Poems. (Privately Printed.): Proofs for the Second Trial Book (partial), Princeton/Troxell. Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1 Used with permission of Princeton University. From the Princeton University Library, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections. All rights reserved. Redistribution or republication in any medium requires express written consent from Princeton University Library. Permissions inquiries should be addressed to Associate University Librarian, Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library. [Untitled] Dante Gabriel Rossetti Strangeways and Walden London 1869 November 25-26 This is a set of proof pages for the Second Trial Book. [1]-[3], 27-32, 65-90, 95-140, 161-162, 165-168, 171-210 DGR DGR Princeton U. Library, Troxell Collection 23304 8 29 crown octavo, 18.5 x 12.1 cm Commentary
Introduction

Following Troxell, Fraser represents these proofs as an early state of the Second Trial Book pulled before the 25 November printing. Lewis follows this view, which is not correct (see 186 ). These pages are a partial (uncorrected) set of the second state of the Second Trial Book which was pulled around 25 November. They were probably kept by DGR for reference purposes as he was engaged in his elaborate process of revisions.

Textual History: Composition

Textual History: Revision

Production History

Reception History

Iconographic

Printing History

Pictorial

Historical

Literary

Translation

Autobiographical

Bibliographic

Lewis, <hi rend="i"> <xref doc="a.z1024.l49.rad" link="dead" from="186">The Trial Book Fallacy</xref> </hi> , 186. Wise, <hi rend="i">The Ashley Library</hi> , VIII. 125-126. Troxell, “The Trial Books” , 184-187. Fraser, “The Rossetti Collection of Janet Camp Troxell” , 163-164. Burnett, <hi rend="i"> <xref doc="a.z6611.l7.rad" link="dead">The Ashley Catalogue</xref> </hi> , I. 71-72.

[Rossetti, Dante Gabriel 1828-18 / Poems. (Privately printed). / London, Strangeways and Wald / 1869] / Proofs of Second Trial / book / Between Oct. 14 and Nov. / 1869. This is the Princeton University Library's cover-sheet to these proofs. This page contains hand-written editorial notes which are obscured in the electronic image. Blank page.

Blank page.

Pages 1-26 not in these proofs. p. 14 repeated Pencil markings in upper right corner. An X is marked in the upper left corner of this page. 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 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, 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? The number 15 has been written in the top right margin. From their dead Past thou liv'st alone; And still thy shadow is thine own 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 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— Not to thy strength—in Nineveh.*

* During the excavations, the Tiyari workmen held their ser-vices in the shadow of the great bulls. (Layard's ‘ Nineveh,’ ch ix.)

The number 16 has been added to the top right margin. 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: ‘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 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? The number 17 is written in the upper left margin. Ah! what is here can testify (Save that dumb presence of the sky) Unto thy day and Nineveh? Why, of those mummies in the room Above, there might indeed have come One out of Egypt to thy home, An alien. Nay, but were not some Of these thine own ‘antiquity?’ And now,—they and their gods and thou All relics here together,—now Whose profit? whether bull or cow, Isis or Ibis, who or how, Whether of Thebes or Nineveh? The consecrated metals found, And ivory tablets, underground, Winged teraphim and creatures crown'd, When air and daylight filled the mound, Fell into dust immediately. And even as these, the images Of awe and worship,—even as these,— So, smitten with the sun's increase, Her glory mouldered and did cease From immemorial Nineveh. The day her builders made their halt, Those cities of the lake of salt The number 18 has been written in the top right margin. Stood firmly 'stablished without fault, Made proud with pillars of basalt, With sardonyx and porphyry. The day that Jonah bore abroad To Nineveh the voice of God, A brackish lake lay in his road, Where erst Pride fixed her sure abode, As then in royal Nineveh. The day when he, Pride's lord and Man's, Showed all the kingdoms at a glance To Him before whose countenance The years recede, the years advance, And said, Fall down and worship me:— 'Mid all the pomp beneath that look, Then stirred there, haply, some rebuke, Where to the wind the salt pools shook, And in those tracts, of life forsook, That knew thee not, O Nineveh! Delicate harlot! On thy throne Thou with a world beneath thee prone In state for ages sat'st alone; And needs were years and lustres flown Ere strength of man could vanquish thee: Whom even thy victor foes must bring, Still royal, among maids that sing As with doves' voices, taboring Upon their breasts, unto the King,— A kingly conquest, Nineveh! The number 19 has been added to the top margin in manuscript. . . . Here woke my thought. The wind's slow sway Had waxed; and like the human play Of scorn that smiling spreads away, The sunshine shivered off the day: The callous wind, it seemed to me, Swept up the shadow from the ground: And pale as whom the Fates astound, The god forlorn stood winged and crown'd: Within I knew the cry lay bound Of the dumb soul of Nineveh. And as I turned, my sense half shut Still saw the crowds of kerb and rut Go past as marshalled to the strut Of ranks in gypsum quaintly cut. It seemed in one same pageantry They followed forms which had been erst; To pass, till on my sight should burst That future of the best or worst When some may question which was first, Of London or of Nineveh. For as that Bull-god once did stand And watched the burial-clouds of sand, Till these at last without a hand Rose o'er his eyes, another land, And blinded him with destiny:— So may he stand again; till now, In ships of unknown sail and prow, Pages 32-64 not in these proofs. F <hi rend="c">DENNIS SHAND.</hi> The shadows fall along the wall, It's night at Haye-la-Serre; The maidens weave since day grew eve, The lady's in her chair. O passing slow the long hours go With time to think and sigh, When weary maidens weave beneath A listless lady's eye. It's two days that Earl Simon's gone And it's the second night; At Haye-la-Serre the lady's fair, In June the moon is light. O it's ‘Maids, ye'll wake till I come back,’ And the hound's i' the lady's chair: No shuttles fly, the work stands by, It's play at Haye-la-Serre. The night is worn, the lamp's forlorn, The shadows waste and fail; There's morning air at Haye-la-Serre, The watching maids look pale. O all unmarked the birds at dawn Where drowsy maidens be; But heard too soon the lark's first tune Beneath the trysting-tree. ‘Hold me thy hand, sweet Dennis Shand, Says the Lady Joan de Haye, ‘That thou to-morrow do forget To-day and yesterday. ‘For many a weary month to come My lord keeps house with me, And sighing summer must lie cold In winter's company. ‘And many an hour I'll pass thee by And see thee and be seen; Yet not a glance must tell by chance How sweet these hours have been. ‘We've all to fear; there's Maud the spy, There's Ann whose face I scor'd, There's Blanch tells Huot everything, And Huot loves my lord. ‘But O and it's my Dennis'll know, When my eyes look weary dim, Who finds the gold for his girdle-fee And who keeps love for him.’ The morrow's come and the morrow-night, It's feast at Haye-la-Serre, And Dennis Shand the cup must hand Beside Earl Simon's chair. And still when the high pouring's done And cup and flagon clink, Till his lady's lips have touched the brim Earl Simon will not drink. ‘But it's, ‘Joan my wife,’ Earl Simon says, ‘Your maids are white and wan.’ And it's, ‘O,’ she says, ‘they've watched the night With Maud's sick sister Ann.’ But it's, ‘Lady Joan and Joan my bird, Yourself look white and wan.’ And it's, ‘O, I've walked the night myself To pull the herbs for Ann: ‘And some of your knaves were at the hutch And some in the cellarage, But the only one that watched with us Was Dennis Shand your page. ‘Look on the boy, sweet honey lord, And mark his drooping e'e: The rosy colour's not yet back That paled in serving me.’ O it's, ‘Wife, your maids are foolish jades, And you're a silly chuck, And the lazy knaves shall get their staves About their ears for luck: ‘But Dennis Shand may take the cup And pour the wine to his hand; Wife, thou shalt touch it with thy lips, And drink thou, Dennis Shand!’ <hi rend="c">THE CARD-DEALER.</hi> 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 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 dancers' feet Than fall her cards on the bright board As 'twere an heart that beat. Her fingers let them softly through, Smooth polished silent things; And each one as it falls reflects In swift light-shadowings, Blood-red 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, 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 More, having fed; the diamond, 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 me 'tis lost or won; With thee it is playing still; with 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 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. <hi rend="c">MY SISTER'S SLEEP.*</hi>

