Poems in many lands :: :: University of Virginia Library

The diamond dew lies cool
In the violet cups athirst,
The buds are ready to burst,
The heart of the spring is full;
Great clouds dream over the sky,
The drops on the grass-blades glisten,
The daffodil droops to listen
As the wind from the South goes by,
For it came through the sea cliffs hollow,
With the dawning over the bay,
And the swallow, it said, the swallow,
The swallow comes home to-day.

IN THE WOODS.

This is a simple song
That the world sings every day,
Hark! as ye pass along
Ye that go by the way!
For the nightingale up in the oak-bough sings,
“Be loyal, be true, true, true,”
And the wood-dove sits with its folded wings,
And answers “to you, to you.”
And the thrush in the hedge, “I am glad, be glad,”
And the linnet, “let love, let live,”
And the wind in the rushes says, “why so sad!”
And the wind in the trees “forgive!”
While ever so high in the skies above
The heart of the lark o'erflows,
And “I love, I love, and I love,”
Is the only song he knows.
Hark! as ye pass along
Ye that go by the way!
This is the simple song
That the world sings every day.

A SUMMER SONG.

Summer in the world and morning, the far hills were in the mist,
And we watched the river borders, how the rush and ripple kist,
While the bird sang “Whither, whither,” and the wind said, “Where I list.”

And we saw the yellow kingcup, and the arrowhead look through,
From the silent, shallow waters, where the mirrored skies were blue,
And the flags about the swan's nest kept the secret that we knew.

In the hedge a thrush was singing, where the wild hopclusters are,
And the lowly ragged-robin, with its frailly fretted star,
While a soft wind brought the fragrance of the meadow-sweet from far.

All its blushing bells a' ringing, on a bank the fox-glove grows,
Where the honeysuckle tangles in the thorns of the wild rose,
And a sudden sea of blue-bells from the wood-side overflows.

And we watched the silver crescent of the wings of the wild dove
Circle swiftly in the sunlight through the aspen tops above,
And we felt the great world's heart beat, in the gladness of our love.

THE BURDEN OF AUTUMN.

We are dying, said the flowers,
All the days are out of tune,
Spent are all the sungold hours,
And the glory that was June,
Dying, dying said the flowers.
The snow will hide the garden bed
While they sleep underground,
Wild winds will drift it overhead,
But they will slumber sound.

We are going, said the swallows,
All the singing days are done,
Summer's over, winter follows,
And we seek a warmer sun,
Going southward, said the swallows.
And I must watch them all depart
And find no song to sing,
Oh take the autumn from my heart
And give me back the spring!

“TO WONDER AND BE STILL.”

Oft in the starry middle night
I vex my heart in vain,
To set its mystic music right,
And find the hidden strain.

To-night the summer moon is strong,
The little clouds drift past,—
The wonder is too deep for song—
The silence speaks at last.

“Thou canst not match those harmonies
On moon-enamoured lute,
Serenely silent arch the skies,
And the great stars are mute;

“Thou canst not tune to thine unrest
Their solemn calm above;
In silence thou shalt worship best,
And reverently love.

“Beyond this night in which thou art,
There is a voice of spheres,
Which the eternal in thine heart
Remembers and reveres.

“But how they sing in unison
Earth's ear hath never heard,
So only in thine heart rings on
The song that has no word.”

AN ANSWER.

Take again thy shallow hearted reason
Groping dimly through the night in which thou art!
Very harmless fall the arrows of thy treason
On the worship and the wonder in my heart.

I have drunk the everlasting fountains
Flowing downward from the infinite to me,
Seen the wonder of the moonrise in the mountains
And the glory of the sunset on the sea.

THE POET.

He will come again as oft of old among you,
With his burden to fulfil;—
Did ye hearken ever to the songs they sung you
Till the song was still?

He will bear again the scorn, the idle wonder,
And heart-hunger and love's need;
You will drown the sound of music in your thunder,
And he will not heed.

Singing unperplexed above the mocking laughter
Till his day be overpast;
Till the music dies, and silence follows after
And ye turn at last,—

Then when all the echoes breathe it and ye know it,
Ye will seek him to revere;
Cry aloud, and call him, master, lover, poet!
And he will not hear.

VICTORY.

This then—to live and have no joy thereof,
To thirst and hunger and be very tired,
To walk unloved, or know if one should love
It were a bitter thing that he desired,
To have no home in all the earth, to be
Mocked and derided and outcast of men,
To squander love and labour, and to see
No fruit of it, and yet to love, and then
Bearing all slander silently alway,
Serenely when the last reproach is hurled
To look Death in the face alone, and say
“Be of good cheer for I have overcome the world.”

“AH! WILD SWANS!”

“Ah! wild swans winging southward, I would fly with you to-night;
Southward, ever swiftly southward, through the autumn grey twilight.

“You will leave these downs and gullies, and the white cliffs far behind,
Sailing on above the waters in the music of the wind.

“And the seamen on their highway looking up will see you fly,
Like a misty shadow moving o'er the moon-illumined sky.

“Day and night and all things changing,—sunny skies and overcast,—
Till the cloud-engirdled mountains and the snowy peaks are passed.

