A Poet's Harvest Home :: :: University of Virginia Library

“Give me a pen, I will not hold you long,
But I have some few words that I would say
Before I mount, before I pass away,
Following my friends all gone; it is not wrong
What I would write, nor any foolish song,
But now I stand beside the shoreless sea,
A word or two from out my heart would flee
Not said before, that coming death makes strong.”

How many have felt thus besides the brave
Fair queen of womankind, the good Roland:
Life's long years past, both joyous years and grave
The wish descends upon the untired hand
To leave some self-drawn picture, or some stave
Of speech for those left waiting on the strand.

162

NEW YEAR BELLS.

TWO EPOCHS. I. 1831.

Long years ago, when love was lord of me
And all good gifts were in the impending year,
At this same hour I heard afar and near
These New Year bells flood heaven with melody:
I, home bound through the snow, as over sea
Voices of dear friends hail the mariner
Returning prosperous: till in their rear
Saint Paul's great voice made lesser voices flee.

What mattered then beneath those hopeful bells
The homeward walk by weary fortune given,
The obscure future whersoever driven,
In years to come; all lost in those sweet knells
High overhead, like messages from heaven.

163

TWO EPOCHS. II. 1881.

Ring out again, ye Bells of Battersea,
Over the seaward Thames while I sit here
Lamplit, with moistened eye and hungering ear,
Recalling thoughts of things once hoped to be—
Past now, forgotten almost; for to me
Those wild harmonies in the waves of air,
Changing yet still repeating, here or there,
Yet truly ordered, ring life's history.

And still I hear them lovingly, good bells,
Across the rushing river in the wind,
Fainting or rising as the tempest swells;
The river rushing like dark years behind
Chasing dark years gone by, and those sweet spells
High overhead with memories intertwined.

164

RHYME OF LOVE.

Early astir in this midsummer time
In the Queen's close, sweet hour in this sweet clime,
I stray at will to hear the throstle sing
Among the trees that round her garden cling;
I, Ronsard, in my youthood's joyous prime,
And by the Queen's desire, beneath the lime
She loves, to sing to her again the rhyme,
The daintiest of all the rhymes I bring,
My rhyme of Love.

But yet despite this July's leafy time,
The Queen's praise, birds' songs, odourous rose and thyme,
This heartache close to me, so close, will cling
Because, forsooth, the blue-eyed Lize took wing
When I yestreen began my daintiest rhyme,
My rhyme of Love.

165

SPRING.

Welcome, Spring, too long delayed,
Kindest, most reluctant maid:
Sweetest of younger sisters, simplest one
Of the bare bosomed chorus of the year.
Now last season's beech-tree leaf
Hath fallen. The crocus sends her spear
Up through the earth, a little span
Each day increasing to a sheaf.
The housewife sings the damsel's song,
The old man whistles like the boy,
Aches no more his limbs annoy,
He steps out like a sower strong.
Sweetest of younger sisters, odourous tressed
Forcefully wooed by sharp-hoofed breezes, Spring!
Thy advent knows each living thing
Through the dense deep earth impressed
With love's light touch of wondrous flame,
That sense and soul revives the same.

Summer, with her proud silence and her haze
Of heat, her gracious shadows, and her maze

166

Of leaves and undergrowths and rills
Dropping asleep beneath the cloudless hills,
Hath no such kindly wing
As thou, bird-hatching Spring.
Autumn, with her boisterous mirth
Shaking the red-ripe fruit upon the earth,
Shedding the rose leaves, each eve shedding too
From saddening clouds and stars great drops of dew,
Hath not the prophet tongue,
Like thine, thou ever young,
Young as a child, thou bride more fair,
Innocent as a blush, and strong
As a lion in a poet's song.

May I then venture near thee, in thy hair
To place this pink-edged daisy, Sweet?
Alas, 'tis mortal even there,
Mortal but saintly Margarite.
The heedless sheep goes browsing on,
The daisy from the grass is gone.
Matron Summer is coming anear,
To crown the still inconstant year:

167

But ere thou flyest, blue-eyed Spring,
It suits us well to bring,
Bound by this withy of poetry,
An offering of thine own flowers to thee.

