. No white robe thrills the larches:
Titania travels not the moony gleam!

Knowledge hath little worth, if all the dreams are going.
God! let me wander forth beside blue waters flowing
And find sweet Venus there.
Let me within the grove find some gay frolic fairy
And clasp her round the waist, and kiss the red lips chary!
Let me watch in the stream the Naiad's hair!

To know is great and well: but not to know is better.
To add new facts to facts adds fetter unto fetter
For all the human race.

252

To number all the stars outweighs not what we are losing
In knowing that no more among the reed-beds musing
Shall we see Pan's half-human wrinkled face.

March, 1883.

253

SOPHIA PEROVSKAIA.

“She was beautiful. It was not the beauty which dazzles at first sight, but that which fascinates the more, the more it is regarded.

“A blonde, with a pair of blue eyes, serious, and penetrating, under a broad and spacious forehead. A delicate little nose, a charming mouth, which showed, when she smiled, two rows of very fine white teeth.

“It was, however, her countenance as a whole which was the attraction. There was something brisk, vivacious, and at the same time, ingenuous in her rounded face. She was girlhood personified. Notwithstanding her twenty-six years, she seemed scarcely eighteen. A small, slender, and very graceful figure, and a voice as charming, silvery, and sympathetic as could be, heightened this illusion. It became almost a certainty, when she began to laugh, which very often happened. She had the ready laugh of a girl, and laughed with so much heartiness, and so unaffectedly, that she really seemed a young lass of sixteen.

“She gave little thought to her appearance. She dressed in the most modest manner, and perhaps did not even know what dress or ornament was becoming or unbecoming. But she had a passion for neatness, and in this was as punctilious as a Swiss girl.

“She was very fond of children, and was an excellent school-mistress. There was, however, another office that she filled even better; that of nurse. When any of her friends fell ill, Sophia was the first to offer herself for this difficult duty, and she performed that duty with such gentleness, cheerfulness, and patience, that she won the hearts of her patients, for all time.

“Yet this woman, with such an innocent appearance, and with such a sweet and affectionate disposition, was one of the most dreaded members of the Terrorist party.

“It was she who had the direction of the attempt of March 13; it was she who, with a pencil, drew out upon an old envelope the plan of the locality, who assigned to the conspirators their respective posts, and who, upon the fatal morning, remained upon the field of battle, receiving from her sentinels news of the Emperor's movements, and informing the conspirators, by means of a handkerchief, where they were to proceed.

“What Titanic force was concealed under this serene appearance? What qualities did this extraordinary woman possess?

“She united in herself the three forces which of themselves constitute power of the highest order: a profound and vast capacity, an enthusiastic and ardent disposition, and, above all, an iron will.”

“Sophia Perovskaia belonged, like Krapotkine, to the highest aristocracy of Russia. The Perovski are the younger branch of the family of the famous Rasumovsky, the morganatic husband of the Empress Elizabeth, daughter of Peter the Great, who occupied the throne of Russia in the middle of the last century (1741–1762). Her grandfather was Minister of Public Instruction; her father was Governor-General of St. Petersburg; her paternal uncle, the celebrated Count Perovsky, conquered for the Emperor Nicholas a considerable part of Central Asia.

“Such was the family to which this woman belonged who gave such a tremendous blow to Czarism.

“Sophia was born in the year 1854. Her youth was sorrowful. She had a despotic father, and an adored mother, always outraged and humiliated. It was in her home that the germs were developed in her, of that hatred of oppression, and that generous love of the weak and oppressed, which she preserved throughout her whole life.”—

“Underground Russia: Revolutionary Profiles and Sketches from Life.” By Stepniak. Translated from the Italian. London: 1883. Pp. 126, 127, 128.

I

Blue-eyed, fair-haired, and young,—a girl in outward seeming,—
Yet when thy foot did pass amid the meadows dreaming
Of gold-haired spring,
What dreams were thine, O strange heroic woman-spirit?
Dreams of the Freedom which thy land shall yet inherit?
Dreams of vast tyrannies upon the wing?—

270

II

When other maidens dream of love and tender flowers
And lovers' voices sweet within the may-white bowers,
Thou,—thou alone,—
Wast dreaming of the deed that set the world a-wonder
And hurled amid one burst of Revolution's thunder
That world's most mighty monarch from his throne.

III

No blossoms white were thine, but blossoms weird and gory.
Thou, thou alone, didst stand before an Empire's glory
And saidst that it should fall.
High-born and noble, thou didst leave the lordly places
And thou didst wander forth, a light for poor men's faces:
Love, wealth, repose;—thou didst surrender all.

271

IV

And has not yet a song from our free isle resounded,
For thee, for thee,—who, when the tyrant's deeds abounded,
Didst say that these should cease?
Are all our transports saved for old historic cities?
Have we no hearts, no souls, no fiery loveful ditties,
For Russia? Are we chained to Rome and Greece?