“We should near the lands of laughter and the vines and olive trees,
Watch the little sails at sundown sparkle out on summer seas;

“Day and night and ever flying till we reached the wonderland,
And the seaward branching river, and the desert ways of sand;

“Saw beneath us standing lonely that grave bird that never sings,
Like a solemn sentry guarding by the giant tombs of kings.

“And I think it would be sunset when our journeying was done,
And the silver of your plumage would be crimsoned in the sun;

“In a pleasant land of palm-trees, where the lotus lilies grow,
And the fruits of many flood-tides by the river borders blow;

“There forgetting and forgotten, and not any one to hear,
I would sing to you, that sing not, all the winter of the year.”

Brighter burn the stars and colder, twilight deepens into night,
Moans the wind among the willows, and the swans fade out of sight.

DAY'S END.

We watched how robed in royal red
The slow sun sailed to rest,
Through crimson cloud streaks islandèd
In seas of glory o'er the west,
I held your hand, and I heard you say,
“What have we done for the world to-day?”

While still the mountain-heather glowed
All songs were hushed, and through
The twilight east the young moon showed
Her frail white crescent in the blue;
The silence sank profound and deep,
The ways of earth were full of sleep;
And the spirit of silence seemed to say,
“What have ye done for the world to-day?”

FROM THE ROADSIDE.

Peace be with the little red-roofed church out yonder,
With its quiet English village gathered round;
With shade of great beech-trees on the grave-mounds under,
And leaves of the Autumn over all the ground!

There go the rooks at even homeward flying!
The sweet sense of home lies over all that land;
The glow is on the tower of the daylight dying,
And lovers in the shadow are walking hand-in-hand.

Here comes no voice from the middle world to move them,
All the year round no memorable thing;
Yet the great skies arch as beautiful above them,
All the year through there are birds with them that sing.

Ah! well with you who calm and little knowing,
Here in submission to your uneventful days,
Leave the mad world to its coming and its going,
Safe with God's shadow on your evening ways!

A DIRGE FOR LOVE.

“What is this pitiful song ye sing,
Shades of the passing hours?
What is this beautiful young dead thing,
Borne on a bier of flowers?”

“This is dead Love who, all night through,
Beat at the fast-closed door;
Wept his heart out waiting for you,
Now he will beat no more!

“Here he dwelt for a night and day,
Longer he might not wait;
Never again will he pass this way,
Therefore we sing ‘too late!’”

“Ah, but the door of my heart within,
Was it not alway wide?
Had he not wings to have entered in,
Why did he beat outside?”

“Once he came, though his eyes were blind,
Up to the outer door;
The way within was too hard to find,
Peace! For he wakes no more.”

“Yet ye knew I had waited long,
Was I not always true?
How could I will sweet Love this wrong—
Where do ye bear him to?”

“Back to the land where he lives again,
Over the westward strand;
Over the waves and the cloud domain,
Into the rainbow land!”

“Then, sweet spirits, do this for grace,
Set my heart on his bier;
So, when he comes to his resting-place,
Love may awake and hear!”

NOS COLLINES D'AUTREFOIS.

Can you remember when we dwelt together,
In the golden land of childhood long ago;
Up on our mountain heights in the clear weather,
How we longed to see the valleys down below?

Lands so lovely never found we after,—
Oh, our winters with the wonder of their snows;
Oh, the swallows of our spring-time, and the laughter,
Oh, the starnight of our summers and the rose!

Well-belovèd, in that land were all the faces,
None are like them of these dwellers in the plain;
Oh, why did we come down from our high places!
We can never climb the bitter hills again!

THE TWO GATES.

Two gates—and one was morning's, gold with gleams
Of sudden sunlight, and clear skies above
Ways where the air is musical with love,
And summer singing in a land of streams:

One sad with twilight and low sound that seems
Like the marred song-voice of a broken heart,
Where life and love sit evermore apart,
And look back longing to the gate of dreams.

Time was, I wandered in those sunlit lands,
And felt the glamour in my wakening eyes;
But now with sword aflame the angel stands,
Pointing the threshold of the gate of gloom;
While through the monotone of human cries,
Upsoars this pitiless, “fulfil thy doom!”

GETTATI AL VENTO.

I.

The sea swallows wheel and fly
To their homes in the grey cliff-side;
And the silent ships drift by,
The world and its ways are wide!

Oh, which of you wandering sails
Will carry a word from me?
Spread all your wings in the gales,
Fly fast to her northern sea!

Go say to my heart's desired,
Too long from her side I roam,
And say I am tired, tired,
And I would she would call me home!

II.

I thought that I wandered, wandered,
All night till the dawn of day,
And I came to the house she dwells in,
A hundred miles away:

So I watched the hills grow golden,
I heard the birds begin,
And she came to open her window,
And let the morning in.

But when she would not greet me,
And I called to her all in vain,
I awoke, and knew I was dreaming,
But I could not sleep again.

I.

What shadow is this of dead delight,
That thou art dreaming of?
Oh, heart, what ails thee in the evenlight,
And is it thine old burden love,
That wistful-eyed, like one who roams,
I stand and watch from far,
The peace of sunset over quiet homes,
And the belovéd evening star?