* This little poem, written in 1847, was printed in a periodicalat the outset of 1850, a month or two before the appearance of ‘ <hi rend="i">In <lb/>Memoriam</hi> ,’ with which the metre (to be met with in old English writers) is now identified.

 She fell asleep on Christmas Eve: At length the long ungranted shade Of weary eyelide overweigh'd The pain nought else might yet relieve. 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 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, Of winter radiance sheer and thin; The hollow halo it was in Was like an icy crystal cup. Through the small room, with subtle sound Of flame, by vents the fireshine drove And reddened. In its dim alcove The 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: 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 So 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, And held my breath, and spoke 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, ‘Christ's blessing on the newly born!’ <hi rend="c">AN OLD SONG ENDED.</hi> ‘How should I your true love know From another one?’ ‘By his cockle-hat and staff And his sandal-shoon.’ ‘And what signs have told you now That he hastens home?’ ‘Lo! the spring is nearly gone, He is nearly come.’ ‘For a token is there nought, Say, that he should bring?’ ‘He will bear a ring I gave And another ring.’ ‘How may I, when he shall ask, Tell him who lies there?’ ‘Nay, but leave my face unveiled And unbound my hair.’ ‘Can you say to me some word I shall say to him?’ ‘Say I'm looking in his eyes Though my eyes are dim.’ <hi rend="c">THE SEED OF DAVID.</hi> <lb/> (<hi rend="i">Inscription for a Picture.</hi>*) Christ sprang from David shepherd, and even so From David king; being born of high and low. The shepherd lays his crook, the king his crown, Here at Christ's feet, and high and low bow down. And high and low, Christ's self is shown here; even Christ the Good Shepherd, Christ the King of Heaven.

* A Triptych. In the centre, the Adoration: at the two sides,David as shepherd and David as king.

