Underneath the Bough :: :: University of Virginia Library

“A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread, and thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness.
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!”

[Mortal, if thou art beloved]

Mortal, if thou art beloved,
Life's offences are removed:
All the fateful things that checkt thee,
Hearten, hallow, and protect thee.
Grow'st thou mellow? What is age?
Tinct on life's illumined page,
Where the purple letters glow
Deeper, painted long ago.
What is sorrow? Comfort's prime,
Love's choice Indian summer-clime.
Sickness? Thou wilt pray it worse
For so blessed, balmy nurse.
And for death? When thou art dying
'Twill be love beside thee lying.
Death is lonesome? Oh, how brave
Shows the foot-frequented grave!
Heaven itself is but the casket
For Love's treasure, ere he ask it,
Ere with burning heart he follow,
Piercing through corruption's hollow.
If thou art beloved, oh then
Fear no grief of mortal men!

[Once, his feet among the roses]

Once, his feet among the roses,
When the roses were all white,
Eros wreathed the faint, wan posies
Round Zeus' goblet; but, ere sipping,
'Mid the buds his ankle tripping,
Lavished half the vintage bright
On the roses, that, fresh-dripping,
Flushed the cup for heaven's lipping;
And the god's eyes felt delight
That the roses were not white.

But the sweetest of the roses,
By that fiery rain unfed,
Coyly still her bosom closes,
Still the crimson vesture misses;
Pale 'mid all the purple this is.
Love, thy burning wine-drops shed!
When her blushes make my blisses,
Glowing answer to my kisses,
In thy triumph be it said
That the roses are all red.

[Let us wreathe the mighty cup]

Let us wreathe the mighty cup,
Then with song we'll lift it up,
And, before we drain the glow
Of the juice that foams below
Flowers and cool leaves round the brim,
Let us swell the praise of him
Who is tyrant of the heart,
Cupid with his flaming dart!

Pride before his face is bowed,
Strength and heedless beauty cowed;
Underneath his fatal wings
Bend discrowned the heads of kings;
Maidens blanch beneath his eye
And its laughing mastery;
Through each land his arrows sound,
By his fetters all are bound.

[O wind, thou hast thy kingdom in the trees]

O wind, thou hast thy kingdom in the trees,
And all thy royalties
Sweep through the land to-day.
It is mid June,
And thou, with all thine instruments in tune,
Thine orchestra
Of heaving fields, and heavy, swinging fir,
Strikest a lay
That doth rehearse
Her ancient freedom to the universe.
All other sound in awe
Repeals its law;
The bird is mute, the sea
Sucks up its waves, from rain
The burthened clouds refrain,
To listen to thee in thy leafery,
Thou unconfined,
Lavish, large, soothing, refluent summer-wind.

[Death, men say, is like a sea]

Death, men say, is like a sea
That engulfs mortality,
Treacherous, dreadful, blindingly
Full of storm and terror.

Death is like the deep, warm sand
Pleasant when we come to land,
Covering up with tender hand
The wave's drifted error.

Life's a tortured, booming gurge
Winds of passion strike and urge,
And transmute to broken surge
Foam-crests of ambition.

Death's a couch of golden ground,
Warm, soft, permeable mound,
Where from even memory's sound
We shall have remission.

[Sometimes I do despatch my heart]

Sometimes I do despatch my heart
Among the graves to dwell apart:
On some the tablets are erased,
Some earthquake-tumbled, some defaced,
And some that have forgotten lain
A fall of tears makes green again;
And my brave heart can overtread
Her brood of hopes, her infant dead,
And pass with quickened footsteps by
The headstone of hoar memory,
Till she hath found
One swelling mound
With just her name writ and beloved;
From that she cannot be removed.

[Ah, Eros does not always smite]

Ah, Eros does not always smite
With cruel, shining dart,
Whose bitter point with sudden might
Rends the unhappy heart—
Not thus forever purple-stained,
And sore with steely touch,
Else were its living fountain drained
Too oft and overmuch.
O'er it sometimes the boy will deign
Sweep the shaft's feathered end;
And friendship rises without pain
Where the white plumes descend.

[Down the forest-path I fled]

Down the forest-path I fled,
And followed a buzzing bee,
Till he clomb a foxglove red.
He filled full the nodding cup;
I stood and I laughed to see;
Then closed it and shut him up,
Till I laughed and set him free.

[I dance and dance! Another faun]

I dance and dance! Another faun,
A black one, dances on the lawn.
He moves with me, and when I lift
My heels his feet directly shift:
I can't outdance him though I try;
He dances nimbler than I.
I toss my head, and so does he;
What tricks he dares to play on me!
I touch the ivy in my hair;
Ivy he has and finger there.
The spiteful thing to mock me so!
I will outdance him! Ho, ho, ho!

[In the moony brake]

In the moony brake,
When we laugh and wake,
And our dance begins,
Violets hang their chins,
Fast asleep;
While we laugh and leap.