V

When thou didst slay and die, were all our singers staggered
At thy vast size of soul and might of hand red-daggered?
That none could say:
“The Empire faced one girl. Yet when the battle ended,
That Empire's cruel life with blood and fire was blended;—
A Czar before a girl's stroke passed away.

272

VI

“Passed like a dream.” O thou who didst the deed tremendous
Design and plot and plan,—whose white hand did defend us
From blood-red hands,—
A bitter sin it was that never a poet hearkened
When o'er thine head the storm of black revenge down-darkened:
That not one song was launched from freer lands!

VII

A bitter sin it was that only English waters
Free-souled thrilled at thy deed; not England's white-souled daughters,
Nor strong-souled English men.
A grievous thing it was that only our sea-waves knew thee
And saw the noble pulse of English blood beat through thee,
Thee,—free-souled still within thy prison-den.

273

VIII

And I,—I would not die without one strong word spoken
Whereby the English chill grim silence may be broken:
I would send unto thee
The greeting of our waves, the love-song of the billows,
And greeting of green leaves of England's oaks and willows,
And our sun's song wherewith he loves our sea.

IX

With more than English force thou didst withstand the tyrant;
And round thee Russia's sons ranged, flame-souled and aspirant,
Thee following hard.
An army thou hast had around thee and behind thee;
Yet couldst thou never indeed for all thy greatness find thee
One true-souled singer, one impassioned bard?

274

X

The stars and seas and winds and flowers and leaves, these know thee.
Then why should human song o'erlook thee and forego thee,
O thou most great,
Who when thy land was dead and never foot came forward
Didst watch the tyrant-wave with deadly crest roll shoreward,
Yet wast content its thundering blow to wait.

XI

An Empire and a world against thee.—Thou a river,
Soft, silver-tongued and sweet,—whereo'er love's branches quiver
And beckon with their bloom.
Love and delights behind, and all the flowers of pleasure;
A life that might yield joy in unknown sumptuous measure;—
Behind thee, rainbow-hopes. In front the tomb.

275

XII

Yet thou didst choose the tomb, and thou didst, river-tender,
Against the foaming tides and cruel soulless splendour
Of sea-wide tyranny
Hurl thy blue rippling waves; and thou didst for a season
Make all that tidal waste of oceanic treason
A conquered tideless helpless prostrate sea.

XIII

One river against the sea! Soon its waves fell upon thee,
And hurled their gathered might of tidal waters on thee
As tigers leap.
Yet thou hadst stemmed the sea! With thy clear river-current
Hadst barred the cruel white waves' multitudinous torrent
And driven them backward on the shuddering deep.

276

XIV

A girl of twenty-six! A mere blue-eyed soft flower!
Yet through thee spake the Soul's immeasurable power
That sun nor star
Nor moon can e'er withstand, nor tidal waves oppressive,
Nor crowns that rest on crime, nor rulers retrogressive,
Nor the omnipotent (worm-eaten) Czar.

XV

Through thee the heart of Greece and England's spirit chainless
And souls of all brave men and women's spirits stainless
Spake. Through thy maiden hand
The might of Russia struck. Thou didst not perish truly;
For every day thy deed and fearless death speak newly
To thine, and unto many another land.

277

XVI

This is thy crown of glory and title of remembrance:
That when the Empire's might and its black-eagle-semblance
And all its chains and bars
On one side were arrayed, and on the lonely other
Thou,—thou didst win:—along with Liberty thy brother,
And all thy clear-eyed sister-hosts the stars.

April, 1883.

The fact that, when in prison under sentence of death, Sophia Perovskaia wrote to her mother asking that some clean collars and cuffs might be sent to her, is a touching comment upon this statement.

278

GELIABOFF.

Geliaboff, who was loved by Sophia Perovskaia, had, as it happened, taken no direct part in the murder of the Czar on March 13, 1882. But he was arrested, and he and Sophia Perovskaia were executed on the same day.

I

Here is a bridal bower! Here is a marriage-chamber!
Hung not with tinted silk, or bright pure cloth of amber:
The deadly black
Scaffold is all that these will know of bower of roses;
Now for the man and maid their earthly journey closes,
And lo! what blood-hounds bay around their track.

II

Only the red strange flowers of Revolution's garden
For these, who having sinned beyond all mortal pardon
And slain the Czar

279

Must pass, not uncontent, into the viewless region
Where every light goes out, save only perhaps the legion
Of God's lamps,—moon on moon and star on star.

III

O strange embrace for these and enigmatic bridal!
Never to meet in love, save only when the tidal
Great streams of human gore
From governmental swords and their own knives were running
And Revolution's waves all human ears were stunning
With their dull deadly desperate ravening roar.

IV

Never to meet in love in joyous green-leafed places!
Never to hope for love and common sweet embraces
That all souls hope to win!

280

To have vowed their lives to crime as to a sacramental
Great task,—the lover strong, and she the Russian gentle
And high-born woman, red to the eyes with sin!