 <hi rend="c">THE BALLAD OF DEAD LADIES.</hi> <lb/>(<hi rend="sc">François Villon</hi>, 1450.) Tell me now in what hidden way is Lady Flora the lovely Roman? Where's Hipparchia, and where is Thais, Neither of them the fairer woman? Where is Echo, beheld of no man, Only heard on river and mere,— She whose beauty was more than human? . . . But where are the snows of yester-year? Where's Héloise, the learned nun, For whose sake Abeillard, I ween, Lost manhood and put priesthood on? (From Love he won such dule and teen!) And where, I pray you, is the Queen Who willed that Buridan should steer Sewed in a sack's mouth down the Seine? . . . But where are the snows of yester-year? White Queen Blanche, like a queen of lilies, With a voice like any mermaiden,— Bertha Broadfoot, Beatrice, Alice, And Ermengarde the lady of Maine,— And that good Joan whom Englishmen At Rouen doomed and burned her there,— Mother of God, where are they then? . . . But where are the snows of yester-year? Nay, never ask this week, fair lord, Where they are gone, nor yet this year, Except with this for an overword,— But where are the snows of yester-year? <hi rend="c">TO DEATH, OF HIS LADY.</hi> <lb/>(<hi rend="sc">François Villon</hi>, 1450.) Death, of thee do I make my moan, Who hadst my lady away from me, Nor wilt assuage thine enmity Till with her life thou hast mine own; For since that hour my strength has flown. Lo! what wrong was her life to thee, Death? Two we were, and the heart was one; Which now being dead, dead I must be, Or seem alive as lifelessly As in the choir the painted stone, Death! <hi rend="c">JOHN OF TOURS.</hi> <lb/>(<hi rend="i">Old French</hi>.) 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, John of Tours gave up his soul. ‘Tell me now, my mother my dear, What's the crying that I hear?’ ‘Daughter, the children are awake, Crying with their teeth that ache.’ ‘Tell me though, my mother my dear, What's the knocking that I hear?’ ‘Daughter, it's the carpenter Mending planks upon the stair.’ G ‘Tell me too, my mother my dear, What's the singing that I hear?’ ‘Daughter, it's the priests in rows Going round about our house.’ ‘Tell me then, my mother my dear What's the dress that I should wear?’ ‘Daughter, any reds or blues, But the black is most in use.’ ‘Nay, but say, my mother my dear, Why do you fall 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, For you must shut the baby there.’ <hi rend="c">MY FATHER'S CLOSE.</hi> <lb/>(<hi rend="i">Old French</hi>.) 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, (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, So sweet. ‘Oh! if he fight and win,’ (Fly away O my heart away!) ‘I keep my love for him, So sweet: Oh! let him lose or win, He hath it still complete.’ <hi rend="c">ONE GIRL</hi>.<lb/>(<hi rend="i">A combination from Sappho.</hi>) 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. <hi rend="c">SONNETS AND SONGS,</hi> <lb/> <hi rend="i">Towards a Work to be called</hi> <lb/> <hi rend="c">‘THE HOUSE OF LIFE.’</hi> blank page <hi rend="c">INCLUSIVENESS.</hi> The changing guests, each in a different mood, Sit at the roadside table and arise: And every life among them in likewise Is a soul's board set daily with new food. What man has bent o'er his son's sleep, to brood How that face shall watch his when cold it lies?— Or thought, as his own mother kissed his eyes, Of what her kiss was when his father wooed? May not this ancient room thou sit'st in dwell In separate living souls for joy or pain? Nay, all its corners may be painted plain Where Heaven shows pictures of some life spent well; And may be stamped, a memory all in vain, Upon the sight of lidless eyes in Hell. <hi rend="c">KNOWN IN VAIN.</hi> As two whose love, first foolish, widening scope, Knows suddenly, with music high and soft, The Holy of holies; who because they scoff'd Are now amazed with shame, nor dare to cope With the whole truth in words, lest heaven should ope; Yet, at their meetings, laugh not as they laugh'd In speech; nor speak, at length; but sitting oft Together, within hopeless sight of hope For hours are silent:—So it happeneth When Work and Will awake too late, to gaze After their life sailed by, and hold their breath. Ah! who shall dare to search through what sad maze Thenceforth their incommunicable ways Follow the desultory feet of Death? <hi rend="c">THE LANDMARK.</hi> Was that the landmark? What,—the foolish well Whose wave, low down, I did not stoop to drink, But sat and flung the pebbles from its brink In sport to send its imaged skies pell-mell, (And mine own image, had I noted well!)— Was that my point of turning?—I had thought The stations of my course should loom unsought, As altar-stone or ensigned citadel. But lo! the path is missed, I must go back, And thirst to drink when next I reach the spring Which once I stained, which since may have grown black. Yet though no light be left nor bird now sing As here I turn, I'll thank God, hastening, That the same goal is still on the same track. <hi rend="c">A DARK DAY.</hi> The gloom that breathes upon me with these airs Is like the drops which strike the traveller's brow Who knows not, darkling, if they bring him now Fresh storm, or be old rain the covert bears. Ah! bodes this hour some harvest of new tares, Or hath but memory of the day whose plough Sowed hunger once,—the night at length when thou, O prayer found vain, didst fall from out my prayers? How prickly were the growths which yet how smooth, Along the hedgerows of this journey shed, Lie by Time's grace till night and sleep may soothe! Even as the thistledown from pathsides dead Gleaned by a girl in autumns of her youth, Which one new year makes soft her marriage-bed. Pages 91-94 not in these proofs. <hi rend="c">HOARDED JOY.</hi> I said: ‘Nay, pluck not,—let the first fruit be: Even as thou sayest, it is sweet and red, 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 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 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 from the sea.’ <hi rend="c">VAIN VIRTUES.</hi> What is the sorriest thing that enters Hell? None of the sins,—but this and that fair deed Which a soul's sin at length could supersede. These yet are virgins, whom death's timely knell Might once have sainted; whom the fiends compel Together now, in snake-bound shuddering sheaves Of anguish, while the scorching bridegroom leaves Their refuse maidenhood abominable. Night sucks them down, the garbage of the pit, Whose names, half entered in the book of Life, Were God's desire at noon. And as their hair And eyes sink last, the Torturer deigns no whit To gaze, but, yearning, waits his worthier wife, The Sin still blithe on earth that sent them there. H <hi rend="c">LOST DAYS.