• And the souls mounting up to God
• Went by her like thin flames.

• And still she bowed above the vast
• Waste sea of worlds that swarm;
• Until her bosom must have made
• The bar she leaned on warm,
• And the lilies lay as if asleep
• Along her bended arm.

• From the fixed place of Heaven she saw
• 10 Time like a pulse shake fierce
• Through all the worlds. Her gaze still strove
• Within the gulf to pierce
• Its path; and now she spoke as when
• The stars sang in their spheres.

• The sun was gone now; the curled moon
• Was like a little feather
• Fluttering far down the gulf; and now
• She spoke through the still weather.
• Her voice was like the voice the stars
• 20 Had when they sang together.

• ‘I wish that he were come to me,
• For he will come,’ she said.
• ‘Have I not prayed in Heaven?—on earth,
• Lord, Lord, has he not pray'd?
• Are not two prayers a perfect strength?
• And shall I feel afraid?

• ‘When round his head the aureole clings,
• And he is clothed in white,
• I'll take his hand and go with him
• 30 To the deep wells of light;
• We will step down as to a stream,
• And bathe there in God's sight.

• ‘We two will stand beside that shrine,
• Occult, withheld, untrod,
• Whose lamps are stirred continually
• With prayer sent up to God;
• And see our old prayers, granted, melt
• Each like a little cloud.

• ‘We two will lie i' the shadow of
• 40 That living mystic tree
• Within whose secret growth the Dove
• Is sometimes felt to be,
• While every leaf that h His plumes touch
• Saith h His n Name audibly.

• ‘And I myself will teach to him,
• I myself, lying so,
• The songs I sing here; which his voice
• Shall pause in, hushed and slow,
• And find some knowledge at each pause,
• 50 Or some new thing to know.’

• ( Ah Sweet! Just now, in that bird's song,
• Strove not her accents there,

   

• Master of the murmuring courts
• Where the shapes of sleep convene!—
• Lo! my spirit here exhorts
• All the powers of thy demesne
• For their aid to woo my queen.
• What reports
• Yield thy jealous courts unseen?

• Vapourous, unaccountable,
• Dreamland lies unknown to light,
• 10Hollow like a breathing shell.
• Ah! that from those dreams I might
• Choose one dream and guide its flight . !
• I know well
• What her sleep should tell to-night.

• There the dreams are multitudes:
• Some whose bouyance waits not sleep,
• Deep within the August woods;
• Some that hum while rest may steep
• Weary labour laid a-heap;
• 20 Interludes,
• Some, of grievous moods that weep.

• Thence are youth's warm fancies: there
  Added TextPoets' fancies all are there:
• Women thrill with whisperings
  Added TextThere the elf-girls flood with wings
• Valleys full of plaintive air;
• There breathe perfumes; there in rings
• Whirl the foam-bewildered springs;
• Siren there
• Winds her dizzy hair and sings.

• Thence the one dream mutually
• 30 Dreamed in bridal unison,
• Less than waking ecstasy;
• Half-formed visions that make moan
• In the house of birth alone;
• And what we
• At death's wicket see, unknown.

• But for mine own sleep, it lies
• Lo!
• In one gracious queen's form's control,
• Fair with honorable eyes,
• Lamps of an auspicious soul:
• 40 O their glance is loftiest dole,
• Sweet and wise,
• Wherein Love descries his goal.

• Reft of her, my dreams are all
• Clammy trance that fears the sky:
• Changing footpaths shift and fall;
• From polluted coverts nigh,
• Miserable phantoms sigh;
• Quakes the pall,
• And the funeral goes by.

• 50Master, bid my shadow bend
• Whispering thus till birth of light,
• Lest new shapes that sleep may send
• Scatter all its work to flight;—
• Master, master of the night,
• Bid it spend
• Speech, song, prayer, and end aright.

• Yet, ah me! if at her head
• There another phantom lean
• Murmuring o'er the fragrant bed,—
• 60Ah! and if my spirit's queen
• Smile those alien words between,—
• Ah! poor shade!
• Shall it strive, or fade unseen?

• Like a vapour wan and mute,
• Like a flame, so let it pass;
• One low sigh across her lute,
• One dull breath against her glass;
• And to my sad soul, alas!
• One salute
• 70 Cold as when death's foot shall pass.

• How should Love's own messenger
• Strive with love and be love's foe?
• Master, nay! If thus in her
• Sleep a wedded heart should show,—
• Silent let mine image go,
• Its old share
• Of thy sunken air to know.