Woodbine leaves above,
Each a tiny dove,
Roost upon the bare
Winter stems, and there
Peaceful cling;
While we shout and sing.

On the rooty earth
Ferns of April's birth,
Brown and closely furled,
Sleep like squirrels curled
Warm and still;
While we frisk our fill.

Hark! our ears have caught
Sound of breath and snort
Near our beechen tree
Mixing carelessly.
Sprites, away!
Fly as if 'twere day!

Silence! on the ground
Set the toadstool round.
Of these mortals twain
We to talk will deign,
Grave and wise,
Till the morning rise.

[Say, if a gallant rose my bower doth scale]

Say, if a gallant rose my bower doth scale
Higher and higher,
And, tho' she twine the other side the pale,
Toward me doth sigh her
Perfume, her damask mouth—
Roses will love the south—
Can I deny her?

I have a lady loves me in despite
Of bonds that tie her,
And bid her honest Corin's flame requite;
When I espy her,
Kisses are near their birth—
Love cannot live in dearth—
Say, shall I fly her?

[Through hazels and apples]

Through hazels and apples
My love I led,
Where the sunshine dapples
The strawberry-bed:
Did we pluck and eat
That morn, my sweet?

And back by the alley
Our path I chose,
That we might dally
By one rare rose:
Did we smell at the heart,
And then depart?

A lover, who grapples
With love, doth live
Where roses and apples
Have naught to give:
Did I take my way
Unfed that day?

[Who hath ever given]

Who hath ever given
Cupid's head white hair,
Or hath put our roses
Under the snow's care?
If such a fool there be
We'll cry, Come all and see!

[The devil is a sinner]

The devil is a sinner,
Ha, la, la—la!
But none can hit him fair;
For who would be the winner,
Fa, la, la—la!
Ay, who would be the winner,
When the devil does not care?

[My lady has a lovely rite]

My lady has a lovely rite:
When I am gone
No prayer she saith
As one in fear:
For orison,
Pressing her pillow white
With kisses, just the sacred number,
She turns to slumber;
Adding sometimes thereto a tear
And a quick breath.

KING APOLLO

When my lady sleeping lies,
Her sweet breaths her lips unbar;
This when King Apollo spies,
With dream footfall, not to mar
The dear sleep,
Through the rosy doors ajar
He with golden thoughts doth creep.

[In winter sere]

In winter sere,
We little men o' the hill
No longer duck and peer
Up holy daffodil,
Nor suck the egg
That the cuckoo lays,
Nor the angry leg
Of the chafer wring
Till the gray-pate sing
With his stiff amaze:
No, no, no, no!
To keep ourselves warm in row
We run—ta, la, la, lo!

A valley's end
Is steep and flat at the top,
No pathways there may wend
Across the sweet-fern crop,

As dead as straw;
At the sign-post wry
All the winds see-saw,
And with chilly feet
We little ones meet
On the rim of sky.
We start, stay, go,
And down to the pool below
We run—ta, la, la, lo!

[Where winds abound]

Where winds abound,
And fields are hilly,
Shy daffadilly
Looks down on the ground.

Rose cones of larch
Are just beginning;
Though oaks are spinning
No oak-leaves in March.

Spring's at the core,
The boughs are sappy:
Good to be happy
So long, long before!

[I by spells had been beguiled]

I by spells had been beguiled
To a marish country wild,
Where a lonely-hearted child
Crossed me; and I felt she knew
All the way she wandered through,
Though the reeds around her blew,
And the dusk was in her rear,
As I watched her disappear
'Mid the flitting umbrage drear.

[If the sun our white headlands with flame]

If the sun our white headlands with flame
Failed to greet,
Should we deem he would shroud them in shame?
Nay, blot
The sweet
Daylight not;
Heaven forgot.

If soft spring failed the flowers name by name
To entreat,
Should we fear she would harden earth's frame?
Her hot
Breath sweet
Bloweth not;
She forgot.

From my love if no gay token came,
Were it meet
To think she had slighted love's claim?

A knot
So sweet
Snappeth not;
She forgot.

If a land full of memories and fame
At the feet
Of a tyrant bowed down, should we blame?
A spot
So sweet
Sinneth not;
It forgot.

[When I grow old]

When I grow old,
I would be bold
To ask of heaven this boon:
Like the thin-circled and translucent moon,
That makes intrusion
Unnoted on the morning sky,
And with soft eye
Watches the thousand, grassy flowers unfold,
I would be free,
Without confusion
Of influence cold,
To pause and see
The flush of youth in its felicity.

[Ah me, if I grew sweet to man]

Ah me, if I grew sweet to man
It was but as a rose that can
No longer keep the breath that heaves
And swells among its folded leaves.

The pressing fragrance would unclose
The flower, and I became a rose,
That unimpeachable and fair
Planted its sweetness in the air.

No art I used men's love to draw;
I lived but by my being's law,
As roses are by heaven designed
To bring the honey to the wind.

[Not as a cloud in shower]

Not as a cloud in shower,
Or pearl,
But white
For heart's delight
As the white myrtle-flower
Is my wan girl.