V

Stained with all deadliest sin—if this be sin, the plotting
How, when a native land lies helpless, bound, and rotting
In slavery grim,
And when a despot holds the keys of every prison,
To bring to prisoned eyes fair Freedom's sunny vision
Even, if it need be, through the death of him.

VI

If this be sin,—to hold that one man's life is little,
A thread most thin indeed, and frail of make, and brittle,
Though he be the Czar,

281

Compared with ceaseless lives that wear away in bondage,
Lives multitudinous as the blood-red autumn frondage,
Who surge in pain and beckon from afar.

VII

If this be sin,—to meet the Terror White with savage
Response o'the Terror Red; the swords that slay and ravage
With keener swords that slay;—
To oppose to headstrong brain of one besotted Ruler
Brains forceful as his own,—as resolute but cooler;
To meet white foam-tides with red tidal spray.

VIII

If this be sin,—to cast one's life and all one's being
On one side in the scale, and then with deep sigh seeing
That for one's country's sake

282

These have to go, to choose without a moment's murmur
The sacrificial part, with brow and stern lips firmer
Than God's old martyrs at the fiery stake.

IX

And have ye passed away for ever from us gazing
Far into heaven in vain, O hearts and souls amazing,
O spirits strong,
Who lived and died pursuing a grand mistake (it may be),
Yet died for Russia's sake? While morn and night and day be,
Your names shall live in Russia's love and song.

X

Have ye beyond the grave, though black your bridal carriage
And black your bridal wreaths, in love's eternal marriage
Been joined indeed?

283

Lover, hast thou now heard beyond all death the laughter
Of her who sought with thee the perilous hereafter,
With love and freedom—nought else—for a creed?

XI

Though dark mistakes be there, and doubt and complication,
Yet for the people indeed, for the vast iron-bound nation,
This man and woman fell:
For Freedom's sake their dream (though it were mad) they cherished,
And for the oppressed and poor without a groan they perished,
First having faced the glittering ranks of hell.

XII

God is on their side; God, and Love, and all the ringing
Of free and spotless waves beneath the morning singing;
God present in these things.

284

Yea, when they fell, the sky was darkened as with tender
Heart-yearning. Round them falls the omnipresent splendour
Of Liberty's large sunset-tinctured wings.

XIII

Over the bodies of these the Imperial Army trampled.
Yet have they left behind a token unexampled:
Their dead lips say,
“For Russia's sake we left the safe sweet paths of pleasure:
If we were wrong God knows, and knows that past all measure
We loved,—past love of lips that praise and pray.

XIV

“We did a cruel deed? Yes: cruel it was then; granted.
But who the bitter seeds of cruelty first planted
In either breast?

285

Who made with iron black immeasurable oppression
Our deep-stung souls revolt and surge past retrogression?
Who forced us forth upon the blood-stained quest?

XV

“Who made the love of country one thing with conspiring,
And love of our own race the same thing with desiring
To die that it might live?
Who made all glad thoughts fade and dark thoughts only attend us,
So that our swords alone we trusted to defend us
When all defences else were fugitive?

XVI

“Who made our spirits bleed for friends and neighbours scattered
Over the ice-bound steppes,—himself adored and flattered

286

By a cringing Court the while?
If him we have slain, we have slain the mystic incarnation
Of Tyranny that crushed the chained and helpless nation
And froze all laughter with its deadly smile.”

May, 1883.

287

IRELAND TO ENGLAND.

I

Thou hast set free the slaves o' the world! With pride thou boastest
That Freedom follows upon thy keels where'er thou coastest:
The strength o' the seas is thine.
The free wind whistles through thy copses that front sea-ward,
And yet the clank of chains thou hearest, looking meward,
And not thy wild wind's voice in fir and pine.

288

II

Thy slaves are free, and yet thy dark-haired grey-eyed sister
Thou, blue-eyed, golden-haired, though oft thy lips have kissed her
In sister-seeming wise—
Thou guardest as in prison. Each low-browed common varlet
Of thine hath now the right, if he be clothed in scarlet,
To stare his brutal coarse soul down her eyes.

III

Her thou hast yielded up, by thy true mood forsaken.
At any corner of street her shoulder may be shaken
By rough and menial hands.
She, once so fair, is now downstricken of heart and bloomless:
Her fields of corn and grass are sheenless and flower-plumeless:
She, once the fairest, now is least of lands.

289

IV

Her mountain-streams run red. In green she used to garb her:
But now her soft green fields and sun-bright mountains harbour
But two wild bands indeed,
Pursuers and pursued,—the hunters and the hunted.
She dares not raise her brow: it shines so crimson-fronted.
England has bled. But does not Ireland bleed?

V

Gifts thou hast given. And yet the gift of all gifts never.
Give her her own green fields for ever and for ever!
Give, with no grudging hand!
Now thou hast traversed all the earth, and all dark places
Hast lightened somewhat, pour some light on Irish faces.
Turn from the ends of the earth to thine own land.