• Then, too, let all hopes of mine,
• All vain hopes by night and day,
• 80Master, at thy summoning sign
• Rise up pallid and obey.
• Dreams, if this is thus, were they:—
• Be they thine,
• And to dreamland pine away.

• (So a chief, who all night lies
• Ambushed where no help appears,—
• 'Mid his comrades' unseen eyes
• Watching for the growth of spears,—
• Like their ghosts, as morning nears,
• 90 Sees them rise,
• Ready without sighs or tears.)

• Yet from old time, life, not death,
• Master, in thy rule is rife:
• Lo! through thee, with mingling breath,
• Adam woke beside his wife.
• O Love bring me so, for strife,
• Force and faith,
• Bring me so not death but life!

• Yea, to Love himself is pour'd
• 100 This frail song of hope and fear.
• Thou art Love, of one accord
• With kind Sleep to bring her near,
• Still-eyed, deep-eyed, ah how dear!
• Master, Lord,
• In her name implor'd, O hear!

   

• In our Museum galleries
• To-day I lingered o'er the prize
• Dead Greece vouchsafes to living eyes,—
• Her Art for ever in fresh wise
• From hour to hour rejoicing me.
• Sighing I turned at last to win
• Once more the London dirt and din;
• And as I made the swing-door spin
• And issued, they were hoisting in
• 10 A wingèd beast from Nineveh.

• A human face the creature wore,
• And hoofs behind and hoofs before,
• And flanks with dark runes fretted o'er.
• 'Twas bull, 'twas mitred Minotaur,
• A dead disbowelled mystery;
• The mummy of a buried faith
• Stark from the charnel without scathe,
• Its wings stood for the light to bathe,—
• Such fossil cerements as might swathe
• 20 The very corpse of Nineveh.

• The print of its first rush-wrapping,
• Wound ere it dried, still ribbed the thing.
• What song did the brown maidens sing,
• From purple mouths alternating,
• When that was woven languidly?
• What vows, what rites, what prayers preferr'd,
• What songs has the strange image heard?
• In what blind vigil stood interr'd
• For ages, till an English word
• 30 Broke silence first at Nineveh?

• Oh when upon each sculptured court,
• Where even the wind might not resort,—
• O'er which Time passed, of like import
• With the wild Arab boys at sport,—
• A living face looked in to see:—
• Oh seemed it not—the spell once broke—
• As though the carven warriors woke,
• As though the shaft the string forsook,
• The cymbals clashed, the chariots shook,
• 40 And there was life in Nineveh?

• On London stones our sun anew
• The beast's recovered shadow threw.
• (No shade that plague of darkness knew,
• No light, no shade, while older grew
• By ages the old earth and sea.)
• Lo thou! could all thy priests have shown
• Such proof to make thy godhead known?
page: 15  
Manuscript Addition: This is part of The Burden of Nineveh.
Editorial Description: Note in unknown hand.
• From their dead Past thou liv'st alone;
• And still thy shadow is thine own
• 50 Even as of yore in Nineveh.

• That day whereof we keep record,
• When near thy city-gates the Lord
• Sheltered his Jonah with a gourd,
• This sun, (I said) here present, pour'd
• Even thus this shadow that I see.
• This shadow has been shed the same
• From sun and moon,—from lamps which came
• For prayer,—from fifteen days of flame,
• The last, while smouldered to a name
• 60 Sardanapalus' Nineveh.

• Within thy shadow, haply, once
• Sennacherib has knelt, whose sons
• Smote him between the altar-stones:
• Or pale Semiramis her zones
• Of gold, her incense brought to thee,
• In love for grace, in war for aid:....
• Ay, and who else?....till 'neath thy shade
• Within his trenches newly made
• Last year the Christian knelt and pray'd—
• 70 Not to thy strength—in Nineveh.*

• Now, thou poor god, within this hall
• Where the blank windows blind the wall
• From pedestal to pedestal,
• The kind of light shall on thee fall
• Which London takes the day to be:
• While school-foundations in the act
• Of holiday, three files compact,
• Shall learn to view thee as a fact
• Connected with that zealous tract:
• 80 ‘Rome,—Babylon and Nineveh.’

• Deemed they of this, those worshippers,
• When in some mythic chain of verse,
• Which man shall not again rehearse,
• The faces of thy ministers
• Yearned pale with bitter ecstasy?
• Greece, Egypt, Rome,—did any god
• Before whose feet men knelt unshod
• Deem that in this unblest abode
• Another scarce more unknown god
• 90 Should house with him from Nineveh?