</hi> The lost days of my life until to-day, What were they, could I see them on the street Lie as they fell? Would they be ears of wheat Sown once for food but trodden into clay? Or golden coins squandered and still to pay? Or drops of blood dabbling the guilty feet? Or such spilt water as in dreams must cheat The throats of men in Hell, who thirst alway? I do not see them here; but after death God knows I know the faces I shall see, Each one a murdered self, with low last breath. ‘I am thyself,—what hast thou done to me?’ ‘And I—and I—thyself,’ (lo! each one saith,) ‘And thou thyself to all eternity!’ <hi rend="c">DEATH'S SONGSTERS.</hi> 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, There where the sea-flowers screen the charnel-caves, Beside the sirens' singing island pass'd, Till sweetness failed along the inveterate waves. . . . Say, soul,—are songs of Death no heaven to thee, Nor shames her lip the cheek of Victory? <hi rend="c">‘RETRO ME, SATHANA!’</hi> 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 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, Mayst wait the turning of the phials of wrath For certain years, for certain months and days. <hi rend="c">LOST ON BOTH SIDES.</hi> As when two men have loved a woman well, Each hating each, through Love's and Death's deceit; Since not for either this stark marriage-sheet And the long pauses of this wedding-bell; Yet o'er her grave the night and day dispel At last their feud forlorn, with cold and heat; Nor other than dear friends to death may fleet The two lives left that most of her can tell:— So separate hopes, which in a soul had wooed The one same Peace, strove with each other long, And Peace before their faces perished since: So through that soul, in restless brotherhood, They roam together now, and wind among Its bye-streets, knocking at the dusty inns. <hi rend="c">THE SUN'S SHAME.</hi> Beholding youth and hope in mockery caught From life; and mocking pulses that remain When the soul's death of bodily death is fain; Honour unknown, and honour known unsought; And penury's sedulous self-torturing thought On gold, whose master therewith buys his bane; And longed-for woman longing all in vain For lonely man with love's desire distraught; And wealth, and strength, and power, and pleasantness, Given unto bodies of whose souls men say, None poor and weak, slavish and foul, as they:— Beholding these things, I behold no less The blushing morn and blushing eve confess The shame that loads the intolerable day. <hi rend="c">RUN AND WON.</hi> Around the vase of Life at your slow pace He has not crept, but turned it with his hands, And all its sides already understands. There, girt, one breathes alert for some great race; Whose road runs far by sands and fruitful space; Who laughs, yet through the jolly throng has pass'd; Who weeps, nor stays for weeping; who at last, A youth, stands somewhere crowned, with silent face. And he has filled this vase with wine for blood, With blood for tears, with spice for burning vow, With watered flowers for buried love most fit; And would have cast it shattered to the flood, Yet in Fate's name has kept it whole; which now Stands empty till his ashes fall in it. <hi rend="c">NEWBORN DEATH.</hi> <lb/>(<hi rend="i">Two Sonnets.</hi>) <hi rend="sc">I</hi>. To-day Death seems to me an infant child Which her worn mother Life upon my knee Has set to grow my friend and play with me; If haply so my heart might be beguil'd To find no terrors in a face so mild,— If haply so my weary heart might be Unto the newborn milky eyes of thee, O Death, before resentment reconcil'd. How long, O Death? And shall thy feet depart Still a young child's with mine, or wilt thou stand Fullgrown the helpful daughter of my heart, What time with thee indeed I reach the strand Of the pale wave which knows thee what thou art, And drink it in the hollow of thy hand? <hi rend="c">II</hi>. And thou, O Life, the lady of all bliss, With whom, when our first heart beat full and fast, I wandered till the haunts of men were pass'd, And in fair places found all bowers amiss Till only woods and waves might hear our kiss, While to the winds all thought of Death we cast:— Ah, Life, and must I have from thee at last No smile to greet me and no babe but this? Lo! Love, the child once ours; and Song, whose hair Blew like a flame and blossomed like a wreath; And Art, whose eyes were worlds by God found fair; These o'er the book of Nature mixed their breath With neck-twined arms, as oft we watched them there: And did these die that thou mightst bear me Death? <hi rend="c">A SUPERSCRIPTION.</hi> Look in my face; my name is Might-have-been; I am also called No-more, Too-late, Farewell; Unto thine ear I hold the dead-sea shell Cast up thy Life's foam-fretted feet between; Unto thine eyes the glass where that is seen Which had Life's form and Love's, but by my spell Is now a shaken shadow intolerable, Of ultimate things unuttered the frail screen. Mark me, how still I am! But should there dart One moment through thy soul the soft surprise Of that winged Peace which lulls the breath of sighs,— Then shalt thou see me smile, and turn apart Thy visage to mine ambush at thy heart Sleepless with cold commemorative eyes. <hi rend="c">ASPECTA MEDUSA.</hi> Andromeda, by Perseus saved and wed, Hankered each day to see the Gorgon's head: Till o'er a fount he held it, bade her lean, And mirrored in the wave was safely seen That death she lived by. Let not thine eyes know Any forbidden thing itself, although It once should save as well as kill: but be Its shadow upon life enough for thee. <hi rend="c">THE SEA-LIMITS.</hi> Consider the sea's listless chime: Time's self it is, made audible,— The murmur of the earth's own shell. Secret continuance sublime Is the sea's end: our sight may pass No furlong further. Since time was, This sound hath told the lapse of time. No quiet, which is death's,—it hath The mournfulness of ancient life, Enduring always at dull strife. As the world's heart of rest and wrath, Its painful pulse is in the sands. Last utterly, the whole sky stands, Grey and not known, along its path. Listen alone beside the sea, Listen alone among the woods; Those voices of twin solitudes Shall have one sound alike to thee: Hark where the murmurs of thronged men Surge and sink back and surge again,— Still the one voice of wave and tree. Gather a shell from the strown beach And listen at its lips: they sigh The same desire and mystery, The echo of the whole sea's speech. And all mankind is thus at heart Not anything but what thou art: And Earth, Sea, Man, are all in each. <hi rend="c">A YOUNG FIR-WOOD.