AN APPLE-FLOWER

I felt my leaves fall free,
I felt the wind and sun,
At my heart a honey-bee:
And life was done.

[Little Lettice is dead, they say]

Little Lettice is dead, they say,
The brown, sweet child who rolled in the hay;
Ah, where shall we find her?
For the neighbours pass
To the pretty lass,
In a linen cere-cloth to wind her.

If her sister were set to search
The nettle-green nook beside the church,
And the way were shown her
Through the coffin-gate
To her dead playmate,
She would fly too frighted to own her.

Should she come at a noonday call,
Ah, stealthy, stealthy, with no footfall,
And no laughing chatter,
To her mother 'twere worse
Than a barren curse
That her own little wench should pat her.

Little Lettice is dead and gone!
The stream by her garden wanders on
Through the rushes wider;
She fretted to know
How its bright drops grow
On the hills, but no hand would guide her.

Little Lettice is dead and lost!
Her willow-tree boughs by storm are tossed—
O the swimming sallows!—
Where she crouched to find
The nest of the wind
Like a water-fowl's in the shallows.

Little Lettice is out of sight!
The river-bed and the breeze are bright:
Ay me, were it sinning
To dream that she knows
Where the soft wind rose
That her willow-branches is thinning?

Little Lettice has lost her name,
Slipt away from our praise and our blame;
Let not love pursue her,
But conceive her free
Where the bright drops be
On the hills, and no longer rue her!

[Thanatos, thy praise I sing]

Thanatos, thy praise I sing,
Thou immortal, youthful king!
Glorious offerings I will bring;
For men say thou hast no shrine,
And I find thou art divine
As no other god: thy rage
Doth preserve the Golden Age,
What we blame is thy delay:
Cut the flowers ere they decay!

Come, we would not derogate,
Age and nipping pains we hate,
Take us at our best estate:
While the head burns with the crown,
In the battle strike us down!
At the bride-feast do not think
From thy summons we should shrink;
We would give our latest kiss
To a life still warm with bliss.

Come and take us to thy train
Of dead maidens on the plain
Where white lilies have no stain;
Take us to the youths, that thou
Lov'st to choose, of fervid brow,
Unto whom thy dreaded name
Hath been simply known as Fame:
With these unpolluted things
Be our endless revellings.

[A calm in the flitting sky]

A calm in the flitting sky,
And in the calm a moon,
A youngling golden:
'Mid windy shades an olden
Oak-tree whose branches croon
As the orb sails by.
Heigh ho!
Youth and age, the soft and dry,
While breezes blow.

Its crookèd arm the oak
Points upward to the moon;
A sapless member,
Which scorching of November
And levin shafts of June
In their season broke.
Heigh ho!
Age is gruff with blight and stroke,
While breezes blow.

But storm has left no trace
Upon the blithe new moon,
That westward slideth,
And on the white wind rideth:
It does not weary soon
Of the blowing race.
Heigh ho!
Youth is free and sweet of face,
While breezes blow.

[Solitary Death, make me thine own]

Solitary Death, make me thine own,
And let us wander the bare fields together;
Yea, thou and I alone,
Roving in unembittered unison forever.

I will not harry thy treasure-graves,
I do not ask at thy still hands a lover;
My heart within me craves
To travel till we twain Time's wilderness discover.

To sojourn with thee my soul was bred,
And I, the courtly sights of life refusing,
To the wide shadows fled,
And mused upon thee often as I fell a-musing.

Escaped from chaos, thy mother Night,
In her maiden breast a burthen that awed her,
By cavern waters white
Drew thee her first-born, her unfathered off-spring, toward her.

On dewy plats, near twilight dingle,
She oft, to still thee from men's sobs and curses
In thine ears a-tingle,
Pours her cool charms, her weird, reviving chaunt rehearses.

Though mortals menace thee or elude,
And from thy confines break in swift transgression,
Thou for thyself art sued
Of me, I claim thy cloudy purlieus my possession.

To a lone freshwater, where the sea
Stirs the silver flux of the reeds and willows,
Come thou, and beckon me
To lie in the lull of the sand-sequestered billows:

Then take the life I have called my own
And to the liquid universe deliver;
Loosening my spirit's zone,
Wrap round me as thy limbs the wind, the light, the river.

[Winds to-day are large and free]

Winds to-day are large and free,
Winds to-day are westerly;
From the land they seem to blow
Whence the sap begins to flow
And the dimpled light to spread,
From the country of the dead.

Ah, it is a wild, sweet land
Where the coming May is planned,
Where such influences throb
As our frosts can never rob
Of their triumph, when they bound
Through the tree and from the ground.

Great within me is my soul,
Great to journey to its goal,
To the country of the dead;
For the cornel-tips are red,
And a passion rich in strife
Drives me toward the home of life.

Oh, to keep the spring with them
Who have flushed the cornel-stem,
Who imagine at its source
All the year's delicious course,
Then express by wind and light
Something of their rapture's height!