II.

Are not the heavens wide? And yet,
Until all journeyings be done,
No star shall change the orbit set,
That marks its journey round the sun.

And, sweet, we travel down our days,
As the stars wander in their sky;
We cannot change our fated ways,
But meet and greet and hasten by.

III.

I breathed a name once and again,
I said a bitter thing in my pain,
“I gave you all my love, and I spent it all in vain!”

Then I saw a form across the night
Glide down the stars in a veil of light,
And I said, “Who are you, dweller of the Infinite?”

And I heard a voice on the stilly air,
“You chide amiss in your own despair;
Lo, I am the soul of her love, and I follow you everywhere!”

WHEN HE HAD FINISHED.

When He had finished, first his orbèd sun
Blazed through the startled firmament, and all
His hosts cried glory, and the stars each one
Sang joy together,—then did there not fall
A peace of solemn silence on His world,
A moment's hush before one leaf was stirred
Or one wave o'er the ocean mirror curled!
Lo! then it was the carol of a bird
Gave the joy-note of being, up the sky
Some lark's song mounted and the young greenwood
Woke to a matin of wild melody,—
And He looked down and saw that it was good.

THE LONELY BAY.

Hollowed and worn by tide on tide
The rocks are steep, to the water's side;
Never a swimmer might hope to land
With the sheer, sheer rocks upon either hand;
Never a ship dare enter in
For the sunken reefs are cruel and thin;
Only at times a plaintive moan
Comes from yon arch in the caverned stone,
When the seals that dwell in the ocean cave
Rise to look through the lifting wave;
Only the gulls as they float or fly
Answer the waves with their wind-borne cry.

Weeds of the waste uptossed lie there
On the sandy space that the tide leaves bare,
Ever at ebb some waif or stray
That ever the flood wave washes away,
And round and round in the lonely bay.

And one dwells there in the caves below
That only the seals and the seagulls know,
And the haunting spirit is passing fair
With sea-flowers set in her grey-green hair,
But she looks not oft to the daylight skies
For the sunshine dazzles her ocean eyes;
But now and again the sea-winds say,
In the twilight hour of after-day,
They have seen her look through her veil of spray.

Stilled are the waves when she lies asleep
And the stars are mirrored along the deep,
The gulls are at rest on the rifted rocks
And slumbering round are the ocean flocks,
Where the waving oarweeds lull and lull
And the calm of the water is beautiful.

But ever and aye in the moonless night,
When the waves are at war and the surf is white,
When the storm-wind howls in the dreary sky,
And the storm-clouds break as it whirls them by;
When it tears the boughs from the churchyard tree
And they think in the world of the folk at sea,
When the great cliffs quake in the thunder's crash

And the gulls are scared at the lightning flash,
You will hear her laugh in the depths below,
Where the moving swell is a sheet of snow,
Mocking the mariner's shriek of woe.

Let us away, for the sky grows wild
And the wind has the voice of a moaning child!
And if she looked through her veil of spray,
And called and beckoned, you might not stay;
You would leap from the height to her cold embrace
And drown in the smile of her wanton face!
She would carry you under the mazy waves
From deep to deep of her ocean caves,
Hold you fast with the things that be
Held in the drifts of the drifting sea,
Round and round for eternity!
The sun goes under, away, away!
It's dark and weird by the lonely bay.

MUSIC.

What angel viol, effortless and sure,
Speaks through the straining silence, whence, ah whence
That tremulous low joy, so keen, so pure
That all existence narrows to one sense,
Lapped round and round
In rapture of sweet sound?
Oh, how it wins along the steep, and loud and loud,
Over the chasm and the cloud,
Swells in its lordly tide
Higher and higher, and undenied,
Full throated to the star!—
Then lowlier, softer, dreaming dies and dies
Over the closing eyes,
Dies with my spirit away, afar,
Swayed as on ocean's breast
Dies into rest.

“WHAT HOLDS THEE BACK?”

What holds thee back then? Hast thou aught to do,
And fearest for the venture, art thou too,
So light a thing that every wind blows through?

What hast thou envied in the lives of these,
That thou should'st heed to please them or displease
And fill thine own with mirrored mockeries?

This arm of thine is thine alone, and strong
To thy free service through thy whole life long,
Hear thine heart's voice, it will not lead thee wrong!

WORDS FOR MUSIC.

I.

The autumn wind goes sighing
Through the quivering aspen tree,
The swallows will be flying
Toward their summer sea;
The grapes begin to sweeten
On the trellised vine above,
And on my brows have beaten
The little wings of love.
Oh wind if you should meet her
You will whisper all I sing!
Oh swallow fly to greet her,
And bring me word in spring!

II.

I see your white arms gliding,
In music o'er the keys,
Long drooping lashes hiding
A blue like summer seas:

The sweet lips wide asunder,
That tremble as you sing,
I could not choose but wonder,
You seemed so fair a thing.

For all these long years after
The dream has never died,
I still can hear your laughter,
Still see you at my side;
One lily hiding under
The waves of golden hair;
I could not choose but wonder,
You were so strangely fair.