</hi> These little firs to-day are things To clasp into a giant's cap, Or fans to suit his lady's lap. From many winters many springs Shall cherish them in strength and sap, Till they be marked upon the map, A wood for the wind's wanderings. All seed is in the sower's hands: And what at first was trained to spread Its shelter for some single head,— Yea, even such fellowship of wands,— May hide the sunset, and the shade Of its great multitude be laid Upon the earth and elder sands. <hi rend="c">THE HONEYSUCKLE.</hi> I plucked a honeysuckle where The hedge on high is quick with thorn, And climbing for the prize, was torn, And fouled my feet in quag-water; And by the thorns and by the wind The blossom that I took was thinn'd, And yet I found it sweet and fair. Thence to a richer growth I came, Where, nursed in mellow intercourse, The honeysuckles sprang by scores, Not harried like my single stem, All virgin lamps of scent and dew. So from my hand that first I threw, Yet plucked not any more of them. <hi rend="c">THE WOODSPURGE.</hi> The wind flapped loose, the wind was still, Shaken out dead from tree and hill: I had walked on at the wind's will,— I sat now, for the wind was still. Between my knees my forehead was,— My lips, drawn in, said not Alas! My hair was over in the grass, My naked ears heard the day pass. Mine eyes, wide open, had the run Of some ten weeds to fix upon; Among those few, out of the sun, The woodspurge flowered, three cups in one. From perfect grief there need not be Wisdom or even memory: One thing then learnt remains to me,— The woodspurge has a cup of three. <hi rend="c">LOVE-LILY.</hi> Between the hands, between the brows, Between the lips of Love-Lily, A spirit is born whose birth endows My blood with fire to burn through me; Who breathes upon my gazing eyes, Who laughs and murmurs in mine ear, At whose least touch my colour flies, And whom my life grows faint to hear. Within the voice, within the heart, Within the mind of Love-Lily, A spirit is born who lifts apart His tremulous wings and looks at me; Who on my mouth his finger lays, And shows, while whispering lutes confer, That Eden of Love's watered ways Whose winds and spirits worship her. Brows, hands, and lips, heart, mind, and voice, Kisses and words of Love-Lily,— Oh! bid me with your joy rejoice Till riotous longing rest in me! Ah! let not hope be still distraught, But find in her its gracious goal, Whose speech Truth knows not from her thought Nor Love her body from her soul. I <hi rend="c">FIRST LOVE REMEMBERED.</hi> Peace in her chamber, wheresoe'er It be, a holy place: The thought still brings my soul such grace As morning meadows wear. Whether it still be small and light, A maid's who dreams alone, As from her orchard-gate the moon Its ceiling showed at night: Or whether, in a shadow dense As nuptial hymns invoke, Innocent maidenhood awoke To married innocence: There still the thanks unheard await The unconscious gift bequeathed; And there my soul this hour has breathed An air inviolate. <hi rend="c">THE MOON-STAR.</hi> In a soft-complexioned sky, Fleeting rose and kindling grey, Have you seen Aurora fly At the break of day? So my maiden, so my modest may Blushing cheek and gleaming eye Lifts to look my way. Where the inmost leaf is stirred With the heart-beat of the grove, Have you heard a hidden bird Cast her note above? So my lady, so my lovely love, Echoing Cupid's prompted word, Makes a tune thereof. Have you seen, at heaven's mid-height, In the moon-wrack's ebb and tide, Venus leap forth burning white, Dian pale and hide? So my bright breast-jewel, so my bride, One sweet night, when fear takes flight, Shall leap against my side. <hi rend="c">SUDDEN LIGHT.</hi> I have been here before, But when or how I cannot tell: I know the grass beyond the door, The sweet keen smell, The sighing sound, the lights around the shore. You have been mine before,— How long ago I may not know: But just when at that swallow's soar Your neck turned so, Some veil did fall,—I knew it all of yore. Then, now,—perchance again! . . . . O round mine eyes your tresses shake! Shall we not lie as we have lain Thus for Love's sake, And sleep, and wake, yet never break the chain? <hi rend="c">A LITTLE WHILE.</hi> A little while a little love The hour yet bears for thee and me Who have not drawn the veil to see If still our heaven be lit above. Thou merely, at the day's last sigh, Hast felt thy soul prolong the tone; And I have heard the night-wind cry And deemed its speech mine own. A little while a little love The scattering autumn hoards for us Whose bower is not yet ruinous Nor quite unleaved our songless grove. Only across the shaken boughs We hear the flood-tides seek the sea, And deep in both our hearts they rouse One wail for thee and me. A little while a little love May yet be ours who have not said The word it makes our eyes afraid To know that each is thinking of. Not yet the end: be our lips dumb In smiles a little season yet: I'll tell thee when the end is come How we may best forget. <hi rend="c">THE SONG OF THE BOWER.</hi> 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. Nay, but my heart when it flies to thy bower, What does it find there that knows it again? There it must droop like a shower-beaten flower, Red at the rent core and dark with the rain. Ah! yet what shelter is still shed above it,— What waters still image its leaves torn apart? Thy soul is the shade that clings round it to love it, And tears are its mirror deep down in thy heart. What were my prize, could I enter thy bower, 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. Kindled with love-breath, (the sun's kiss 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?— 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, 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 goal may we meet? <hi rend="c">PENUMBRA.</hi> I did not look upon her eyes, (Though scarcely seen, with no surprise, 'Mid many eyes a single look,) Because they should not gaze rebuke, Thenceforth, from stars in sky and brook. I did not take her by the hand, (Though little was to understand From touch of hand all friends might take,) Because it should not prove a flake Burnt in my palm to boil and ache. I did not listen to her voice, (Though none had noted, where at choice All might rejoice in listening,) Because no such a thing should cling In the sea-wind at evening. I did not cross her shadow once, (Though from the hollow west the sun's Last shadow runs along so far,) Because in June it should not bar My ways, at noon when fevers are. They told me she was there: but I, Who saw her not, did fear and fly The means brought nigh of seeing her. Thus must this day be bitterer, I felt; yet did not speak nor stir. So nightly shall the crows troop home One less; one less the wailings come From tongues of foam that chafe the sand; One less, from sleep's dumb quaking land, The dreams shall at my bed's foot stand. <hi rend="c">A NEW YEAR'S BURDEN.