290

VI

Turn from the China seas and Japanese strange waters:
Turn from the task of freeing far India's dusky daughters:
Turn homeward, now at length.
Give unto us the thing that we through wild years long for;
The gift that now at last our hearts and hands are strong for;
Give,—if it be but token of thy strength.

VII

By all thine English hills and every English river,—
By the far fields of fight wherein with shock and shiver
Thy sword and lance have met
The sword and lance of far slave-holding state and city,—
Let now thy soul, near home, be roused to love and pity.—
Thou hast done great deeds. Do one deed greater yet.

291

VIII

Do one deed greater yet than all thy history showeth,
Though this with strong great deeds brims o'er and over-floweth.
Give liberty to me.—
Our creeds are not the same in outward passing semblance:
Yet are we both fair lands in God's most high remembrance,
And circled, both, by God's vast slaveless sea.

IX

Thou hast stricken off the chains of nation after nation:
Thy bayonets fill far lands with hope and exultation;
They fill our homes with woe.
Bulgarian hands to thee stretch out in prayer and find thee:
Greece seeks thee not in vain. O England, look behind thee!
How far afield thy love and succour go!

292

X

Thou hearest if a serf in Russia groans in bondage.
Or if in Poland blood dyes pavement or wet frondage
Thou startest up fierce-eyed.
Yet blood for years has poured upon our hills and meadows:
Groans fill the morning air, and fill the evening shadows.
Thou listenest; then dost lightly turn aside.

XI

Thou art upon the road to Ind or Madagascar.
Thou hast heard the cry of some poor tortured dark-skinned lascar.
To Borneo thou art bound.
Thou hast a Burmese war on hand: or Boers, it may be,
Must be set free—(In God's great true name, why should they be,—
While still our coupling-irons strike the ground?)

293

XII

Thou hast within thy House of free debate to settle
Whether thine arms shall test the Zulus' warlike mettle,
Or try the Afghans' steel.
Thou hast to pass a bill to guard the gulls and widgeons,
Or to protect the poor blood-stained ill-treated pigeons.—
Thou hast no time to give to our appeal.

XIII

Then when in wild despair we strike, not knowing whither
Our random blows may fall, thou sendest armed men hither
As if to possess the land.
Thou lookest in my eyes. Yes: they are blood-shot truly.
Thou lookest at my robe. Yes: it is blood-stained newly.
Yes: drops of English blood run down my hand.

294

XIV

Yes.—Then thou draggest away whole hosts of men to prison.
Next lo! in town and town the black trees have arisen,
An evil growth by night.
Blood still cries out for blood, and slaughter leads to slaughter.
Injustice is the sire, and murder is the daughter;
She with the crimson hand, and face quite white.

XV

So it goes on, and will, till thou at length beholdest
The inner truth of things, and thine own flag unfoldest
Above the Irish walls.
For thine is Freedom's flag: but that black deadly other
Grim flag to us thou givest that telleth that another
Blood-stained misjudged misjudging patriot falls.

295

XVI

Of all the world's strange things it will be deemed hereafter
Most strange, that English hearts with ring of martial laughter
Fought all the world around
For Freedom's sake,—yet fought at home still more to enslave her
Their sister, when they should have given their souls to save her:
Freed dark arms,—left their white-armed sister bound.

XVII

Scotland!—Yes: she was free—the land of rock and thistle.
But thou hast trained her sons to follow at thy whistle:
We are not such as they.
A race is ever a race. A nation is a nation.
No power on earth can join in close amalgamation
Two differing races; for one must obey.

296

XVIII

Try plan on novel plan: expedient on expedient.
Still one must conqueror be; the other race obedient;—
Keen swords must threaten or kill.
All schemes have but one end. Oh, make an end of scheming!
Lo! Ireland waits to be twofold in outward seeming,
Then for the first time one in heart and will.

XIX

We have fought side by side. The Irish legions stood thee
In right good stead full oft. Their wild-pulsed strength renewed thee
Fainting at Waterloo.
And on Crimean hills they shed their life-blood willing.
No French or Russian hand our heart's-blood now is spilling:
This was reserved for English hands to do.

297

XX

We wait, and in the end shall triumph. But we sorrow
That the great priceless boon might be conferred to-morrow,
Yet blood on blood must flow
(It seems) ere thou canst wake to see that gifts but madden,
Make bad things worse, enrage and grieve and sting and sadden,
When with the gifts the bullet-cases go.

XXI

Thou art not strong but weak, while we are weak. Thine island
Needs guards and watchers now in city, in wood, on highland,
Lest red deeds spring to light.
Strike off our chains and thou wilt strike a thousand fetters
From thine own limbs as well, and write in golden letters
Thy name upon our hearts renewed and bright.

298

XXII

Our weakness is thine own. Our strength will be thy glory.
Lo! while our arms are red, England, thine own are gory,
And while our weapons shine
Thine dare not seek their sheath. For thine own sake deliver!
When women's laughter rings by Irish lake and river
Fearless, thou wilt be free, proud sister mine!

March, 1883.

299

SONNET XX. “IT IS GOD WE NEED.”