168

WM. BLAKE'S DESIGNS FOR THE GRAVE.

SEEN AFTER MANY YEARS.

There was a time before the chick could fly,
But still was screened by the maternal wing,
He worshipped these as if they held a spring
Of living waters. Had not God on high
Shown innocent William what it was to die,
Made him to know the rapture of the pain,
When soul and body part to meet again:
Dread truths concealed within futurity.

And now that years have shriven and tortured me,
When labouring much in thriftless fields hath filled
The tablets of my memory, these burn
With their old fires, within them still I see
A hand inspired, though in his Art unskilled;
My heart leaps up, my childhood's awes return.

169

CHRISTIANITY AND PAGANISM.

ROME. TIME OF THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM.

Then face to face the New Faith and the Old,
The new Faith promising endless reign
Beyond the catacombs and martyr's pain;
The mystic doctrines sacraments enfold
The scorn of learning, the contempt of gold.
The Old Faith, fancy's foundling, faith of heart,
Lighting small lamps to Lares, by the art
Of potter or of sculptor bought and sold.

This is the day of Triumph: lo, this hour
Titus the conqueror enters, raised on high
The sacredest of Trophies borne to-day
By brutal soldiers, from them gone the power:
Yet over all the wide world goes the cry,
Awake! ye blind, arise, go hence away!

170

INFANCY.

SUGGESTED BY A RAILWAY ACCIDENT.

“Let him lie still,” the young wife cried, “right soon
I shall be back,” and on my lap she laid
Her swaddled nurseling; startled even dismayed,
I looked down on the face like a white moon,
On the closed eyes and open mouth, no spoon
Had yet touched, and could see its breathing made
The folds expand in which it was arrayed:
It was alive, yet knew not night from noon.

Beautiful was it? I can scarcely say.
I never held so young a thing before;
But wonderful it was to me, and may
Be likened to a shrine within closed door,
Closed, unlit, but from whence a breath made way
Te Deum laudamus, saying o'er and o'er.

171

AN ANNIVERSARY: THE 31st.

ADDRESSED TO A DEAR FRIEND.

Spring comes with all the firstlings of the year
Leaping around her, careless of the cold;
Soon summer's tale so charming will be told,
The last rose fall, the sun shrink as in fear;
Alas, the weeks fly faster, and more near
Yule seems to Easter, when the hair grows gray,
Sooner it seems the swallows fly away,
And wintry floes brim full the shivering weir.

What matters it, these are old ills we know
That pass us by as Chronos gives command:
But still your smile is bright as long ago,
Still can we gather shells on life's lee shore,
We still can walk like children hand in hand,
Friendship and love beside us as of yore.

172

DANTE IN EXILE.

In life we judge and estimate,
With our dearest even debate,
And strive to hold the balance true
Between the brown eyes and the blue.
But with the dead we do not so;
Shrined in the past we let them go
Their mystic journey high and far,
Until they pass the starlit bar
Dividing gods from things below:
And thus at last on chancel stones
We worship before empty thrones.

Could we wind back the skean of time
Ere Giotto's tower could bellman climb,
We might see Gemma, weary wife,
Nursing her babes in threadbare quoif—
One, two, three, four—alas they're seven,
Left to the charities of heaven!
We might see Dante, foiled in strife,
Thankless over strangers' bread,
Raking hell's fires on the dead;

173

Casting back on Florence fair
His bloodshot eyes, a hateful stare.
Not wise in guile or strong of arm,
To shield himself from bale or harm;
With powerless hate and childish lies
Inventing undreamt cruelties.

174

THE INFERNO.

A celtic Saint this tale first told,
Ere Dante's birth the saint was cold,
But he in faith with mortal eyes
Had been uplifted through the skies
And seen the winged in Paradise.

