The Collected Poems of Lord De Tabley :: :: University of Virginia Library

The fleecy fragments of a roseleaf cloud,
Parted, unveils the central silver peaks
And steeps with amber all the mountain land,
Where Ætna, spectral with granitic brows,
Impends upon the far-cragged island shores.
There the Trinacrian downs are loveliest;
Their blue ravines unmatched in pastoral flowers,
There ripen fast the scarlet-fruited globes
Of Arbutus distinct along the cliffs.
The headlong brooks festoon their sides with vine,
Tendril and bunch of changing amethyst;
And in among the rows the vineyard men
Sing in their houses. Under and away,
In channels of the silent shoaling sea
The far Tyrrhenian islets fringe the foam,
And draw the purple of the evening sun
Into their hills, volcanic outlines grand,
That waver in the violet-tinged verge,
Half-cloud, half island, set in mirrored sea,
Where the great changes of the ocean pass.

Why art thou silent, voice of my desire?
Sweet mountain nymph, more lovely than the dawn,
Whose regal eyes are wondrous like the sea,
Whose face excels all nature's coloured shows,—
As thou art radiant, so be pitiful.
Make firm my doubts with kisses, lest I feel
This mighty dream unreal; lest the touch
Of thy sweet hand seem but the mock of sleep.
Bend thine eyes, beautiful with all their light,
Full on my face: let thy lips follow them,
Lest I should fear delusion, and awake
Hereafter weeping for a phantom joy.

472

What have I done to guerdon such a gift?
How shall I rise up worthy of my sweet?
Honour enough for me and my poor lips
To kiss the little broken cistus bud
Which on some flowery slope thy rosy feet
Have bruised and half dispetalled, in the dust.

Why hast thou given me this wealth of joy,
And hast adorned love's burnished altar-sides
With the red splendour of thy sacrifice,
And beaming garlands, fit for passion's brows,
And secrets from the treasuries of love?
Thou art as liberal morning in thy gifts,
And I as niggard night, whose empty hands
Absorb thy fragrance and repay my gloom.
In thy beatitude I am but a leaf
Bathed in the new beam of thy radiant eyes.

I am only a dewdrop shaken from the stars
Of thy transcendent glory: a grain of sand
Steeped in an affluent river's fervid roll
Of sheer Pactolian gold, or pure Choaspes,
The drink of Persian kings in jewelled cups.

What have I done to merit love of thine?
Wonder of Eros, this and thus was I:
The dull weak thing, whose instinct at thy face
Drave him to fall in adoration prone.
Before thy beauty, terrible as fire,
His feeble nature faltered as in flame.
Marvel of love, whose empire alters all,
Since thou hast deigned to raise me to thy smile;
As the moon calls a low and earth-born cloud
To ascend and glisten in her glorious arms,
Till in his vapour all her form is lost;
But he, who veils her round, glows more and more.

As in a silence of warm air the lark
Sings, in thy love my spirit is content;
As in a waste of many buds the bee
Is busy with much perfume, till it tire;
I am broken with the sweetness of my love.
I feel thy spirit brooding in serene
Completeness, deep as ether, pure as dew.
The still hours come and watch us and depart.
At length, as when the glory of a star

473

Goes out of heaven and leaves the saddened verge
To gray lament and clouds uncrimsoning;—
Thou dost arise, and in thy leaving me,
Soothest my burning forehead with thy hand.
Or in caress, that runs before farewell,
I watch thee gather back thy heavy curls
Disordered; leaning in a silent care
To smile, before thy lips are moved to mine;
Lest I should lose thy smile, as intense light
Is lost if men consider it too near.
So leaning drink my soul into thine own;
Have thy fond arm about me, and begin
A murmuring breath in whisper, as the talk
Of mated swallows when their nest is laid.
Ah, but to rest with thy sweet serious eyes
Above my slumber, thy smooth cheek on mine:
And let the ringlet flakes efface the day
With clustered ripples from my glowing eyes.
For surely they who love become as gods
Knowing all wisdom; and thy love shall draw
My faltering soul invested in its power,
Out and beyond this tumult we call Time,
Where the loud fruitless billows heave themselves,
Where the long aimless clouds roll and are lost.
Where all things drift to the dread shadow of gods,
The Cherub Death, whose lips are soft with sleep.

Across the exultant lyre-beat of our love
Intrudes a chord of doom; a moaning wire;
Death lays his hushing finger on the notes.
The horrid cadence changes at its close,
And dies away in discord with a wail.
Let the song cease. Ah me, my beautiful,
Let us be very busy with our joy.
While there is light above and the sweet air,
Let us make harvest in the tangled meads
And deep redundant meadows of the May.
Let us be misers of our hours of June.
Let all else fade, I have enough in thee.
Love, let us crown and build his altar well,
The King of Time, Lord of the fleeting day.
Thine eyes, thine eyes are on me, and thy palm
Is wound with mine: thy lucid orbs resume
Old tenderness, and wean me from the thought
Beyond thine arms. Thine instant, love, is more
Than all the deep hereafter, dim with cloud.

474

What matter if around us every field
Is sprinkled with immeasurable graves?
I heed not, if love leave me merely this,
Only that I may hear thy tender sighs
And feel thy tears and smiles are all for me.
While this endures, why should I question more?
Beautiful dream, whose red Aurora fades,
Before thy dew dries on the myrtle leaf,
O perfect vision of love, one little hour,
Be patient, in thy plenitude abide,
And till it perish, leave us hand in hand,
To watch the Tyrian changes of the woods,
The wave against the vineyard, and the cloud
That crowns the peak of Ætna like a tower.

July 16th, 1895.