Thou needest God.—Yes, he can conquer death
For thee, and open the eternal gates.
For more than man's love thy sweet spirit waits
And for far more than the one small rose-wreath
That love can give thee. When love's mortal breath
Flags, thou dost need the breath that renovates
The laughing flowers when night's cold dark abates
And when the linnet sings upon the heath.

Yes, woman needeth God. I know it well.
Because I know that I have not the whole
Eternal force to satisfy thy soul
I love thee more than I can ever tell.—
Woman needs man. Man needeth her. And each
Needs God's heart,—smiling ever out of reach.

327

SONNET XXI. “AND YET WE STRETCH OUR ARMS OUT TO THE HUMAN.”

And yet we seek the human.—When we tire
Of God's great loving limitless embrace
And of the features of the endless face,—
Yea, when we weary of his passion-fire
And of his stern implacable desire,
We turn with longing to some grassy place
On earth, and 'mid the lilies for a space
We rest, and listen to the earth's old lyre.

The human love is very very sweet,
And there are seasons when the highest rhyme
Of kingliest stars would strike as less sublime
Than love-songs sung where the brown waters meet
On earth, or where rose-tendrils cling and climb.—
When God fails, listen for Love's human feet.

328

THE DEEP LOVE.

One has to count the cost.—One cannot win love's sweetness—
One cannot grasp fair love in absolute completeness
Without the pain as well.
The sweetest flowers are those which grow not on the mountains
But at the solemn edge, and sprinkled by the fountains,
Of pain's dim red unfathomable hell.

Oh, not the common love is sweetest, but the passion
Which bindeth soul to soul in mystic sacred fashion
In spite of adverse things.
Without pursuit could love exult in priceless capture?
No soul can know love's deep immeasurable rapture
And yet forego the pain the deep love brings.

Feb. 25, 1884.

330

SONNET. CHRIST'S ETERNAL POETHOOD.

The Church that made the poet into God
Stole his eternal Poethood from him,
And lo! his eyes of genius waxèd dim
And flowerless grew the plains his God's foot trod.
The batlike blind Church limped along the road
He took, and changed to its own image grim
The Eastern poet; swathed his every limb
With stifling robes, and bound the eyes that glowed.

But now the eyes are gleaming forth again:
The robes are falling, and his limbs are free:
He standeth forth, a soul without a stain,
And through his eyes love's light unchangeably
Smiles on the men who for his sake are slain
To-day by Churches asking “Where is he?”

Jan. 13, 1884.

333

AUTUMN VOICES:

SONNETS AND LYRICS.

(1883.)

335

I. THE LATER LOVE.

Yes: first love was most sweet. But, fourteen long years nearer
To death (and God?), one sees all things with vision clearer
And larger is the might
Of love that gathers force from all the years receding
And glances back and back along the roadway bleeding,
Till thoughts of past pains fill its eyes with light.

So, greater is the love that God and death watch over
Now, than the love that wings of meadow-sweet and clover
Guarded in early days.

336

And grander is the scent of salt waves large and leaping
Than scent of the old pines in mountain-meadows sleeping
Under the suns of youth, and their warm rays.

The whole soul gathers force, and all the force it gathers
Adds to the might of love, and strong love ever fathers
Stronger delight and glee:
Even as the laughing might of the blue-bubbling river
Is nought beside the jests whose strong wings flash and quiver
Over the surface of the windy sea.

First love is very sweet. But later love is sweeter:
For the near face of death adds sweetness to the metre
In which the last love sings.
Sweet is the touch of love when life is all before us,
But sweeter is love's touch when round about and o'er us
Rustle the untouched and immortal wings.

Sept.. 17, 1883.

337

II. THE ETERNAL BOYHOOD.

This I would do, start fresh with thee,—through sweet France dreaming,
Or marking wealth of blue or purple night-time gleaming
In fragrant Italy.
Start fresh—quite fresh,—I could; and watch the moonlight chasing
The sea-bird's pure white wings with laughter and love amazing
Across new azure leagues of Southern sea.

338

Yes: I could be a boy again.—I could to-morrow
Banish all thoughts of old and sombre-hearted sorrow
And enter life anew.
Wonder at all the skies, as if the ethereal azure
Never, not once before, gave eyes and spirit pleasure:
Marvel, as if new-born, at ocean's blue.

I could start quite afresh,—young, passionate, boy-hearted.
God gave the poets youth for ever when he parted,
Weary, with all his own.
And when God tired of love, he gave the poets power
To enter love's bright fields, and gather love's white flower,
With all the force that from himself had flown.

So I could be quite young. The poppies in the meadows;
The tender flower of blue that 'mid the cornstalks' shadows
Rests, and it shines between;

339

The iris in the pond; the water-flags, and follies
Of the blue-capped titmice amid the yews and hollies;
The dusky pinewoods' depths of darkening green;

The splendour of the sky; the wonder of great cities;
The glory of the moon that soars above and pities
The town's dim smoky roar;
The summer waves that plash upon the shingly gravel;
The wintry white large waves whose threatening swift crests travel
Out from wild ocean to the trembling shore;

The robin on the rail with plaintive soft note piping;
The crimson bars of cloud the lilac background striping
When sunset gilds the air:—
All this could be as new to me as when God saw it
For the first time, without one human pang to flaw it,
When first creation shone supremely fair.