I keep the flower you braided
Among those waves of gold,
The leaves are sere and faded,
And like our love grown old.
Our lives have lain asunder,
The years are long, and yet,
I could not choose but wonder.
I cannot quite forget.

III.

All through the golden weather
Until the autumn fell,
Our lives went by together
So wildly and so well.—

But autumn's wind uncloses
The heart of all your flowers,
I think as with the roses,
So hath it been with ours.

Like some divided river
Your ways and mine will be,
—To drift apart for ever,
For ever till the sea.

And yet for one word spoken,
One whisper of regret,
The dream had not been broken
And love were with us yet.

IV.

I remember low on the water
They hung from the dripping moss,
In the broken shrine of some streamgod's daughter
Where the north and south roads cross;
And I plucked some sprays for my love to wear,
Some tangled sprays of maidenhair.

So you went north with the swallow
Away from this southern shore,
And the summers pass, and the winters follow,
And the years, but you come no more,
You have roses now in your breast to wear,
And you have forgotten the maidenhair.

And the sound of the echoing laughter,
The songs that we used to sing,
To remember these in the years long after
May seem but a foolish thing,—
Yet I know to me they are always fair
My withered sprays of maidenhair.

V.

The wide seas lay before us
The moon was late to rise,
The skies were starry o'er us
And Love was in our eyes;
And “like those stars, abiding,”
You whispered “Love shall be,”
Then one great star went gliding
Right down into the sea.

Since then beyond recalling
How many moons have set!
And still the stars keep falling,
But the sky is starry yet:
And I look up and wonder
If they can hear and know,
For still we walk asunder,
And that was years ago.

BELLA DONNA.

Two tear-drops of the bluest seas
Were prisoned in those laughing eyes,
And soft as wind in summer trees
The music of her low replies;
A sunbeam caught entangled there
Makes light in all her golden hair;

The wild rose where the wild bees sip
Is not so delicate as this,
And yet that little rose-curled lip
Is very poisonous to kiss,
And they were stars of wintry skies
That lit the lustre in her eyes.

And she will smile and bid you stay
And love a little at her will,
And love a little—and betray
But smile as ever sweetly still;
She knows that roses fade away,
To-morrows turn to yesterday.

She walks the smooth and easy ways
Apparelled in her queenly dress,
She hears no word that is not praise,
And ever of her loveliness;
And she will kill, that cannot hate,
Dispassionately passionate.

JOSEPH BARA.

In the year of battles, ninety-three,
In Vendée, by the westward sea,
The word was whispered—Liberty.

There was a child that would not stay,
When he watched them arm and ride away,
For the sword was bared in la Vendée.

Thirteen years, and girl-like fair,
With blue wide eyes and yellow hair—
And the word had moved him unaware.

“Mother,” he said, “if I were old,
My arm should win the young ones gold—
A boy's life may be dearly sold.

“Mother, the hearts of the children bleed,
There are lips enough for one hand to feed,
And the youngest born have the greater need.”

In the year of battles, ninety-three,
In Vendée by the westward sea,
He rode to fight for liberty.

They wondered how his stedfast eye
Could see the strong men bleed and die,
His shrill lips shape the battle cry.

At Chollet, in the month Frimaire
They found the lion in his lair,
And long the struggle wavered there.

Till wide and scattered, man with man,
The bloody waves of battle ran,
The boy was leading in the van.

His bugle at his waist he wore,
His sword-arm pointing straight before,
And on his brow the tricolore.

Horse and rider overthrown,
Lay about him stark as stone,
The bugle boy stood all alone.

They closed about him menacing,
To strike him seemed a murderous thing;
“Take life, cry homage to the King!”

Fearless their bayonets he eyed,
The dead he loved were at his side,
And “Vive la République,” he cried.

Sword thrust and bayonet
In his young heart's-blood met,
The groan died in his lips hard set,
And through his eyes shone life's regret.

O'er his torn and bleeding breast
All the storm of battle pressed,—
He lay lowly with the rest.

When the bitter fight was done
There they found their little one,
Stark and staring at the sun.

Freedom, let thy banners wave,
Where he lies among the brave,
For that young fresh life he gave!

Song above the names that die
Shrine his name in memory!

BY THE ANNIO.

(PASTORAL.)

Here where shallows ripple by,
And the woody banks are high,
Every little wind that frets
Waves the scent of violets;
Here the greening beech has made
Such a palace of cool shade,
You and I would rather sit
Silent in the shade of it,
Seeking questions and replies
Only through each other's eyes.
Sweet, than climb the thorny ways
Up their barren hills of praise.
In the gloom of yonder glen
Hides the crimson cyclamen,
And the tall narcissus still
Lingers near the reedy rill,
In the ooze the rushes grow
Pipes for merry lips to blow;

Here the songs that we shall sing
Shall be all of love or spring;
Here the emerald dragon-fly
Flits and stays and passes by,
While the bird that overhead
Mocked our song, grows unafraid,
Splashing till his breast be cool
At the margin of the pool.
In my hand the hand I hold
Lies more daintily than gold;
On your lips is all the praise
I would barter for my lays,
In your eyes I look to see
Witness of my sovereignty.
They that long for high estate
Turn to look for love too late,
Climbing on at last they find
Love has long been left behind;
Sweet, we do not envy these
In our riverland of trees.