[I would not die]

I would not die
To meet a goodly company;
I was ever, ever shy,
And have loved to live retired,
That I might con
Some mystery scarce pondered on.
Oh, this I have desired!

No hope to brood
Where harpers wing on wing intrude,
Or bold saints with trumpets rude;
Where four beasts from turning eyne
Watch my strange ways:
But in concealment of deep rays
May some recess be mine!

I never can,
On earth, though quite escaped from man,
Put society under ban:
Buzzing bees swing in a flower,
Gnats drum and dance,
The weasel intercepts my trance,
Birds warble through a bower.

Once Chloe graced
My suit; how fondly we embraced!
Still my arm was round her waist:
Chloe dropt her pretty head
Upon my knee,
And Love was left alone with me
Just while she slumberèd.

And once I lay
In sickness; I had swooned away,
For I wandered as at play;
It was untethered innocence:
Naught of my own
I had, the night was open thrown,
Sound wrought no more offence.

Endowed by thee,
Death, let me enter privacy,
Unmorose and fellowly
To mix, with the free pleasure
Of stars and springs
And magic, unfamiliar things,
My beauteous leisure.

[I stood to hear that bold]

I stood to hear that bold
Sentence of grit and mould,
Earth to earth; they thrust
On his coffin dust;
Stones struck against his grave:
O the old days, the brave!

Just with a pebble's fall,
Grave-digger, you turn all
Bliss to bereaving;
To catch the cleaving
Of Atropa's fine shears
Would less hurt human ears.

Live senses that death dooms!
For friendship in dear rooms,
Slow-lighting faces,
Hand-clasps, embraces,
Ashes on ashes grind:
O poor lips left behind!

[Others may drag at memory's fetter]

Others may drag at memory's fetter,
May turn for comfort to the vow
Of mortal breath; I hold it better
To learn if verily and how
Love knits me with the loved one now.

Others for solace, sleep-forsaken,
May muse upon the days of old;
To me it is delight to waken,
To find my Dead, to feel them fold
My heart, and for its dross give gold.

[Ah me, how sadder than to say farewell]

Ah me, how sadder than to say farewell
It is to meet
Dreading that Love hath lost his spell
And changed his sweet!
I would we were again to part,
With that full heart.

The hawthorn was half-bud, half-flower
At our goodbye;
And braver to me since that hour
Are earth and sky:
For us it were too poor a thing
To meet this spring.

Our hearts—life never would have marge
To bear their tides,
Their confluent rush! Lo, death is large
In boundary-sides;
And our great χαιρε must be said
When I am dead.

[I laid her to sleep]

I laid her to sleep,
And I came to weep
By her forest-grave; but I found
That a squirrel gay
At its noiseless play
Was springing across the mound.

The sun made a mote
Of gold on its coat,
On its pretty hind-legs it stood;
Then without a sound
Leapt over the mound
To its home again in the wood.

[Come, mete me out my loneliness, o wind]

Come, mete me out my loneliness, o wind,
For I would know
How far the living who must stay behind
Are from the dead who go.

Eternal Passer-by, I feel there is
In thee a stir,
A strength to span the yawning distances
From her grave-stone to her.

AN ÆOLIAN HARP

Dost thou not hear? Amid dun, lonely hills
Far off a melancholy music shrills,
As for a joy that no fruition fills.

Who live in that far country of the wind?
The unclaimed hopes, the powers but half-divined,
The shy, heroic passions of mankind.

And all are young in those reverberant bands;
None marshals them, no mellow voice commands;
They whirl and eddy as the shifting sands.

There, there is ruin, and no ivy clings;
There pass the mourners for untimely things,
There breaks the stricken cry of crownless kings.

But ever and anon there spreads a boom
Of wonder through the air, arraigning doom
With ineffectual plaint as from a tomb.

A DEATH-BED

Her husband kept
Watch by her side; no word she spoke
Of parting; but the children crept
To bid good-night: she slept,
And, sleeping, never woke.

A CAMPO SANTO

The sky is gray,
The olives are gray,
And the air is gray between;
The dead are living—how far away!
And the maize is springing green.

[A curling thread]

A curling thread
Uncoils overhead—
From the chimney-stack
A replenished track
Of vapour, in haste
To increase and waste,
Growing wings as it grows
Of amber and rose,
With an upward flight
To the frosty light.
Puff on puff
Of the soft breath-stuff,
Till the cloudy fleece
Thickens its feathers; its rounds increase,
Mingle and widen, and lose the line
Of their dull confine,
Thinning mote by mote
As they upward float,
And by-and-bye
Are effaced on the sky.

A BALLAD

In winter, afternoons are short;
It was a winter afternoon.
The milking was already done;
I took my man, I took my gun,
That we might have some sport.

We stooped behind the tallest brake:
There was a bush of golden furze;
The furze has scent so rich and full
It makes the sense a little dull:
I hardly felt awake.