</hi> Along the grass sweet airs are blown Our way this day in Spring. Of all the songs that we have known Now which one shall we sing? Not that, my love, ah no!— Not this, my love? why, so!— Yet both were ours, but hours will come and go. The grove is all a pale frail mist, The new year sucks the sun. Of all the kisses that we kissed Now which shall be the one? Not that, my love, ah no!— Not this, my love?—heigh-ho For all the sweets that all the winds can blow! The branches cross above our eyes, The skies are in a net: And what's the thing beneath the skies We two would most forget? Not birth, my love, no, no,— Not death, my love, no, no,— The love once ours, but ours long hours ago. <hi rend="c">EVEN SO.</hi> So it is, my dear. All such things touch secret strings For heavy hearts to hear. So it is, my dear. Very like indeed: Sea and sky, afar, on high, Sand and strewn seaweed,— Very like indeed. But the sea stands spread As one wall with the flat skies, Where the lean black craft like flies Seem well-nigh stagnated, Soon to drop off dead. Seemed it so to us When I was thine and thou wast mine, And all these things were thus, But all our world in us? Could we be so now? Not if all beneath heaven's pall Lay dead but I and thou, Could we be so now! <hi rend="c">BRIDAL BIRTH.</hi> As when desire, long darkling, dawns, and first The mother looks upon the newborn child, Even so my Lady stood at gaze and smiled When her soul knew at length the Love it nursed. Born with her life, creature of poignant thirst And exquisite hunger, at her heart Love lay Quickening in darkness, till a voice that day Cried on him, and bonds of birth were burst. Now, shielded in his wings, our faces yearn Together, as his fullgrown feet now range The grove, and his warm hands our couch prepare: Till to his song our bodiless souls in turn Be born his children, when Death's nuptial change Leaves us for light the halo of his hair. <hi rend="c">FLAMMIFERA.</hi> O Thou who at Love's hour ecstatically Unto my lips dost evermore present The body and blood of Love in sacrament; Whom I have neared and felt thy breath to be The inmost incense of his sanctuary; Who without speech hast owned him, and intent Upon his will, thy life with mine hast blent, And murmured o'er the cup, Remember me!— O what from thee the grace, for me the prize, And what to Love the glory,—when the whole Of the deep stair thou tread'st to the dim shoal And weary water of the place of sighs, And there dost work deliverance, as thine eyes Draw up my prisoned spirit to thy soul! <hi rend="c">LOVESIGHT.</hi> When do I see thee most, beloved one? When in the light the spirits of mine eyes Before thy face, their altar, solemnize The worship of that Love through thee made known? Or when in the dusk hours, (we two alone,) Close-kissed and eloquent of still replies Thy twilight-hidden glimmering visage lies, And my soul only sees thy soul its own? O love, my love! if I no more should see Thyself, nor on the earth the shadow of thee, Nor image of thine eyes in any spring,— How then should sound upon Life's darkening slope The ground-whirl of the perished leaves of Hope, The wind of Death's imperishable wing? <hi rend="c">THE KISS.</hi> What smouldering senses in death's sick delay Or seizure of malign vicissitude Can rob this body of honour, or denude This soul of wedding-raiment worn to-day? For lo! even now my lady's lips did play With these my lips such consonant interlude As laurelled Orpheus longed for when he wooed The half-drawn hungering face with that last lay. I was a child beneath her touch,—a man When breast to breast we clung, even I and she,— A spirit when her spirit looked through me,— A god when all our life-breath met to fan Our life-blood, till love's emulous ardours ran, Fire within fire, desire in deity. <hi rend="c">NUPTIAL SLEEP.</hi> 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, Fawned on each other where they lay apart. Sleep sank them lower than the tide of dreams, 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. <hi rend="c">SUPREME SURRENDER.</hi> To all the spirits of love that wander by Along the love-sown fallowfield of sleep My lady lies apparent; and the deep Calls to the deep; and no man sees but I. The bliss so long afar, at length so nigh, Rests there attained. Methinks proud Love must weep When Fate's control doth from his harvest reap The sacred hour for which the years did sigh. First touched, the hand now warm around my neck Taught memory long to mock desire: and lo! Across my breast the abandoned hair doth flow, Where one shorn tress long stirred the longing ache: And next the heart that trembled for its sake Lies the queen-heart in sovereign overthrow. K <hi rend="c">LOVE'S LOVERS.</hi> Some ladies love the jewels in Love's zone And gold-tipped darts he hath for painless play In idle scornful hours he flings away; And some that listen to his lute's soft tone Do love to deem the silver praise their own; Some prize his blindfold sight; and there be they Who kissed his wings which brought him yesterday And thank his wings to-day that he is flown. My lady only loves the heart of Love: Therefore Love's heart, my lady, hath for thee His bower of unimagined flower and tree: There kneels he now, and all-anhungered of Thine eyes grey-lit in shadowing hair above, Seals with thy mouth his immortality. <hi rend="c">PASSION AND WORSHIP.</hi> One flame-winged brought a white-winged harp-player Even where my lady and I lay all alone; Saying: ‘Behold, this minstrel is unknown; Bid him depart, for I am minstrel here: Only my strains are to Love's dear ones dear.’ Then said I: ‘'Mid thine hautboy's rapturous tone Unto my lady still this harp makes moan, And still she deems the cadence deep and clear.’ Then said my lady: ‘Thou art Passion of Love, And this Love's Worship: both he plights to me. Thy mastering music walks the sunlit sea: But where wan water trembles in the grove And the wan moon is all the light thereof, This harp still makes my name its voluntary.’ <hi rend="c">THE PORTRAIT.</hi> O Lord of all compassionate control, O Love! let this my Lady's picture glow Under my hand to praise her name, and show Even of her inner self the perfect whole: That he who seeks her beauty's furthest goal, Beyond the light that the sweet glances throw And refluent wave of the sweet smile, may know The very sky and sea-line of her soul. Lo! it is done. Above the long lithe throat The mouth's mould testifies of voice and kiss, The shadowed eyes remember and foresee. Her face is made her shrine. Let all men note That in all years (O Love, thy gift is this!) They that would look on her must come to me. <hi rend="c">THE BIRTH-BOND.