Then was he hand-led down the stair
Where Purgatorial sulphurs flare,
And round the furthest confines there
Had seen the copeless walls of Hell,
But not even angel-guides could tell
What horrors Satan might prepare
For sinners at the Judgment knell.
At that time 'twas a waste, no soul
Till the last day could reach that goal!

But Dante forestalled time, too well
He loved the pits, and loved the spell
Of friends and foes foredoomed to hell.
Alas! must we, at this late time,
Make our good God act Satan's part,

175

Accepting that accursed rhyme,
Forgiving blasphemy for art?
Is our paternal God displayed
In these vile cruelties arrayed?
Or is the poet before heaven,
Guilty of that sin ne'er forgiven?

176

RAPHAEL'S MADONNA DI SAN SISTO.

Once and once only, and no more,
Art hath reached the topmost bough;
The goodliest fruit of all his store
Our well-filled garner holds till now.

Lo! from a life-filled atmosphere
She comes with silent step, with mild
And plaintive eyes bent sadly here
Holding her prize of prizes, her man-child,
King of the world-expected year,
Safe within her queenly arms
Above all harms.

Once and once only, and no more,
Out of the sensuous classic night,
Born of the dusk mid-christian lore,
Into our midday's questioning light:
Behold! Ideal womanhood,
Maternity, supremely good,
Self sacrificing, without stain;
Goddess eternally serene,
Yet robed in thoughtful mortal mien;

177

And once, no more, the painter's art
Hath touched this mystery on the heart.
Behold her here, untouched by pain
But with foreknowledge of the day
Still far away
In darkness on the mount of death
Defiled by malefactor's breath—
When “It is finished” he shall cry,
And the immortal seem to die.
Finished? nay, but just begun
Beneath the sun.
Look at him here a child to-day.

178

MERRY ENGLAND.

England was merry in old times? Indeed!
When the worn ploughman might not leave the ground
Where he was born, and where his children found
His old shoes and nought else for all their need;
When “Benefit of Clergy” saved the deed
Of blood from punishment, and once a year
Men climbed a greasy pole for Christmas cheer,
And once in twelve months got one plenteous feed.

Merry in sooth! Astronomy was then
Astrology, the chemist's craft again
Was alchemy, and every crone grown old
Died as a witch, and you or I, sad fate!
Had given to fat Mass John our scantiest gold
For his old gown to mask us at heaven's gate!

179

THE AUTO DA FE.

I. SAINT DOMINIC.

Saint Dominic had a vision: Mary mild
Stood by him shining in her robes of light,
And warned him fire and sword, the law of might,
Should spread the faith and worship of her child.
Time passed, and holy Church the faggots piled.
In Italy, in fair Provence, in Spain,
Prayer was torn up with groans, blood fell like rain,
Pity and brotherhood thenceforth exiled.

And I too had a vision of the night:
Appalled by shrieks I rose awake! red light
Burst from a pit of fire, and far down there,
While those still rang like a dom-church bell,
I saw a carcase in the quivering lair:
Dominic it was in Dante's fieriest cell.

180

II. TORQUEMADA.

I rose in bed, repeated like a child
The dear Lord's prayer; a candle lit, and read
The Sermon on the Mount, until my head
Sank on the pillow; then too soon beguiled
By the same fever-sleep, again the wild
Horror of death-by-fire, eternally
Prolonged, possessed my senses, and the cry
Rang up, the shrieks returned; around me coiled
That vision of the pit, the pit of doom,
Where two still living corpses now consume,
Struggling together with their talons thrust
Into each others eye-holes filled with dust.
'Twas Torquemada in the maddening gloom,
And Dominic, struggling in their murderous lust.

181

CARDINAL NEWMAN.

I.

Good, learned, wise, in some sense; but to-day
Can we accept a Christopher, poor knight,
For guide, or take his lanthorn for the light
To guide our pathway, and so shunt away
Whole centuries with their severe assay
Of all the past; as if dark night were kin
To Christian wisdom, and the soul within
Was lost when powerful knowledge holdeth sway?