Oh, could it be the whirr of game,
That sudden, little spring of noise!
Robin was shouting in the wind;
He must have left me far behind,
So faint his whistle came.

I felt the bushes with my hand:
There was a certain furrowed nook—
The gorse with fire was black and brown,
But there the music drew me down
Into a clear, white land.

There was more grass than I could see,
The grass was marked with pale, green rings;
And oh, the sudden joy I felt
To see them dancing at a full pelt,
The whole Fair Family.

We did not touch the pale, green rings,
I think we eddied through the air;
A swirl of dew was in my face,
And, looking downward, I could trace
The mark of pale, green rings.

The measure scarcely was begun;
I could have danced a hundred years!
But Robin, he would surely scoff—
Straightway I broke the measure off:
My eyes blinked in the sun.

If Robin should be come to harm!
I looked for him to left, to right:
In winter, afternoons are short,
It was too late to think of sport;
I turned back to the farm.

My mother all the tale should know.
How thick the trees above the hedge!
There was a pond that I must pass;
I looked in it as in a glass;
My hair was white as snow.

The servants saw me pass and smiled.
But that was not the worst, for when
I looked in at the parlour door
The children rose up from the floor:
I had no wife or child.

They gathered round me in a flock;
The mistress jeered. But who was he,
That old man with the bald, bent head?
Oh, he would know I had been dead,
He would not feel the shock.

His master was away from home,
He said, and rose to give me food;
“But my old master has been lost
These fifty years.” A terror crost
His breast, and he was dumb.

I could not touch the wheaten bread,
So plain I saw the clear, white land.
O cursèd, cursèd elfin-race,
Mid living men I have no place,
And yet I am not dead.

I travel on from town to town,
But always by a dusty road,
By market-streets, by booths and fairs;
I have great terror of the snares
Upon the furzy down.

But I must see my home once more,
Nor fear to eat the wheaten bread.
Oh, some day I must see my friend,
And eat with him, and make an end,
For Robin is fourscore.

[Leda was wearied of her state, the crown]

Leda was wearied of her state, the crown
was heavy on her head;
She put the crown away,
And ran down to the river-bed
For a whole holiday.

She came to draw free, lonely breaths beside
the mellow, autumn pools;
Counting their starry drops,
She mused on the lone god who rules
Above the mountain-tops.

And, as she worshipped him with secret heart,
among the willow-trees
She felt how something sailed
And gathered round her as a breeze:
The breath within her failed.

There were white feathers on her breast when
she awoke; the water stirred
With motion of white wings,
And in her ear that note she heard
The swan a-dying sings.

[Why are women silent? Is it true]

Why are women silent? Is it true,
As he thinks, they are not poets just because they dare not woo?
Let them sing themselves their passions, Nature resonant all through!

O Christina, by thy cry of pain,
Sappho by thy deadly sweat, I answer women can attain
The great measures of the masters only if they love in vain.

[Our myrtle is in flower]

Our myrtle is in flower;
Behold Love's power!
The glorious stamens' crowded force unfurled,
Cirque beyond cirque
At breathing, bee-like, and harmonious work;
The rose-patched petals backward curled,
Falling away
To let fecundity have perfect play.

O flower, dear to the eyes
Of Aphrodite, rise
As she at once to bare, audacious bliss;
And bid us near
Your prodigal, delicious hemisphere,
Where thousand kisses breed the kiss
That fills the room
With languor of an acid, dark perfume!

[I live in the world for his sake]

I live in the world for his sake,
For the eyes that sleep and wake,
I live in the world for his eyes:
Earth's kingdoms may pass away,
I heed not these things of clay,
But I live, I love, I pray
From the light of his eyes.

[Across a gaudy room]

Across a gaudy room
I looked and saw his face,
Beneath the sapless palm-trees, in the gloom
Of the distressing place,
Where everyone sat tired,
Where talk itself grew stale,
Where, as the day began to fail,
No guest had just the power required
To rise and go: I strove with my disgust;
But at the sight of him my eyes were fired
To give one glance, as though they must
Be sociable with what they found of fair
And free and simple in a chamber where
Life was so base.

As when a star is lit
In the dull, evening sky,
Another soon leaps out to answer it,
Even so the bright reply
Came sudden from his eyes,
By all but me unseen;

Since then the distance that between
Our lives unalterably lies
Is but a darkness, intimate and still,
Which messages may traverse, where replies
May sparkle from afar, until
The night becomes a mystery made clear
Between two souls forbidden to draw near:
Creator, why?

[As two fair vessels side by side]

As two fair vessels side by side,
No bond had tied
Our floating peace;
We thought that it would never cease,
But like swan-creatures we should always glide:
And this is love
We sighed.

As two grim vessels side by side,
Through wind and tide
War grappled us,
With bond as strong as death, and thus
We drove on mortally allied:
And this is hate
We cried.

[A nightingale wakes me. Think of this!—]

A nightingale wakes me. Think of this!—
While she sings so loud,
A woman is lying in her shroud
To whom a lover has never vowed:
O wrong in the world, and by God allowed!