Seldom feet of mortals pass
Here along the dewy grass;

Only in the loneliest spot,
Where the woodman enters not,
Spirits of these groves and springs
Make their nightly wanderings.
Never now they walk at day
Since the Satyrs fled away,
Only when the fireflies gleam
Up the winding wooded stream,
You may hear low silver tones,
Like the ripple on the stones,
Asking some familiar star
Where their olden lovers are.
Listen, listen, up above
All the branches sing of love!
When the world is tired of May,
When the springtide fades away,
When the clouds draw over head,
And the moon of love is dead,
When the joy is no more new,
Seek we other work to do!
Only while the heart is young
Let no other song be sung!

BY THE CRUCIFIX.

He tells his story with his young sad eyes,
The rags are drooping from his sunburnt breast,
He had sat down a little while to rest,
Far off the country of his longing lies;

He sits there looking at his bare bruised feet
And sees the rich man and the priest pass by,
There where the crucifix is planted high
On the grass bank outside the village street.

Beside him lies his little flageolet—
The children danced that morning when he played,
Laughed loud to hear the music that he made;—
Now the day closes and he wanders yet.

Oh, if some one of all the folk who pass,
Would turn and speak one word and hear him though,
And help! It were so small a thing to do;
And all they see him lying in the grass.

So the day ended, and the evening sun
Cast the long shadows down; he turned and saw
The crucifix blood-red, and in mute awe,
He crossed himself, and shuddered, and went on.

And then, it seemed that the pale form above
Moved slowly, lifting up the thorn-crowned head,
And the drooped eyelids opened, and he said,
“Oh, ye who make profession of your love,

“With voices echoing a hollow cry,
My name is ever on your lips, and yet
I wander wearily and ye forget,
I am as nothing to you passers by,

“I had no heed of any shame or loss,
And will ye leave me tired and homeless still
Oh, call my name by any name ye will,
But leave me not for ever on my cross!”

IN THE ALPS.

It is spring by now in the world, but here
The doom of winter on all the year;
A little brown bird flits to and fro,
Watching perhaps for a rift of blue
Where the mists divide and the sky looks through,
Or a crocus-bell in the half-thawed snow.

Little brown bird, have you no nest here
When winds blow cold in the long starlight?
Never a tree, and the fields so white—
And are you ever a wayfarer?
It is spring by now in the vales below,
And why do you stay in the world of snow?

IN NÔTRE DAME DE ------

There were two had died one day
So they told me by the way;
“One, ah well, poor soul,” they said,
“Better off that he is dead,
Such a poor man!—but the other
He was our good prefect's brother;
Rich! And surely of great worth;—”
Both at one now—earth and earth!—
“Half the town is deep in prayer;
Round him at our Lady's there;
But the poor man's funeral
Is in the church outside the wall;
Aye, our Lady's nave is wide,
Would you lay them side by side?”
So I followed both these dead;—
Where the poor man's pall was spread,
Boarded in his box of deal,
There were only six to kneel,

And a priest that hurried through
Such quick office as would do.
Requiem æternam dona ei, Domine,
Et lux perpetua luceat ei.

Oh, but here how good to see
The great sable canopy!
All the columns shrouded o'er,
The rich curtains at the door,
And the purple velvet pall,
And the high catafalque o'er all,
Where a hundred tapers glow
On the same pale face of death below.—
All the good town's folk are there,
Some to weep and some to stare;
Little recks he how ye weep,
Very sound he lies asleep;
Little recks he how ye pray,
For his ears are sealed alway!
Many a monk to thumb his beads,
Chant his canticles and creeds;
Aye and here with quivering lips
O'er his meagre finger-tips

Prays the priest, and all the while
Drones the deep organ thrill; and then
Along the gloomy curtained aisle,
Swells the full chant again;
Requiem æternam dona ei, Domine,
Et lux perpetua luceat ei.

Now beyond the city wall
Winds his pomp of funeral;
Feebly do those tapers flare
In the sunshine's summer glare,
Loud above their chanting swells
The horror of the tolling bells,
Tapers burn where light is needed
For the living, not the dead!
Aye, and if your chants be heeded,
For the living be they said!
Where were all this folk who pray
When the poor man passed this way?

Long ago the spirit fled,
All of him that was of worth,
In his sojourning on earth;
Wherefore o'er a body dead,
Need long litanies be said?

Shall the jewelled cross he presses
In those bony hands of his,
Aught avail, when death caresses
With his equal mouldering kiss?
Shall the rosary they twined
Round and round his stiffened wrists,
Hold his body sanctified
From the worms, the socialists?
Gaudea sempiterna possideat!

So the two that died one day
Travelled down the selfsame way,
One in simple coffin board
Painted cross along it scored,
One with all his high estate
Graven on the silver plate,
All the pomp that he could save
To adorn him in the grave,
Lily wreaths of eucharis
To cover those poor bones of his,
From the graveyard's mouldy sod,—
But the poor man's soul and this
Went the same way up to God!
In Paradisum deducant te angeli,
Æternam habeas requiem!