</hi> Have you not noted, in some family Where two were born of a first marriage-bed, How still they own their gracious bond, though fed And nursed on the forgotten breast and knee?— How to their father's children they shall be In act and thought of one goodwill; but each Shall for the other have, in silence speech, And in a word complete community? Even so, when first I saw you, seemed it, love, That among souls allied to mine was yet One nearer kindred than life hinted of. O born with me somewhere that men forget, And though in years of sight and sound unmet, Known for my soul's birth-partner well enough! <hi rend="c">LOVE'S BAUBLES.</hi> I stood where Love in brimming armfuls bore Slight wanton flowers and foolish toys of fruit: And round him ladies thronged in warm pursuit, Fingered and lipped and proffered the strange store: And from one hand the petal and the core Savoured of sleep; and cluster and curled shoot Seemed from another hand like shame's salute,— Gifts that I felt my cheek was blushing for. At last Love bade my Lady give the same: And as I looked, the dew was light thereon; And as I took them, at her touch they shone With inmost heaven-hue of the heart of flame. And then Love said: ‘Lo! when the hand is hers, Follies of love are love's true ministers.’ <hi rend="c">WINGED HOURS.</hi> Each hour until we meet is as a bird That wings from far his gradual way along The rustling covert of my soul,—his song Still loudlier trilled through leaves more deeply stirr'd: But at the hour of meeting, a clear word Is every note he sings, in Love's own tongue; Yet, Love, thou know'st the sweet strain suffers wrong, Through our contending kisses oft unheard. What of that hour at last, when for her sake No wing may fly to me nor song may flow; When, wandering round my life unleaved, I know The bloodied feathers scattered in the brake, And think how she, far from me, with like eyes Sees through the untuneful bough the wingless skies? <hi rend="c">THE LOVE-MOON.</hi> ‘When that dead face, bowered in the furthest years, Which once was all the life years held for thee, Can now scarce bid the tides of memory Cast on thy soul a little spray of tears,— How canst thou gaze into these eyes of hers Whom now thy heart delights in, and not see Within each orb Love's philtred euphrasy Make them of buried troth remembrancers?’ ‘Nay, pitiful Love, nay, loving Pity! Well Thou knowest that in these twain I have confess'd Two very voices of thy summoning bell. Nay, Master, shall not Death make manifest In these the culminant changes which approve The love-moon that must light my soul to Love?’ <hi rend="c">THE MORROW'S MESSAGE.</hi> ‘Thou Ghost,’ I said, ‘and is thy name To-day?— Yesterday's son, with such an abject brow!— And can To-morrow be more pale than thou?’ While yet I spoke, the silence answered: ‘Yea, Henceforth our issue is all grieved and grey, And each beforehand makes such poor avow As of old leaves beneath the budding bough Or night-drift that the sundawn shreds away.’ Then cried I: ‘Mother of many malisons, O Earth, receive me to thy dusty bed!’ But therewithal the tremulous silence said: ‘Lo! Love yet bids thy lady greet thee once:— Yea, twice,—whereby thy life is still the sun's; And thrice,—whereby the shadow of death is dead.’ <hi rend="c">SLEEPLESS DREAMS.</hi> Girt in dark growths, yet glimmering with one star, O night desirous as the nights of youth! Why should my heart within thy spell, forsooth, Now beat, as the bride's finger-pulses are Quickened within the girdling golden bar? What wings are these that fan my pillow smooth? And why does Sleep, waved back by Joy and Ruth, Tread softly round and gaze at me from far? Nay, night deep-leaved! And would Love feign in thee Some shadowy palpitating grove that bears Rest for man's eyes and music for his ears? O lonely night! art thou not known to me, A thicket hung with masks of mockery And watered with the wasteful warmth of tears? <hi rend="c">SECRET PARTING.</hi> Because our talk was of the cloud-control And moon-track of the journeying face of Fate, Her tremulous kisses faltered at love's gate And her eyes dreamed against a distant goal: But soon, remembering her how brief the whole Of joy, which its own hours annihilate, Her set gaze gathered, thirstier than of late, And as she kissed, her mouth became her soul. Thence in what ways we wandered, and how strove To build with fire-tried vows the piteous home Which memory haunts and whither sleep may roam,— They only know for whom the roof of Love Is the still-seated secret of the grove, Nor spire may rise nor bell be heard therefrom. <hi rend="c">PARTED LOVE.</hi> What shall be said of this embattled day And armed occupation of this night By all thy foes beleaguered,—now when sight Nor sound denotes the loved one far away? Of these thy vanquished hours what shalt thou say,— As every sense to which she dealt delight Now labours lonely o'er the stark noon-height To reach the sunset's desolate disarray? Stand still, fond fettered wretch! while Memory's art Parades the Past before thy face, and lures Thy spirit to her passionate portraitures: Till the tempestuous tide-gates flung apart Flood with wild will the hollows of thy heart, And thy heart rends thee, and thy body endures. <hi rend="c">BROKEN MUSIC.</hi> The mother will not turn, who thinks she hears Her nursling's speech first grow articulate; But breathless with averted eyes elate She sits, with open lips and open ears, That it may call her twice. 'Mid doubts and fears Thus oft my soul has hearkened; till the song, A central moan for days, at length found tongue, And the sweet music welled and the sweet tears. But now, whatever while the soul is fain To list that wonted murmur, as it were The speech-bound sea-shell's low importunate strain,— No breath of song, thy voice alone is there, O bitterly beloved! and all her gain Is but the pang of unpermitted prayer. M <hi rend="c">CASSANDRA.</hi> <lb/>(<hi rend="i">Two Sonnets for a Design.</hi>*) <hi rend="sc">I</hi>. Rend, rend thine hair, Cassandra: he will go. Yea, rend thy garments, wring thine hands, and cry From Troy still towered to the unreddened sky. See, all but she that bore thee mock thy woe:— He most whom that fair woman arms, with show Of wrath on her bent brows; for in this place This hour thou bad'st all men in Helen's face The ravished ravishing prize of Death to know. What eyes, what ears hath sweet Andromache, Save for her Hector's form and step; as tear On tear make salt the warm last kiss he gave? He goes. Cassandra's words beat heavily Like crows above his crest, and at his ear Ring hollow in the shield that shall not save.