Ah me, a girl to be dead, and miss
That high-and-away, that clang of pain,
The way Love trebles his sweets again,
And then feels it vain,
Jar, jarra! and keeps to the mocking strain!

NOONTIDE SLEEP

He is asleep,
But yet my heart is throbbing and I keep
His tones, his smile, the message from his eyes
Wandering within me. On a bank he lies
Beside me in the noon. I think I know
Just how his palm spreads flat beneath the flow
Of curls that print a shadow on his cheek.
I could not face him when he ceased to speak,
So thrummed my mandolin; and now I burn
To put the formal thing away, to turn
Toward him a lavish breast, to lay him there,
To let my fingers touch his trailing hair,
To breathe on him, as he were small to wind
And rock him in my arms: but he must find
Just what he left—the trees as heavy drop
Above the cliff. . A woman's mood must stop
Where man has marked the place. My god, my food!
But this must seem a transient lyric mood;
Already he is waking—I begin
To thrum my mandolin.

VINTAGE

A land of riotous harvest and of sweat,
A land when men pull down the boughs to get
Plump clusters and then ravage them, a land
Where some coarse mystery breeds that must expand;
A festival as ominous as fate,
A holiday that will not satiate,
Such laughter as must leap up to a creed;
More clusters and more crushings and more speed,
Pressure of bubbling fruit on open lips,
Squashing and spirts and juicy finger-tips!
For this sun-smothered champaign were accurst,
Should Bacchus pass, with glazing eyes, athirst.

[Love doth never know]

Love doth never know
Why it is beloved,
And to ask were treason:
Let the wonder grow!
Were its hopes removed,
Were itself disproved
By cold reason,
In its happy season
Love would be beloved.

FEBRUARY

Gay lucidity,
Not yet sunshine, in the air;
Tingling secrets hidden everywhere,
Each at watch for each;
Sap within the hillside beech,
Not a leaf to see.

[We meet. I cannot look up; I hear]

We meet. I cannot look up; I hear
He hopes that the rainy fog will clear:
My cheeks flush him back a hope it may,
And at last I seek his eyes.
Oh, to greet such skies—
The delicate, violet, thunder gray,
Behind, a spirit at mortal play!
Who cares that the fog should roll away?

[I have found her power!]

I have found her power!
From her roving eyes
Just a gift of blue,
That away she threw
As a girl may throw a flower.
I am weary of glances;
This blue enhances
My life: I have found her power.

IRISES

In a vase of gold
And scarlet, how cold
The flicker of wrinkled grays
In this iris-sheaf! My eyes fill with wonder
At the tossed, moist light, at the withered scales under
And among the uncertain sprays.

The wavings of white
On the cloudy light,
And the finger-marks of pearl;
The facets of crystal, the golden feather,
The way that the petals fold over together,
The way that the buds unfurl!

CYCLAMENS

They are terribly white:
There is snow on the ground,
And a moon on the snow at night;
The sky is cut by the winter light;
Yet I, who have all these things in ken,
Am struck to the heart by the chiselled white
Of this handful of cyclamen.

[How rapidly the land]

How rapidly the land
With spring's fresh current fills,
And all its summer bravery discloses!
The stubborn apple-trees alone resist,
Nor will relax a muscle of the twist
In their gnarled maze;
Their sappy veins some crabbèd hindrance dams:
Hoar lichen grays
Their budless boughs; they stand
Like grave-plots mid the pleasant garden-hills,
O'erset with starry primroses,
And blissful lambs.

[The lady I have vowed to paint]

The lady I have vowed to paint
Has contour of a rose,
No rigid shadow of a saint
Upon the wall she throws;
Her tints so softly lie
Against the air they almost vie
With the sea's outline smooth against the sky.

To those whom damask hues beguile
Her praise I do not speak,
I find her colour in the smile
Warm on her warm, blond cheek:
Then to the eyes away
It spreads, those eyes of mystic gray
That with mirage of their own vision play.

Her hair, about her brow, burns bright,
Her tresses are the gold
That in a missal keeps the light
Solemn and pure. Behold
Her lashes' glimmerings
Have the dove's secret springs
Of amber sunshine when she spreads her wings.

[A shady silence fills]

A shady silence fills,
At deep mid-eventide,
The rockless land of hills
Where two slow rivers glide.
The gnats beneath the gloom
Have failed in song,
Yet something through the combe
Comes like a sound along,
Though very far as yet,
Though no one is in sight,
Nor could a mortal set
Such alien echoes moving through the night.

'Tis not an hour to fear:
The sun is gone to bed,
The clouds from dusk are clear,
And there are overhead
But one or two large stars,
A bat or two.

Yet, hark! a jangle mars
The peaceful mountain-view,
Like the far cry of hounds
Chasing a distant prey:
The chime of yelping sounds—
Oh, will it sink, or will it swell this way?