Can we ignore our birthright, on the back
Of packhorse can we seek the dead monk's cell,
And by the rush-wick in the thick fish-oil,
Let subtle Thomas and Duns Scotus rack
Our brains till common night-wind seems a coil
Of devils, and we trust some mad old spell!

Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven.

—Henry VI., Part 2, Act iv.

182

II.

Good Newman? well! he gives the devil his due,
Honours the Pope, whose chartered power can save
Gnostics like him on t'other side the grave,
If they but trust nought else, resign all clue
God-given through nature, holding only true
Traditional Rites, and with sealed eyes contrive
To shut out reason from their cloistered hive,
And what our mighty science teaches new.

But are they not right happy to have found
This haven? Ask the smile their thin lips feign
When workers tell of all the toils and fears
Manhood exacts each step of stable ground.
Ask the brave triumphs, the material gain
To civilization for a thousand years.

183

THE SICKLE.

AN AUTUMNAL ODE.

I.

Reach the old Sickle from the wall
Where it hath hung so long.
The reaper's re-awakening song
Sounds the autumn's annual call,
Bewildering the watchful hare
In his yet unhunted lair.
Dear old Sickle, once again
The undergrowth of poppies red,
Whose beauties on themselves were shed,
Shall dazzle soon the trembling air,
When the wheat-ears over head
Across thy curved blade have lain,
In triumph as the reaper's eye
Smiles to his fair mate jocundly.

Sacred old Sickle, while the wind
Died on the winter's crisped rind,
And the mossed thatching o'er the door
Was whiter than now is the mill's white floor,
Thou broughtest July's sun to mind:

184

And so, when May-day breezes blew,
And made each building bird renew
The search for straws and sticks, 'twas thou
For whom we blessed the fledgeling bough,
Then through high summer's long bright eves
Sat the dear saint Tranquility,
Longing to see them gild the sheaves,
And, bread-rich Sickle, glance on thee
Over the villager's shoulder flung,
Love-making fieldward, blythe and young.

II.

Most potent sun, how beautiful
Old harvest days have been,
With health and peace, the garner full,
The fields more yellow than green;
When upwards thrown on the arch that leaps
The fly-frequented stream,
Where the tired midday traveller sleeps,
Danced ever-more the ripple's gleam,
And on its ledge a white-haired child
Sat for idling hours beguiled,

185

Peeping down right cautiously
A glimmering water friend to see
Smiling from beneath, with hair
Like his own but still more fair.
Beside him laid the bunch of grain,
His earnings in the gleaning train
Then seen through hedge-rows here and there,
Gay in their sun-bright rustic dress,
Where the binder rears the sheaves
At intervals in grouped caress,
Joking wisely as he leaves
Each rustling girth of fruitfulness,
And the looped-up damsels go
Far down the field, now fast, now slow,
Now resting in the sultry air,
Or throwing back betimes their hair
As it falls before their eyes
When they stoop or when they rise.

III.

Beloved Sickle, thou hast been
Where lyre or sword were never seen,

186

And round thee, like the ivy screen
Around a faun's brown knotted hair,
Clung hopes and fears and blessings rare.
In a warmer clime
In a distant time
A goddess held thee in her hand
About whose head's immortal band
Were braided ears of bearded corn,
More loved than even the halo borne
By Phœbus or than Dian's horn.
Round this maternal-goddess' shrine
There was a flower-encircled glow
Of fruitage and of wine,
To her the autumnal overflow
Was borne with hymns divine.
This goddess is departed now,
No more she guides the timely plough,
It grides along alone:
No more men light her temple dim,
Aud the consecrating hymn,
Dear Sickle, long hath been thine own.

187

IV.