• Ah! in what quarries lay the stone
• From which this pigmy pile has grown,
• Unto man's need how long unknown,
• Since thy vast temples, court and cone,
• Rose far in desert history?
• Ah! what is here that does not lie
• All strange to thine awakened eye?

• Some tribe of the Australian plough
• Bear him afar,—a relic now
• 100 Of London, not of Nineveh!

• Or it may chance indeed that when
• Man's age is hoary among men,—
• His centuries threescore and ten,—
• His furthest childhood shall seem then
• More clear than later times may be:
• Who, finding in this desert place
• This form, shall hold us for some race
• That walked not in Christ's lowly ways,
• But bowed its pride and vowed its praise
• 110 Unto the God of Nineveh.

• The smile rose first,—anon drew nigh
• The thought:... Those heavy wings spread high
• So sure of flight, which do not fly;
• That set gaze never on the sky;
• Those scriptured flanks it cannot see;
• Its crown, a brow-contracting load;
• Its planted feet which trust the sod:...
• (So grew the image as I trod:)
• O Nineveh, was this thy God,—
• 120 Thine also, mighty Nineveh?

   

• ‘Who rules own s these lands?’ the Pilgrim said.
• ‘Stranger, Queen Blanchelys.’
• ‘And who has thus harried them?’ he said.
• ‘It was Duke Luke did this:
• God's ban be his!’

• The Pilgrim said: ‘Where is your house?
• I'll rest there, with your will.’
• ‘Ye've but to climb these blackened boughs
• And ye'll see it over the hill,
• 10 For it burns still.’

• ‘Which road, to seek your Queen?’ said he.
• ‘Nay, nay, but with some wound
• Thou'lt You'll fly back hither, it may be,
• And by thy your blood i'the ground
• My place be found.’

• ‘Friend, stay in peace. God keep thy head,
• And mine, where I will go;
• For He is here and there,’ he said.
• He passed the hill-side, slow,
• 20 And stood below.

• The Queen sat idle by her loom:
• She heard the arras stir,
• And looked up sadly: through the room
• The sweetness sickened her
• Of musk and myrrh.

• Her women, standing two and two,
• In silence combed the fleece.
• The pilgrim said, ‘Peace be with you,
• Lady;’ and bent his knees.
• 30 She answered, ‘Peace.’

• Her eyes were like the wave within;
• Like water-reeds the poise
• Of her soft body, dainty thin;
• And like the water's noise
• Her plaintive voice.

• For him, the stream had never well'd
• In desert tracts malign
• So sweet; nor had he ever felt
• So faint in the sunshine
• 40 Of Palestine.

• Right so, he knew that he saw weep
• Each night through every dream
• The Queen's own face, confused in sleep
• With visages supreme
• Not known to him.

   

• ‘But he says, till you take back your ban,
• Sister Helen,
• His soul would pass, yet never can.’
• ‘Nay then, shall I slay a living man,
• Little brother?’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• A living soul, between Hell and Heaven!)

• ‘But he calls for ever on your name,
• Sister Helen,
• 10 And says that he melts before a flame.’
• ‘My heart for his pleasure fared the same,
• Little brother.’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• Fire at the heart, between Hell and Heaven!)

• ‘Here's Holm of West Holm riding fast,
• Sister Helen,
• For I know the white plume on the blast.’
• ‘The hour, the sweet hour I forecast,
• Little brother!’
• 20 ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• Is the hour sweet, between Hell and Heaven?)

• ‘He stops to speak, and he stills his horse,
• Sister Helen;
• But his words are drowned in the wind's course.’
• ‘Nay hear, nay hear, you must hear perforce,
• Little brother!’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• A word ill heard, between Hell and Heaven!)

• ‘Oh he says that Holm of Ewern's cry,
• 30 Sister Helen,
• Is ever to see you ere he die.’
• ‘He sees me in earth, in moon and sky,
• Little brother!’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• Earth, moon and sky, between Hell and Heaven!)

• ‘He sends a ring and a broken coin,
• Sister Helen,
• And bids you mind the banks of Boyne.’
• ‘What else he broke will he ever join,
• 40 Little brother?’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• Oh, never more, between Hell and Heaven!)

• ‘He yields you these and craves full fain,
• Sister Helen,
• You pardon him in his mortal pain.’
• ‘What else he took will he give again,
• Little brother?’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• No more again, between Hell and Heaven!)