It comes as comes the wind,
With little noise at first.
Exultantly combined,
Halloes and bays outburst
Upon that solitude
Where two streams meet:
Then in a scramble rude
Of shoulders, ears, and feet
The banhounds rush along,
And drive before their jaws
A wincing, naked throng
At flight from heated breath and thorny claws.

These are the souls that moan
Because upon their birth
God's water was not thrown;
Or those who left the earth
Impenitent, unblessed.

Now all must fly,
While summer is at rest,
And, hunted furiously,
Be caught and bitten through
By dogs of faery-breed,
Sleek creatures, ebon-blue,
With lusting teeth and fore-ordainèd speed.

They scour the mountain side,
The upland township, then
Skirt the dark valley wide,
A cloud of dogs and men:
Behind, tall ladies race,
Each dressed in green,
Each with a smile-lit face
And presence of a queen,
Who breathe from steely lips,
Clap when a soul is caught,
And urge, with corded whips,
The stragglers of the pack to fiendish sport.

Their dogs have ceased to whine;
The whining doth not cease.

One cannot watch the kine,
That chew their cud in peace;
For still the lengthy curs,
It almost seems,
Phantasmal haunt the firs,
Haunt the two voiceless streams:
The sprites themselves have ghosts
That it is hard to lay,
And echoes walk in hosts
Long after the live echoes pass away.

[The iris was yellow, the moon was pale]

The iris was yellow, the moon was pale,
In the air it was stiller than snow,
There was even light through the vale,
But a vaporous sheet
Clung about my feet,
And I dared no further go.
I had passed the pond, I could see the stile,
The path was plain for more than a mile,
Yet I dared no further go.

The iris-beds shone in my face, when, whist!
A noiseless music began to blow,
A music that moved through the mist,
That had not begun,
Would never be done,
With that music I must go:
And I found myself in the heart of the tune,
Wheeling round to the whirr of the moon,
With the sheets of mist below.

In my hands how warm were the little hands,
Strange, little hands that I did not know:
I did not think of the elvan bands,
Nor of anything
In that whirling ring—
Here a cock began to crow!
The little hands dropped that had clung so tight,
And I saw again by the pale dawnlight
The iris-heads in a row.

TRIUMPH OF BACCHUS AND ARIADNE

[_]

From Lorenzo di Medici “Quant' è bella giovinezza”

Ah, how beautiful is youth,
Youth that fleets so fast away!
He who would be gay, forsooth,
Let him hasten to be gay!
This is Bacchus we are seeing,
Ariadne—how they glow!
Always happy and agreeing,
Since 'tis plain that nothing matters
While they love each other so;
And these others, nymphs and satyrs,
Dance beside them all the way:
He who would be gay, forsooth,
Let him hasten to be gay.

See! these little fauns, a-bubble
With pure mischief, muse and plot
How to get the nymphs in trouble,
And a thousand traps have baited
Mid the bushes, in the grot;
Now by Bacchus' heat elated
They are skipping all the way:
He who would be gay, forsooth,
Let him hasten to be gay.

And the tricksome nymphs discover
It is nice to be pursued,
Caught and worried by a lover;
Who should frown at Love's ensnaring
Were a thankless creature rude;
So they mingle, pleasure sharing,
Making gambol all the way:
He who would be gay, forsooth,
Let him hasten to be gay.

On an ass Silenus hoary
Rides, with all his flesh and years,
Drunken, steeped in Bacchic glory.
At his figure's backward swaying

He is foremost in his jeers;
And at whiles, in snatches singing
With the others, cheers the way:
He who would be gay, forsooth,
Let him hasten to be gay.

This is Midas: as they tell us,
All he touches turns to gold,
But his gift scarce makes us jealous;
For what good is there in treasure,
Treasure more than man can hold,
If he cannot take his pleasure,
Being thirsty all the way?
He who would be gay, forsooth,
Let him hasten to be gay.

Now all ears be set a-tingle,
Open, quick to every bliss!
Young and old together mingle,
Young nor old possess the morrow,
'Tis to-day we meet and kiss;
We must drop our grief, for sorrow
Would pollute this holy way:
He who would be gay, forsooth,
Let him hasten to be gay.

Youth and maiden, swell the chorus!
In our hearts how warm and sweet
Thus to feel the gods are for us,
Loving music, loving dances,
Merry with our moving feet!
Let misfortune as it chances
Strike across us on our way:
He who would be gay, forsooth,
Let him hasten to be gay.
Ah, how beautiful is youth,
Youth that fleets so fast away!

[Love's wings are wondrous swift]

Love's wings are wondrous swift
When hanging feathers lift.
Why hath Love wings,
Great pinions strong of curve?
His wild desires to serve;
To swoop on the prey,
And bear it away,
Love hath wings.

Love's wings are golden soft,
When dropping from aloft.
Why hath Love wings,
Feathers of glistening fleece?
To soothe with balmy peace,
And warmth of his breath
Souls he cherisheth
Love hath wings.