340

For the whole world is ever virgin to the poet.
The thinker's brain he brings,—but the boy's heart to know it;
The youth's heart to adore:—
Sweet as first love to him the world for ever gleameth,
And in her deep sweet eyes his answering deep heart dreameth,
Full of wild worship,—yes, for evermore.

341

IX. THE SOUL-GAME.

This is the game that thrills the giant veins
Of God himself with most impassioned life:
Soul against soul to balance in wild strife;
Heart against heart. No battling warrior gains
So fierce a sense of joy as he who drains
In the soul-struggle large and sweet and long
The cup of passion and the cup of song;
Then loosens for the charge his bridle-reins.

Command an army? Yes: the joy is large.
But far more terrible and far more deep
The joy of feeling stern against one's targe
A woman's pitiless soul-arrows leap;
The joy of holding 'mid the thunderous charge
Of passion the soul's battlemented keep.

351

XII. THE SWEETEST LOVE.

Yes: marriage-love is sweet. But sweeter far
The love that perfect Freedom crowns and brings:
The love that underneath the midnight sings
And weaves through sorrow's dark locks star on star.
The love that though the whole world rose to bar
Its kingly road would sweep with fiery wings
Far from its path all fierce opposing things
And seek the regions where the great souls are.

O holiest love of all!—the love that links
Two souls in one for very love's own sake.
The love that not time's jarring thunders shake:
The love that at heaven's clearest sweet fount drinks:
The love that loves till every thought else sinks:
The love that bends not, though the heart may break.

354

XXII. AT LAST.

I heard a voice that said: “The time has come.
Let the whole line of bayonet-points advance”.—
I looked around the field with one last glance,
And saw once more a blackberry-hedge in bloom.
And then through curdled smoke and powdery gloom
I saw the quick fires round the cannons dance,
And saw wild pennons wave from many a lance,
And saw strange helmets flash and mad steeds loom.

I drew my sword ere that great final sound
“Let the whole line advance” had fully past,
Tightened my sword-belt, and drew in my breath.
Then as the red line with a giant bound
Plunged after me, my whole soul laughed at last.—
And this was life supreme,—and this was death.

Dec. 30, 1883.

366

SONNET. CHRIST'S LOVE.

Did Christ love many women? Yes. But he
Not only with strong sweet lips held them fast,
But with his soul he loved them to the last
And with the incarnate pulse of Deity.
The spirit of love in him was like a sea,
Immutable, eternal, wondrous, vast:
Yet when the wave of passionate joy was past,
His love throbbed onward through eternity.

Christ never lost a love.—He held his own
Safe though the winds of dark time round them rang.
No woman whose glad mouth with passion sang,
Touched by his mouth, her Master did disown.
Through Peter came the treacherous deadly pang:
The love of woman made Christ's cross a throne.

March 7, 1884.

367

A VISION OF THE DEAD.

I

Through all my former life as in a dream
I passed.—I saw the Dover cliffs again,
Where the bright “clouded yellows” used to gleam
And “azure blues” in many a leafy lane.
Yet o'er the cliffs when sunset grim and red
Flamed, I beheld the faces of the dead.

II

Keswick I tried. The birch and oak were there;
And blue and tranquil Derwentwater shone:
O'er the high hills the floating clouds were fair;

368

The moon hung o'er the green glens, sweet and wan.
Yet when the golden day had waned and fled,
There also I was haunted by the dead.

III

I went to Paris. The dear city white
Was beautiful as ever: by the Seine
I wandered, when the sacred starlit night
Folded the city in soft peace again.
But here too fluttered round about my head
Dim pinions of the innumerable dead.

IV

Nor only my dead. O'er the river wide
I seemed a silent breathless host to see:
They swept with awful starry gaze, flame-eyed,
Around, above, on every side of me.
I heard a voice that from the blue air said,
“Behold! each live soul hath an host of dead”.

369

V

And through the host one pale majestic face,
Crowned like a leader of all men, I saw.
A ghostly army at his heels did race:
He and his phantom-soldiers smote with awe
My spirit:—a gigantic host he led,
And yet each warrior of the host was dead.

VI

Dim bearskins I could see, and helmets bright
Over the Seine: and he amid them all
Shone with that clear-cut face so deadly-white,—
He led the old Guard now without bugle-call.
O'er Paris he and they, an army dread,
Floated: Napoleon and Napoleon's dead.

VII

I sought Geneva. Blue and clear the lake
Gleamed, and afar Mont Blanc was touched to rose:

370

Still doth the sunsets' fire the mountains take,
Breaking their sombre measureless repose.
Then all grew dark and darker,—and instead
Of stars I saw the star-eyes of the dead.