• 50‘He calls your name in an agony,
• Sister Helen,
• That even dead Love must weep to see.’
• ‘Hate, born of Love, is blind as he,
• Little brother!’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• Love turned to hate, between Hell and Heaven!)

• ‘Oh it's Holm of Holm now that rides fast,
• Sister Helen,
• For I know the white hair on the blast.’
• 60‘The short short hour will soon be past,
• Little brother!’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• Will soon be past, between Hell and Heaven!)

• ‘He looks at me and he tries to speak,
• Sister Helen,
• But oh! his voice is sad and weak!’
• ‘What here should the mighty Baron seek,
• Little brother?’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• 70 Oh vainly sought, between Hell and Heaven!)

• ‘Oh his son still cries, if you forgive,
• Sister Helen,
• The body dies but the soul shall live.’
• ‘Fire shall forgive me as I forgive,
• Little brother!’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• Is this forgiven As she forgives, between Hell and Heaven ? ! )

• ‘Oh he prays you, as his heart would rive,
• Sister Helen,
• 80 To save his dear son's soul alive.’
• ‘Nay, flame cannot slay it, it shall thrive,
• Little brother!’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• Alas, alas, between Hell and Heaven!)

• ‘He cries to you, kneeling in the road,
• Sister Helen,
• To go with him for the love of God!’
• ‘The way is long to his son's abode,
• Little brother.’
• 90 ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• The way is long, between Hell and Heaven!)

• ‘O Sister Helen, you heard the bell,
• Sister Helen!
• More loud than the vesper-chime it fell.’
• ‘No vesper-chime, but a dying knell,
• Little brother!’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• His dying knell, between Hell and Heaven!)

• ‘Alas! but I fear the heavy sound,
• 100 Sister Helen;
• Is it in the sky or in the ground?’
• ‘Say, have they turned their horses round,
• Little brother?’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• What would she more, between Hell and Heaven?)

• ‘They have raised the old man from his knee,
• Sister Helen,
• And they ride in silence hastily.’
• ‘More fast the naked soul doth flee,
• 110 Little brother!’
• ( O Mother, Mary Mother,
• The naked soul, between Hell and Heaven!)

   

• Could you not drink her gaze like wine?
• Yet though its splendour swoon
• Into the silence languidly
• As a tune into a tune,
• Those eyes unravel the coiled night
• And know the stars at noon.

• The gold that's heaped beside her hand,
• In truth rich prize it were;
• And rich the dreams that wreathe her brows
• 10 With magic stillness there;
• And he were rich who should unwind
• That woven golden hair.

• Around her, where she sits, the dance
• Now breathes its eager heat;
• And not more lightly or more true
• Fall there the dancer's feet
• Than fall her cards on the bright board
• As 'twere an heart that beat.

• Her fingers let them softly through,
• 20 Smooth polished silent things;
• And each one as it falls reflects
• In swift light-shadowings,
• Crimson and purple, green and blue,
• The great eyes of her rings.

• Whom plays she with? With thee, who lov'st
• Those gems upon her hand;
• With me, who search her secret brows;
• With all men, bless'd or bann'd.
• We play together, she and we,
• 30 Within a vain strange land:

• A land without any order,—
• Day even as night, (one saith,)—
• Where who lieth down ariseth not
• Nor the sleeper awakeneth;
• A land of darkness as darkness itself
• And of the shadow of death.

• What be her cards, you ask? Even these:—
• The heart, that doth but crave
• Yet more, being fed; the diamond,
• 40 Skilled to make base seem brave;
• The club, for smiting in the dark;
• The spade, to dig a grave.

• And do you ask what game she plays?
• With him me 'tis lost or won;
page: 61  
• With thee it is playing still; with him him
• It is not well begun;
• But 'tis a game she plays with all
• Beneath the sway o' the sun.

• Thou seest the card that falls,—she knows
• 50 The card that followeth:
• Her game in thy tongue is called Life,
• As ebbs thy daily breath:
• When she shall speak, thou'lt learn her tongue
• And know she calls it Death.

   

• She fell asleep on Christmas Eve , :
• At length her eyes were in the shade
• Of weary lids; her arms, uplaid,
• Covered her bosom, I believe.

• Our mother, who had leaned all day
• Over the bed from chime to chime,
• Then raised herself for the first time,
• And as she sat her down, did pray.