Love's wings are broad of van,
Stretched for great travel's span.
Why hath Love wings,
Mail of the sea-bird's might?
From feeble hearts and slight
To lift him forlorn
To a fastness of scorn,
Love hath wings.

[A girl]

A girl,
Her soul a deep-wave pearl
Dim, lucent of all lovely mysteries;
A face flowered for heart's ease,
A brow's grace soft as seas
Seen through faint forest-trees:
A mouth, the lips apart,
Like aspen-leaflets trembling in the breeze
From her tempestuous heart.
Such: and our souls so knit,
I leave a page half-writ—
The work begun
Will be to heaven's conception done,
If she come to it.

A SPRING MORNING BY THE SEA

I did not take me to the sea,
When the winged morning wakened me
With beamy plumes: I used them right
To bear me in an Eastern flight
Of arrowy swiftness to the bed
Where my beloved still slumberèd,
Lying half poet and half child,
The twin divineness reconciled.

[Methinks my love to thee doth grow]

Methinks my love to thee doth grow
And this the sign:
I see the Spirit claim thee,
And do not blame thee,
Nor break intrusive on the Holy Ground
Where thou of God art found.

I watch the fire
Leap up, and do not bring
Fresh water from the spring
To keep it from up-flaming higher
Than my chilled hands require
For cherishing.

I see thy soul turn to her hidden grot,
And follow not;
Content thou shouldst prefer
To be with her,
The heavenly Muse, than ever find in me
Best company.

So brave my love is grown,
I joy to find thee sought
By some great thought;
And am content alone
To eat life's common fare,
While thou prepare
To be my royal moment's guest:
Live to the Best!

[My love is like a lovely shepherdess]

My love is like a lovely shepherdess;
She has a dress
Of peach and green,
The prettiest was ever seen:
All eyes must bless
The passing of my pretty shepherdess.

My love is like the first day of the spring,
To everything
She gives a grace,
Touching it with her tender face:
Ye lambkins cling
To her, and frolic in the sunshining!

My love is like the earliest streak of morn,
Ere day is born;
So virgin white,
The sun with his transfiguring light
Fears to adorn
That tremulous, pellucid streak of morn.

O love, O springtime, morning shepherdess,
Of my distress
I tell my flute;
To thee I must be ever mute,
And, weeping, bless
The footprints of my sacred shepherdess.

ACHERON

Thou must not leave me!
Though 'tis a mournful land
Through which I travel,
I will but guide thee, hand in hand,
To mysteries thou must in art unravel.
When thou a little way art gone,
Ere the grove's steep descent
Darkening can grieve thee,
Thou backward to the sweet stars shalt be sent;
While I plod on
To Acheron.

[I lay sick in a foreign land]

I lay sick in a foreign land;
And by me, on the right,
A little Love had taken stand,
Who held up in my sight
A vessel full of injured things—
His shivered bow, his broken wings;
And underneath the pretty strew
Of glistening feathers, half in view,
A broken heart: he held them up
Within the silver-lighted cup
That I might mark each one, then pressed
His little cheek against my chest,
And fell to singing in such wise
He shook the vision from my eyes.

A HOSPITAL GARDEN

Forth to the sunshine-mottled weather,
Forth to the whispering breeze
High overhead! Oh, were there ever
Such happy groves as these!
One may pick up a wood-dove's feather
Beneath the tall plane-trees.

[There comes a change in her breath]

There comes a change in her breath,
A change that saith
She is breathing in her sleep,
Breathing, breathing and yet so low:
O life at ebb, O life at flow,
Her life, her breath!

[A gray mob-cap and a girl's]

A gray mob-cap and a girl's
Soft circle of sprouting curls,
That proclaim she has had the fever:
How dear the days when the child was nurst!
I can but pray she may die the first,
That I may not leave her!

Her head on my knee laid down,
That duvet so warm, so brown,
I fondle, I dote on its springing.
“Thou must never grow lonesome or old,
Leave me rather to darkness and cold,
O my Life, my Singing!”

UNBOSOMING

The love that breeds
In my heart for thee!
As the iris is full, brimful of seeds,
And all that it flowered for among the reeds
Is packed in a thousand vermilion-beads
That push, and riot, and squeeze, and clip,
Till they burst the sides of the silver scrip,
And at last we see
What the bloom, with its tremulous, bowery fold
Of zephyr-petal at heart did hold:
So my breast is rent
With the burthen and strain of its great content;
For the summer of fragrance and sighs is dead,
The harvest-secret is burning red,
And I would give thee, after my kind,
The final issues of heart and mind.

100

[It was deep April, and the morn]

It was deep April, and the morn
Shakspere was born;
The world was on us, pressing sore;
My Love and I took hands and swore,
Against the world, to be
Poets and lovers evermore,
To laugh and dream on Lethe's shore,
To sing to Charon in his boat,
Heartening the timid souls afloat;
Of judgment never to take heed,
But to those fast-locked souls to speed,
Who never from Apollo fled,
Who spent no hour among the dead;
Continually
With them to dwell,
Indifferent to heaven and hell.