The goddess gone! ah, no more here
But wrapt up with our school-boy gear
Of dactyl and trochee, no more
On this side of the Stygean shore!
The Sickle too, when I was young,
A doleful when, so long ago!
Was polished bright though never sung.
But now alack, it too must go
Among forgotten things too slow
For these our frantic hours of speed:
No more the boast of kirtled maid,
It rusts among the long decayed;
Nor more, like Ruth, the gleaner need
Stoop her flexile back to-day.
Make clear the way!
The grand machine with man and steed,
And countless knives and clash of steel,
Passing on its dangerous fray,
Makes the child run, the old man reel.

188

Nor there the end, with welcome sway
From prairies vast the steamship braves
The grim Atlantic's mightiest waves,
Filled with grain from that far land.
The farmer turns his eyes away,
The Sickle dropping from his hand

189

VOICES OF SUNSET CLOUDS.

1ST.
Sister with the crimson crest
And broad wings of every die,
Come ye from the eagle's nest,
On the mountain turrets high,
Or from kissing the lake below
Swimming thus so softly slow?
Round thy folded feet the breeze
Languishes in blissful ease,
Holding his breath for beauty's sake
Till he hath passed thee unawake.
Our father-sun is gone to sea,
Come thou after him with me.

2ND.
Sister, yes, we shall entwine
Our arms and wings, both thine and mine,
Then wait for me, too fast you stray
Adown that steep though golden way
To the far home of yesterday.

190

Behold! the messengers are still
Shedding flame on wave and hill;
Shield me in thy saffron vest,
So may we in its folds be pressed
Together, and together move
Like lovers in their day of love,
With like colour, and like motion,
Across that fearful, glittering ocean.

1ST.
Foot to foot and hand to hand,
Over sea as over land:
Hark, the children on the strand
Are singing at their evening play.
Can you hear them, what they say?

2ND.
They are too far, too far away:
But still I see them on the sand
Run before the breaking spray,
And I can see the curfew bell

191

Swinging in the fretted spire,
Lit up in a bright farewell,
Like a pyramid of fire.

1ST.
But now, oh sister, what are these,
So many and so swift, astray
Up hither far from fields and trees?
They dart right through us like a breeze
With forked tails, strange birds are they.

2ND.
Swallows are they following
Our father-sun to a warmer land;
Swallows, swallows, strong of wing,
Seeking Afric's heated sand—
Already they have passed away,
Lost until another spring.

1ST.
Another spring! another year!
But we are only for a day—

192

Already I am faint with fear.
Behold those fishermen return
Home across the darkening bay,
Their oars give off that ghastly spray
Where the shoreward surf they spurn.

2ND.
For a day, ah well you say
Only for a single day.
Dank and cold
And shapeless grows thy mantle's fold.
But where art thou? gone, gone from me
Over the wind-swept darkening sea,
Alas, and I must follow thee.

193

A LAST WALK, IN ILLNESS.

Let's close the book, and underneath the blue
Stepping again where innocent daisies grow,
Sweet daisies the child's playthings long ago;
Feel the spring wind as then it briskly blew,
And hear as then we heard the shrill curlew;
Make friends with the slow cow upon the lea,
And seated on this height behold the sea.
Dear ancient sights, for me again so new.

The darkening sea, alas! night comes apace,
The sun hath touched his cloud-strewn misty goal;
To-day as every day he wins the race:
Homeward we turn, homeward we still must look
When Nature, the stern step-dame of the soul,
Closes for evermore life's half-read book.

194

THE FURTHER SHORE.

Life's half-read book, for we are well aware
We cannot know it to its furthest end:
But still we hope the coming page may mend
Its story, and our sun shine out more fair;
That infant laughter may light age's care;
That Good and Evil's ravelled skeins shall blend
In closer harmony like friend with friend,
And God's love never leave us anywhere.

But now the book is closed, the dusk falls low
Upon the unknown sea: For me no more
The Pleiades and Bear will shine: I go;
My unknown home is on the further shore,
And when my darkened eyes mark nought below
The Mighty Hand shall guide me as before.