By the sable shrouded door,
Of our Lady's church once more!
Softly came low music floating from above,
And a voice seemed to breathe its cadence through;
“Peace, peace! Lo this we did it of our love,
There was so little we could do!”
Requiem æternam dona iis, Domine,
Et lux æterna luceat iis.

THE SONG OF THE DEAD CHILD.

FLORENCE, '81.

By the light of their waxen tapers, I saw not ever a tear,
For the child in its bridal garment, the little dead child on the bier.

Some child of the poor;—I wonder, was it glad that the years were done,
This flower that fell in spring tide, and had hardly looked on the sun?

They have decked her in burial raiment, they have twined a wreath for her hair;
Ah child, you had never in life such delicate dress to wear!

And the man in the pilgrim's habit has covered the marble head,
And carried it out for ever to the sleeping place of the dead.

Rest, little one, have no fear, you will hardly turn in your sleep,
Though the moon and the stars are clouded, and the grave they have made be deep!

But an hour before the dawning there will come one down on the night,
With the wings and the brows of an angel, in wonder-robes of white.

He will smile in your eyes of wonder, he will take your hand in his hand,
And gather you up in his arms and pass from the sleeping land.

Then after a while, at morning, you will come to the lands that lie
On the other side of the sunrise between the cloud and the sky,

And here is the place of resting with the wings of your angel furled,
For the feet that are tired with travel in the dusty ways of the world.

And here is the children's meeting, the length of a summer's day,
You will gather you crowns of roses, in the deep meadow lands at play.

While up through the clouds dividing, like a sweet bewildering dream,
You will watch the wings of the angels drift by in an endless stream;

Such marvellous robes are o'er them, and whiter are some than snows,
And some like the April blossom, and some like the pale primrose.

For these are the hues of day-dawn that you saw from the world of old,
And the first light over the mountains was shed from their crowns of gold;

And many go by with weeping, for ever, the long night through,
The tears of the sorrowing angels fall over the earth in dew;

Till your eyes grow weary of wonder as you sit in the long cool grass,
And many will bend and kiss you of the wonderful forms that pass;

With your head on the breast of the angel there will steal down over your eyes
The sleep of the long forgetting, and the dream where memory dies,

As the flowers are washed in the night-time, when the dew drops down from above,
You will reck no more of the winter, and hunger, and want of love.

Then at last it will seem like even when you waken, and hand in hand
You will pass with your angels guiding, to the utmost verge of the land;

And I think you will hear far voices growing musical there, and loud,
As you pass, with an unfelt swiftness, from luminous cloud to cloud;

Till the light shall turn to a glory, that seemed but a lone faint star,
That will be the gate of Heaven, where the souls of the children are.

NIGHT AT AVIGNON.

No cloud between the myriad stars and me,—
Soft music moving o'er a sleeping land
Of winds that fret about the cypress tree,
And Rhone's swift rapids rippling past the sand.
Arch over arch, and tower on battled wall,
Against the violet deepness of the skies;—
And one grey spire set high above them all,
Where round the hill the moon begins to rise.
An hour's knell rings softly out once more
From unseen cloisters, where the misty bridge
Fades in the distance of the further shore,
And nearer spires repeat it o'er and o'er;
One great blue star peers through the seaward ridge;
A hollow footfall up the echoing street
Goes wandering out to silence, and the breeze
Drops faint and fainter, here beneath my feet
The grass is all with violets overstrewn;
Oh listen, listen; in yon garden trees

Do you not hear the lute that lovers use!
One sets the discord of its strings atune;—
And in the dreamland of the risen moon
They sing some olden love-song of Vaucluse.

GARIBALDI IN ROME.

JUNE 29–30, 1849.

St. Peter's eve, from dim Janiculum
The battle's thunder drowned the bells that tolled,
The great guns flashed, but that night as of old
We kept St. Peter's vigil, and the dome
Blazed with its myriad little lamps of gold,
And all the river ran with yellow foam,
While on the torchlit Capitol unrolled
The banner blew of our Republic, Rome,

Then silence fell with treacherous midnight,—
An hour ere dawn we heard a wild alarm,
The blast of bugles, the swift call to arm,
We sang his war hymn and fell in to fight;
Then as dawn gathered on the Esquiline
Our grand old lion gave the battle sign.

ΕΡΑΝ ΤΩΝ ΑΔΥΝΑΤΩΝ.

So now I know we shall not any more,
As we have done in these last golden days,
Go hand in hand along life's pleasant ways,
Walk heart with heart together as before.

It seems we cannot choose but wear the chain
Fate winds about our little lives. Ah sweet,
What wall is set between us that your feet
Must wander alway where I gaze in vain!

Could we have climbed together! How these bars
Had melted in the fire of love; the road
Had known our footsteps where the wise men trod,
And our sure ways had ended with the stars!

We had atoned for passion!—passed above
All fleeting shadows of the world's desire,
Made pure our spirits at a holier fire,
And in the lap of morning laid our love.

One law I knew, one right, one starward way,
One hope to make our lives divine, one love
In this one life, one star of truth above,
And one great desert where the rest go stray.