VIII

I sought Lausanne: and round about the place
Still the old orchards full of quiet charm;
Still mountain streamlets run their foaming race,
And still the mountains fold with dusky arm
The glittering water. From each orchard-shed
A grey ghost peeped: some well-loved friend long dead.

IX

And then to England my sad spirit came,
To Whitby: and the old white waves were there,
And blue far waters, and the sun's fierce flame,

371

And ferns and green woods,—and a woman fair.
Sweeter than words the scent her loose locks shed!
And yet here too I communed with the dead.

X

I went to Oxford. Still the fields were green,
And still the yellow marigold most bright
Clustered along the frequent dykes was seen,
And still the Isis laughed with ripples light.
But ah, the old days! For ever each had sped.
Old days, old faces . . . all my friends were dead.

XI

Again I saw the green rough Cornish waves
Pour giant masses on the rocky shore;
Still in the hollow cliff-side granite caves
The maiden-hair lurks hidden as of yore:
The brown streams as of old the moorland fed.
Yes. But here too I met the cloud of dead.

372

XII

I sought the streets of Edinburgh. There
Frowned the old castle; all was still the same:
Still the same mountains,—mossy rocks and bare:
Towards Holyrood one quiet night I came,
When lo! the august inevitable tread
About my path of legions of pale dead.

XIII

And midmost these shone Mary, with the eyes
That held the hearts of lovers magic-bound:
And after her through haunted heights of skies
Swept hosts of followers, gliding without sound
Along the airs,—and in their looks I read
That these were shadows, shadows of the dead.

XIV

Darnley was there and Bothwell: Chastelard,
And pallid Rizzio; and a thousand more.

373

The guarded gates of Holyrood were barred,
Yet through the gates their grisly hosts did pour.
The sentry's living eyes were dull as lead:
He saw not Mary; no, nor Mary's dead.

XV

Next Balcombe. Quiet undergrowth of firs,
And yellow sunsets, and the smell of pines,
And purple heather on the green hill-spurs,
And red fruit of the withering eglantines.
Yes, all was as of old. Yet my heart bled.
Here too I heard soft whispers of the dead.

XVI

Then London. There I wait:—till I too pass
Beyond all flowers and songs to that dim room
Where never summer scent of rose or grass

374

Mingles with the dull omnipresent gloom;
Till I too join with sombre wings outspread,
Their last recruit, the army of the dead.

April, 1882.

376

LOVE-LYRICS.

(1884.)

377

I. AFTER LONG MONTHS.

Straight from the dark of months thy sweet eyes shone upon me
And shed the light of suns and light of old stars on me
And light of their own flame:—
And from them all the sense of Spring-tide crocus-hearted
Along my weary soul, swift, on a sudden, darted;
And with thy voice the lark's new love-song came.

Thou wast the spirit of Spring.—The sense of grassy meadows
And merry leaves that dance and balmier twilight shadows
Was born along with thee.

378

All blossoms are not dead,—for thou art living, lady!
So once again the sun will through the foliage shady
Strike his long arrows, lighting flower and tree.

Thou art alive. By this I know that Spring will follow:
Now hyacinths will bloom, and hill and copse and hollow
Will gleam with fiery gold.
The silent heart of Spring that for thy mandate waited
Will break to flower at last—Spring tortured and belated,
Hiding his ferns and flowers in fold on fold.

Thou hast the spirit of Spring and Summer's heart within thee:
And who would love and hold, and worship thee, and win thee,
Must meet the Spring's own eyes
Fearless, and Summer's eyes,—and laugh for very pleasure
When the bright fields spread out their limitless gold treasure
Beneath the cloudless smile of stormless skies.

379

I know that Winter now has passed away before thee.
The very heart of May will worship and adore thee
And kiss thine hands ere long.—
The heart of all the world will come with love and gladness,
And silver streams will seek with silver-voiced sweet madness
To catch the echo of thy pure heart's song.

And once again I lift the lyre the cold had frozen,
And laugh to think how soon of all flowers thou the chosen
Wilt put the flowers to scorn.
When thou dost call on Spring, he wakes and follows after:
In thine I hear the ring of very June's own laughter:
Thine eyes are lovelier than a summer morn.

380

II. “THY FACE.”

Among the weary crowd of weary common faces
I linger,—and I search through flowerless dreary places,
Seeking amid the throng
One vision worth a thought. Pale Death and Sorrow meet me:
Death sues me for a wreath, and Sorrow doth entreat me
To crown her wild-haired forehead with a song.

Then I take up mine harp, and sing of Death and Sorrow,—
Of how the sweetest things are saddest things to-morrow;
How pain fills every place;

381

How woe has set its hand upon our city's features;
How agony is grooved on brows of human creatures;—
Then on a sudden, lady, lo! thy face.