• Her little work-table was spread
• 10 With work to finish. For the glare
• Made by her candle, she had care
• To work some distance from the bed.

• Without, there was a cold moon up,
• To winter midnight near akin;
  Added TextOf [indecipherable—possibly "sharpened"] winter radiance sheer and thin;
• The hollow halo it was in
• Was like an empty silver icy crystal cup.

• Through the small room, with subtle sound
• Of flame, by vents the fireshine drove
• And reddened. In its dim alcove
• 20The mirror shed a clearness round.

• I had been sitting up some nights,
• And my tired mind felt weak and blank;
• Like a sharp strengthening wine , it drank
• The stillness and the broken lights.

• Twelve struck. That sound, which all the years
• Hear in each hour, crept off; and then
• The ruffled silence spread again,
• Like water that a pebble stirs.

• Our mother rose from where she sat , :
• 30 Her needles, as she laid them down,
• Met lightly, and her silken gown
• Settled: no other noise than that.

• ‘Glory unto the Newly Born!’
• So, as said angels, she did say;
• Because we were in Christmas Day,
• Though it would still be long till morn.

• Just then in the room over us
• There was a pushing back of chairs,
• As some who had sat unawares
• 40So late, now heard the hour, and rose.

• With anxious softly -stepping haste
• Our mother went where Margaret lay,
• Fearing the sounds o'erhead—should they
• Have broken her long watched-for rest!

• She stooped an instant, calm, and turned;
• But suddenly turned back again;
• And all her features seemed in pain
• With woe, and her eyes gazed and yearned.

• For my part, I but hid my face,
• 50 And held my breath, and spake no word:
• There was none spoken; but I heard
• The silence for a little space.

• Our mother bowed herself and wept , :
• And both my arms fell, and I said ; ,
• ‘God knows I knew that she was dead , .’
• And there, all white, my sister slept.

• Then kneeling, upon Christmas morn
• A little after twelve o'clock
• We said, ere the first quarter struck,
• 60‘Christ's blessing on the newly born!’

   

• John of Tours is back with peace,
• But he comes home ill at ease.

• ‘Good-morrow, mother.’ ‘Good-morrow, son;
• Your wife has borne you a little one.’

• ‘Go now, mother, go before,
• Make me a bed upon the floor;

• ‘Very low your foot must fall,
• That my wife hear not at all.’

• As it neared the midnight toll,
• 10John of Tours gave up his soul.

• ‘Tell me now, my mother, my dear,
• What's the singing that I hear?’

• ‘Daughter, it's the troops priests in rows
• Going round about our house.’

• ‘Tell me though, my mother, my dear,
• What's the knocking that I hear?’

• ‘Daughter, it's the carpenter
• Mending planks upon the stair.’

• ‘Well, but tell, my mother, my dear,
• 20What's the crying that I hear?’

• ‘Daughter, the children are awake,
• Crying with their teeth that ache.’

• ‘Nay, but say, my mother, my dear,
• Why do you stand weeping here?’

• ‘Oh! the truth must be said,—
• It's that John of Tours is dead.’

• ‘Mother, let the sexton know
• That the grave must be for two;

• ‘Aye, and still have room to spare,
• 30For you must lay the baby there.’

   

• Inside my father's close,
• (Fly away O my heart away!)
• Sweet apple-blossom blows
• So sweet.

• Three king's daughters fair,
• (Fly away O my heart away!)
• They lie below it there
• So sweet.

• ‘Ah!’ says the eldest one,
• 10 (Fly away O my heart away!)
• ‘I think the day's begun
• So sweet.’

• ‘Ah!’ says the second one,
• (Fly away O my heart away!)
• ‘Far off I hear the drum
• So sweet.’

• ‘Ah!’ says the youngest one,
• (Fly away O my heart away!)
• ‘It's my true love, my own,
• 20 So sweet. ’

• ‘Oh! if he fight and win,’
• (Fly away O my heart away!)
• ‘I keep my love for him,
• So sweet:
• Oh! if he lose or win,
• He hath it still complete.’

   

• I.
• Like the sweet apple which reddens upon the topmost
• bough,
• A-top on the topmost twig,—which the pluckers forgot,
• somehow,—
• Forgot it not, nay, but got it not, for none could get it
• till now.

• II.
• Like the wild hyacinth flower which on the hills is found,
• Which the passing feet of the shepherds for ever tear and
• wound,
• Until the purple blossom is trodden into the ground.