Life had no more to give, if that we two
Had let the world go gladly, grasp and reach
Strained ever upward, leaning each on each,
Had seen one star-ray of the pure and true.

Had we but climbed together! Oh my light,
My star, my moon, and art thou clouded o'er?
And we that were together, evermore
Must stand apart and stare across the night!

One life it seems must take its tale of days,
And as it may make service of its own,
But ah! the infinite help of love!—alone
The heart grows faint and weary of dispraise.

I shall be braver on the way I go,
Hearing that voice forever, for whose sake,
What burthen had I not bowed down to take,
What shame or peril, had it helped you so!

This must content me, to have loved, who lose
In this hard world where little loves live on,
No man will love you as I might have done,
Sweet heart, too holy for the world to choose!

Therefore be strong, remembering love's past,
Climb on for ever in the steep old way
That haply so a moment's space we may
Meet on the verge of changes at the last.

That at the end of all these journeyings,
Crossing the borderland of time and space
We two may stand together face to face,
Whose hearts were set upon abiding things,
And through the cloud-veil of Eternity
Our eyes may meet at last in the full light, and see.

AVE ATQUE VALE.

I.

And he is gone!—like strain of viols parted—
Back to the infinite from whence he came,
And we sit here, bereft and weary hearted,
New songs may wake, but not again the same.

Our hearts were lutes, whereon he used to play,
Now evermore is silence on that key,
And thought grows chilly like a sunless day
That greys the ripple on the haggard sea.

Those lips were cold that lingering we kissed,
There came no pressure from the old true hand,
A little while and through the twilight mist
We scarce shall trace his footprints in the sand.

II.

This was the end love made,—the hard-drawn breath,
The last long sigh that ever man sighs here;
And then for us, the great unanswered fear,
Will love live on,—the other side of death?

Only a year, and I had hoped to spend
A life of pleasant communing, to be
A kindred spirit holding fast to thee,
We never thought that love had such an end.

This was the end love made, for our delight,
For one sweet year he cannot take away;—
Those tapers burning in the dim half-light,
Those kneeling women with a cross that pray,
And there, beneath green leaves and lilies white,
Beyond the reach of love, our loved one lay.

III.

He had the poet's eyes,
—Sing to him sleeping,—
Sweet grace of low replies,
—Why are we weeping?

He had the gentle ways,
—Fair dreams befall him!—
Beauty through all his days,
—Then why recall him?—

That which in him was fair
Still shall be ours:
Yet, yet my heart lies there
Under the flowers.

105

ST. CATHARINE OF EGYPT.

There was a king's one daughter long ago,
In ways of summer, where the swallows go,
For whom no prince was found in any land
Fair lived and clean to wed so white a hand;
Who lying wakeful on a moonless night
Saw the dim ways grow tremulous with light,
As the sun's dawning glory, and was aware
Of a pale woman standing shrouded there,
With hands locked in another's hands, whose eyes
Shone like the starriest wonder of the skies.

And the pale woman bending o'er her bed
Unveiled the pity in her eyes, and said,
“Lo this is he whose blameless days were sweet,
If thou could'st love him, and thy love was meet.”
And yet he turned those lustrous brows away,
And a sad voice seemed evermore to say
Across the stillness of a world that slept,
“Not mine, not mine,”—so all night through she wept
And never heard the singing nightingales.

106

Then awhile after when the cloudy sails
Of many a day had winged across the sky,
And she had gathered all the mystery
From a lone hermit in a desert wood,
He came once more in the night-time and stood
And set a bridal ring upon her hand
To be his lady in his father's land.
So in a little while her rumour grew
Till the rough Roman angered—her they slew
Being too sweet and wise for that rude time
That murdered pity and made love a crime.

And the wise men were glad when she was dead,
For they had failed of reason—she had said,
“When I come up into my kingdom there
And my Lord greets me, and I speak him fair,
Then will I take him by the hand with me
And lead him down, how far so e'er it be,
Until we find the old man, Socrates,
And the fair souls who followed, for all these
Will be together, and I will bid him take
Their hands in his and love them for my sake,
Because of old they brought me near his side.”

107

It was the time of even when she died;
And a fair choir of angels swept along
The dying afterglow, before their song
The gates were loosed and through the broken bars
They bore her skyward under the chill stars,
Westward—but once alighting as they flew.
In a deep meadow-land, with soft night-dew,
They washed the tender wounded throat, and kissed
The cords that bound her delicate soft wrist,
And at their kiss the fetters fell in twain
And the white robe grew faultless of one stain.
Then onward, ever onward, all night through,
Till lustreless the moon of morning grew
In the pale sky where one star lingered yet.

Some dark-browed fisher, as he cast his net
And woke a ripple on the waveless calm,
Looked up and heard the passing angels' psalm,
And through the ripple of the water-rings
He saw the gleam of rainbow-tinted wings
Drift o'er the glassing bosom of the sea.

There where the grave of innocence should be,
High up between the rock ridge and the sky,

108

Upon the holy summit Sinai,
Above the red sea's summer-tranced wave
They laid their burden in a marble grave.
And there her beauty fleeteth not, decay
Can never steal her loveliness away,
But like a carven image evermore
Sleeps on now with her still hands folded o'er
The saint's white lily ever blossoming,—
All that was earthly of so fair a thing.