Then Death and Sorrow fade, and Pain smooths out before thee
Its wrinkled brow. The sun seems ever to cast o'er thee
Strange sunlight's ceaseless charm.
Greece rises at thy glance; and Youth and Beauty linger
Beside thee just to kiss one hand or one white finger,
And Life's young red lips kiss thy rounded arm.—

I wander through the crowd. I wander gloomy-hearted.
Then just as if the sun had on a sudden parted
Dense leaves that interlace
And smiled with gracious eyes adown the leafy narrows,
I weary with the points of daily pain's mute arrows
Turn round,—and on a sudden, lo! thy face.

382

III. “BEYOND.”

I am so old.—But thou hast stolen from Spring the power
Whereby he clothes in robes of leaf and bud and flower
Each new year without fail.
Not even Death, I think, could meet thee and not tremble:
Yea, surely he would turn, and sorrow and dissemble:
At sight of thy flushed cheek his hand would quail.

It seems to me that thou hast endless life within thee;
That never heart of man, nor poet's heart, must win thee,
But souls of flowers and seas:

383

The living voice of Spring within the woods and mountains:
The laughter of the morn in rivers and in fountains:
The deathless love-song of the thornless breeze:

These are thine own.—But I,—what can I bring but sadness?
Thou gazest at the plain with young heart full of gladness,
The plain so bright with flowers:
I see beyond the plain the solemn mountains rising
Height beyond awful height, with tiers and shelfs surprising
And snow-capped vast indomitable towers.

Life's joys are all thine own.—Thou gazest at the sunlight:
And I with only love for sunshine and for one light
Gaze at thee, rapt and fond.
Yet ever is it true that thou art gazing only
At the broad flowerful plain,—while I with vision lonely
(So lonely!) mark the unscaled rocks beyond.

384

IV. “NEVER TIRED?”

And art thou never tired of poems, and of singing?—
“Nay! not more tired than Spring of merry bright birds winging
Along the woods their way.
A woman never tires of love, so it be endless:
The summer, full of flowers, would feel forlorn and friendless
With one flower less on one acacia spray!

“A woman never tires of love, so it be tireless:
A woman never tires till passion's soul be fireless
And song's heart void of flame.

385

What, do my eyes not speak? Then must my lips make plainer
That Song is ever sweet, a gentle-eyed retainer
Who follows on the path where Love's feet came?

“Sing on; and sing of me. Are still my eyes a wonder?
Sing till the hushed birds part the leafy boughs in sunder
To listen to thy song.
A woman's gentle soul of love is never weary:
Lo! lover, how the dark with songless hand and dreary
Will seek to claim me for its own ere long!

“Sing, ere the night be here.”—Song woke at her sweet warning,
And with the heart of birds and with the wings of morning
Stormed through the sunlit skies:—
For song can never cease, while dark and pure and tender,
Full of the soul of love, and full of light and splendour,
Shine ever through song's heart her unchanged eyes.

386

V. IN THE LATER DAYS.

So many poets lived, and died, and never found thee!—
How countless are the hearts whose loving song had crowned thee
Had they but seen thy face!—
Now in the later days, when doubt and sorrow darken,
And when to whispers strange the pain-crowned poets hearken,
For one Time has reserved a nobler place.

In these the later days, when through the wild world ringing
With shock and clash of strife strange sound of fiery singing
Eddies, swift wave on wave;

387

In these the later days, when some are chanting only
The soul of man laid waste, and passion's heart left lonely,—
While some sing love-songs to the wan-lipped grave;

In these the later days, when kings and thrones are falling
And when across the waves the fierce storm-birds are calling
And answering, one by one;
When Revolution's tides are foaming down upon us;
When the high mountains shake and temples totter on us
And tempests threaten God and mock the sun;

In these wild later days, when all is dark and boding;
When deadly thoughts are hurled like deadliest shells exploding
On pale belief and creed;
Strong help and high delight it is to hold a treasure
Untouched by all the storm—a gift that none may measure—
A task to which none other may succeed.

388

Through all the storms I hear thy gentle soft voice calling:
Amid the fiery rain of storm-bolts round us falling
I listen for thy tread:
Thou wouldst remain unchanged though all the world around thee
Fell at the trump of doom. The Love whose strong hand crowned thee
Would hold thee scatheless though the world lay dead.

Great help and pure delight it is to worship theeward:—
Like turning heart and glance no longer foamward, seaward,
But up some valley-glen
Full of gold gorse and grass and gentle pink-belled heather,
Full of the sense of sun and windless summer weather,—
Then, strengthened, meeting the grey waves again.

Such is the peace thou bring'st.—In this wild stormy season,
Full of the sound of strife and hints of wrath and treason,
It is most glad and sweet

389

To have on me bestowed the priceless charge to sing thee,
To love thee and to crown,—to worship thee and bring thee
Flowers gathered from betwixt the warriors' feet.

Keats, Shelley, Marlowe,—These would, each, have perished, willing,
If only through their hearts thy voice had once gone, thrilling
Those fiery hearts to praise.
They lived and sang and died, yet never never knew thee!
Their swift song followed not, nor might their love pursue thee:
They died, and, dying, panted for thy gaze.