       

• I said: ‘Nay, pluck not,—let the first fruit be:
• Even as thou sayest, it is sweet and red,
• Yet it shall But let it ripen still. The tree's bent head
• Sees in the stream its own fecundity
• And bides the day of fulness. Shall not we
• At heat's high the sun's hour that day possess the shade,
• And claim our fruit before its ripeness fade,
• And eat it from the branch and praise the tree?’

• I say: ‘Alas! our fruit hath wooed the sun
• 10 Too long,—'tis fallen and floats adown the stream.
• Lo, the last clusters! Pluck them every one,
• And let us sup with summer; ere the gleam
• Of autumn set the year's pent sorrow free,
• And the woods wail like echoes of from the sea.’

   

• When first that horse, within whose populous womb
• The birth was Death, o'ershadowed Troy with fate,
• Her elders, dubious of its Grecian freight,
• Brought Helen there to sing the songs of home:
• She whispered, ‘Friends, I am alone; come, come!’
• Then, crouched within, Ulysses waxed afraid,
• And on his comrades' quivering mouths he laid
• His hands, and held them till the voice was dumb.

• The same was he who, lashed to his own mast,
• 10
  Added TextThere where the sea flowers screen the charmed caves,
• Beside the sirens' singing island pass'd,
• Till sweetness failed along the inveterate sea, waves....
• Say, soul,—and doth no fatal song for us
  
  Prove yet than any crown more rapturous,
  Added TextSay, soul,—are songs of Death no heaven to thee,
• No death's lip shame the cheek of victory?
  Added TextNor shames her lip the cheek of Victory?

   

• Get thee behind me. Even as, heavy-curled,
• Stooping against the wind, a charioteer
• Is caught from out his chariot by the hair,
• So shall Time be; and as the void car, hurled
• Abroad by reinless steeds, even so the world:
• Yea, even as chariot-dust upon the air,
• It shall be sought and not found anywhere.
• Get thee behind me, Satan. Oft unfurled,
• Thy perilous wings can beat and break like lath
• 10 Much mightiness of men to win thee praise.
• Leave these weak feet to tread in narrow ways.
• Thou still, upon the broad vine-sheltered path,
• May 'st wait the turning of the phials of wrath
• For certain years, for certain months and days.

   

• Say, is it day, is it dusk in thy bower,
• Thou whom I long for, who longest for me?
• Oh! be it light, be it night, 'tis Love's hour,
• Love's that is fettered as Love's that is free.
• Free Love has leaped to that innermost chamber,
• Oh! the last time, and the hundred before:
• Fettered Love, motionless, can but remember,
• Yet something that sighs from him passes the door.

• What were my prize, could I enter thy bower,
• 10 This day, to-morrow, at eve or at morn?
• Large lovely arms and a neck like a tower,
• Bosom then heaving that now lies forlorn.
• Deep in warm pillows (the sun's bed is colder!)
• Thy sweetness all near me, so distant to-day;
• My hand round thy neck and thy hand on my shoulder,
• My mouth to thy mouth as the world melts away.

• What is it keeps me afar from thy bower,—
• My spirit, my body, so fain to be there?
• Waters engulfing or fires that devour?—
• 20 Earth heaped against me or death in the air?

• Nay, but in day-dreams, for terror, for pity,
• The trees wave their heads with an omen to tell;
• Nay, but in night-dreams, throughout the dark city,
• The hours, clashed together, lose count in the bell.

• Shall I not one day remember thy bower,
• One day when all days are one day to me?—
• Thinking, ‘I stirred not, and yet had the power,’—
• Yearning, ‘Ah God, if again it might be!’
• Peace, peace! such a small lamp illumes, on this highway,
• 30 So dimly so few steps in front of my feet,—
• Yet shows me that her way is parted from my way....
• Out of sight, beyond light, at what point goal shall we meet?

   

• At length their long kiss severed, with sweet smart:
• And as the last slow sudden drops are shed
• From sparkling eaves when all the storm has fled,
• So singly flagged the pulses of each heart.
• Their bosoms sundered, with the opening start
• Of married flowers to either side outspread
• From the knit stem; yet still their mouths, burnt red,
• Chirped at Moaned toeach other where they lay apart.

• Sleep sank them lower than the tide of dreams,
• 10 And their dreams watched them sink, and slid away.
• Slowly their souls swam up again, through gleams
• Of watered light and dull drowned waifs of day;
• Till from some wonder of new woods and streams
• He woke, and wondered more: for there she lay.