111

THEORETIKOS.

A Thought of Darwin.

He dwelt unblinded with eternal truth,
Through long communion perfected, not once
Did he misdeem the prelude for the song,
And looking onward, to his ample view
That long to-come when he should be no more
Outweighed the moment of his passing here.

And he was happy, and his peace was full,
Having outlived the struggle—not as those
Who take the world on faith, and rest content
With the old verdicts, question, wonder not,
But feeling trusting loving are at peace.

He sought and found one little germ of truth,
Made pure his spirit of all chance and change,
Held fast on things abiding, learned to stand
On ever loftier summits—till at last
His brow grew starry and his searching eyes
Blue with the mirrored distance, and he heard
The everlasting music, Time and space
Were part with every heart-beat, and almost

112

God seemed to whisper in his listening ear.
What need for him of all your wonder world?
He made the wonder visible—enough
This little handful of the common clay
A seed to sow therein, and then to watch
The hidden forces quicken into life,
Till leaf by leaf some flower-star unfolds,
One flower of all the flowers, because the sun
Is in the skies, one sun of all the suns.
Search but the structure of one daisy's heart
Your lore has no such miracle as this!—
And look at all the infinite device,
The texture of the leaves of all the trees—
Is there not marvel here enough? And yet
Ye crave new signs and wonders to convince
And wander lost upon your devious ways.
Ye will but gaze upon a part, and grow
In little wisdom overwise, therefore
Your partial grasp is barren to conceive
The thought Infinity, Time wilders yet
Because ye measure with your finite gauge,
And Motion maddens through your own unrest.

He let the world go gladly, hand in hand
He walked with Reason, till thought strained away

113

And God grew nearer,—so he built his mind
A bridge to span from sun to sun of all
The starry systems;—like a faint far dream
The changing pageant of men's lives unrolled,
And he stood by serenely,—but with him
The calm was struggle in a lordlier way,
Absorbed and dwelling with eternal truth,
Whose star o'ershone him; till it seemed that life
And death were one, and from the throbbing brow
The craving died away,—and now he rests
With that fair choir from many times whose souls
Have earned the right of knowledge after death.

120

SEA PICTURES—FRANCE.

I. SUNSET.

One autumn evening from the west most-steep
I watched the daylight passing o'er the deep;—
Down from the setting sun the great waves rolled
Along its seaward path of molten gold,
All the dark ocean rocks like capes of brass
Gleamed where the foam had washed them, and the grass
Grew glorious with that light, and the long swell
Line after line that followed, rose and fell
And shattered into frosted gold, the sky
Arched splendour over splendour,—isles that lie
Of crimson cloudland in pale seas of blue
Red bars of flame with one star peeping through,
Silent for glory; and the sea's monotone
Grew part with silence;—the great world rolled on
And the sun watched along the waves, until
The glow died upwards on the western hill,
And the shade saddened over all the sea
Reaching away, starward away from me
Into the twilight and Eternity.

121

II. TWILIGHT.

Late evening now, and overclouded skies
To-night we shall not see the young moon rise;
The twilight deepens, and on either hand
The cliffs are lost in mystic shadowland.
Only low sound of breakers as they die
Pale shimmer of waters and a pale still sky
Where darkness gathers on the moving sea,
And yet the child laughs light of heart with me!

Still deeper now;—one little brown-sailed bark
Glides past us seaward, drifting into dark,
The only light is on the white sea-foam
And the lamp by the crucifix: Come home!

122

III. STORM.

Night grows on the heaving ocean
With its ominous white foam flakes,
And the dizzy eternal motion
Where the crest of the wave line breaks,
With surge and swirl on the shingle
Blown on by the keen sea wind,
Surf waves that recoil and mingle
With the hurrying surf behind.

Low over the sea line yonder
The gathering cloud-ranks form,
With a gleam of the sunset under
The fringe of the boding storm.
Along the dim cliffs hollows
The voice of the water moans,
Where the wave as it follows follows
Tears on at the yielding stones.

The last day gleam departed,
Wild gusts of a storm blast came,
And out of the cloud gloom darted
The flash of the lightning flame,

123

And the pale, pale sea grew haggard
A moment under the flash,
And the line of the dark rocks staggered
And reeled from the thunder-crash:

Long loudly sullenly pealing
It died in the cliffs afar,—
And I saw that a woman was kneeling
At the cross by the harbour bar.

124

A LAST WORD.

Time now to close these pages, far away
And fainter the old hills of childhood fade,
The very graves where the young dreams are laid
Are hidden deep in autumn leaves to-day.

It may be they have brought thee nearer truth,
These hasting years, but fain wouldst thou have stayed
In the old land where trust was unbetrayed,
And love was honest in the eyes of youth.

And now it's winter, and the moon of snow
Blind mists of doubt, and chill unfriendly rain,
But somewhere, sometime in the year, we know
It must be spring and flowertime again.
Do thou but keep, though winter days be long,
Thy young love loyal, and thy young faith strong.