* The subject shows Cassandra prophesying among her kindred,as Hector leaves them for his last battle. They are on the platformof a fortress, from which the Trojan troops are marching out. Helenis arming Paris; Priam soothes Hecuba; and Andromache holdsthe child to her bosom.

 <hi rend="sc">II</hi>. ‘O Hector, gone, gone, gone! O Hector, thee Two chariots wait, in Troy long bless'd and curs'd; And Grecian spear and Phrygian sand athirst Crave from thy veins the blood of victory. Lo! long upon our hearth the brand had we, Lit for the roof-tree's ruin: and to-day The ground-stone quits the wall,—the wind hath way,— And higher and higher the wings of fire are free. O Paris, Paris! O thou burning brand, Thou beacon of the sea whence Venus rose, Lighting thy race to shipwreck! Even that hand Wherewith she took thine apple let her close Within thy curls at last, and while Troy glows Lift thee her trophy to the sea and land.’ <hi rend="c">DANTIS TENEBRÆ.</hi> <lb/> (<hi rend="i">In Memory of my Father.</hi>) And didst thou know indeed, when at the font Together with thy name thou gav'st me his, That also on thy son must Beatrice Decline her eyes according to her wont, Accepting me to be of those that haunt The vale of magical sweet mysteries Where to the hills her poet's foot-track lies And wisdom's living fountain to his chaunt Trembles in music? This is that steep land Where he that holds his journey stands at gaze Tow'rd sunset, when the clouds like a new height Seem piled to climb. These things I understand: For here, where day still soothes my lifted face, On thy bowed head, my father, fell the night. <hi rend="c">SAINT LUKE THE PAINTER.</hi> Give honour unto Luke Evangelist; For he it was (the aged legends say) Who first taught Art to fold her hands and pray. Scarcely at once she dared to rend the mist Of devious symbols: but soon having wist How sky-breadth and field-silence and this day Are symbols also in some deeper way, She looked through these to God and was God's priest. And if, past noon, her toil began to irk, And she sought talismans, and turned in vain To soulless self-reflections of man's skill,— Yet now, in this the twilight, she might still Kneel in the latter grass to pray again, Ere the night cometh and she may not work. <hi rend="c">AUTUMN IDLENESS.</hi> This sunlight shames November where he grieves In dead red leaves, and will not let him shun The day, though bough with bough be over-run: But with a blessing every glade receives High salutation; while from hillock-eaves The deer gaze calling, dappled white and dun, As if, being foresters of old, the sun Had marked them with the shade of forest-leaves. Here dawn to-day unveiled her magic glass; Here noon now gives the thirst and takes the dew; Till eve bring rest when other good things pass. And here the lost hours the lost hours renew While I still lead my shadow o'er the grass, Nor know, for longing, that which I should do. <hi rend="c">FAREWELL TO THE GLEN.</hi> Sweet stream-fed glen, why say ‘farewell’ to thee Who far'st so well and find'st for ever smooth The brow of Time where man may read no ruth? Nay, do thou rather say ‘farewell’ to me, Who now fare forth in bitterer fantasy Than erst was mine where other shade might soothe By other streams, what while in fragrant youth The bliss of being sad made melancholy. And yet, farewell! For better shalt thou fare When children bathe sweet faces in thy flow And happy lovers blend sweet shadows there In hours to come, than when an hour ago Thine echoes had but one man's sighs to bear And thy trees whispered what he feared to know. <hi rend="c">ON THE SITE OF A MULBERRY-TREE</hi>;<lb/> <hi rend="i">Planted by Wm. Shakspeare; felled by the Rev. F. Gastrell</hi>. This tree, here fall'n, no common birth or death Shared with its kind. The world's enfranchised son, Who found the trees of Life and Knowledge one, Here set it, frailer than his laurel-wreath. Shall not the wretch whose hand it fell beneath Rank also singly—the supreme unhung? Lo! Sheppard, Turpin, pleading with black tongue This viler thief's unsuffocated breath! We'll search thy glossary, Shakspeare! whence almost, And whence alone, some name shall be reveal'd For this deaf drudge, to whom no length of ears Sufficed to catch the music of the spheres; Whose soul is carrion now,—too mean to yield Some tailor's ninth allotment of a ghost.
Stratford-on-Avon.
 <hi rend="c">A LAST CONFESSION</hi>. <lb/>(<hi rend="i">Regno Lombardo-Veneto,</hi> 1848.) * * * * * * * * * Our Lombard country-girls along the coast Wear daggers in their garters; for they know That they might hate another girl to death Or meet a German lover. Such a knife I bought her, with a hilt of horn and pearl. Father, you cannot know of all my thoughts That day in going to meet her,—that last day For the last time, she said;—of all the love And all the hopeless hope that she might change And go back with me. Ah! and everywhere, At places we both knew along the road, Some fresh shape of herself as once she was Grew present at my side; until it seemed— So close they gathered round me—they would all Be with me when I reached the spot at last, To plead my cause with her against herself So changed. O Father, if you knew all this You cannot know, then you would know too, Father, And only then, if God can pardon me. What can be told I'll tell, if you will hear. I passed a village-fair upon my road, And thought, being empty-handed, I would take Some little present, which might prove that day Either a pledge between us, or (God help me!) A parting gift. And there it was I bought The knife I spoke of, such as women wear. That day, some three hours afterwards, I found For certain, it must be a parting gift. And, standing silent now at last, I looked Into her scornful face; and heard the sea Still trying hard to din into my ears Some speech it knew which still might change her heart If only it could make me understand. One moment thus. Another, and her face Seemed further off than the last line of sea, So that I thought, if now she were to speak I could not hear her. Then again I knew All, as we stood together on the sand At Iglio, in the first thin shade o' the hills. ‘Take it,’ I said, and held it out to her, While the hilt glanced within my trembling hold; ‘Take it and keep it for my sake,’ I said, Her neck unbent not, neither did her eyes Move, nor her foot left beating of the sand; Only she put it by from her and laughed. Father, you hear my speech and not her laugh; But God was there and heard. Father, will God Remember all? He heard her when she laughed. It was another laugh than the sweet sound Which rose from her sweet childish heart, that day Eleven years before, when first I found her Alone upon the hill-side; and her curls Shook down in the warm grass as she looked up Out of her curls in my eyes bent to hers. She might have served a painter to pourtray That heavenly child which in the latter days Shall walk between the lion and the lamb. I had been for nights in hiding, worn and sick And hardly fed; and so her words at first Seemed fitful like the talking of the trees And voices in the air that knew my name. And I remember that I sat me down Upon the slope with her, and thought the world Must be all over or had never been, We seemed there so alone. And soon she told me Her parents both were gone away from her. I thought perhaps she meant that they had died; But when I asked her this, she looked again Into my face, and said that yestereve They kissed her long, and wept and made her weep, And gave her all the bread they had with them, And then had gone together up the hill Where we were sitting now, and had walked on Into the great red light: ‘and so,’ she said, ‘I have come up here too; and when this evening They step out of the light as they stepped in, I shall be here to kiss them.’ And she laughed. Then I bethought me suddenly of the famine; And how the church-steps throughout all the town, When last I had been there a month ago, Swarmed with starved folk; and how the bread was weighed By Austrians armed; and women that I knew For wives and mothers walked the public street, Telling their husbands how, if they still feared To snatch the children's food, themselves would stay Till they had earned it there. So then this child Was piteous to me; for all told me then Her parents must have left her to God's chance, To man's or to the Church's charity, Because of the great famine, rather than To watch her growing thin between their knees. With that, God took my mother's voice and spoke, And sights and sounds came back and things long since, And all my childhood found me on the hills; And so I took her with me. I was young, Scarce man then, Father; but the cause which gave The wounds I die of now had brought me then Some wounds already; and I lived alone, As any hiding hunted man must live. It was no easy thing to keep a child In safety; for herself it was not safe, And doubled my own danger: but I knew That God would help me. Yet a little while Pardon me, Father, if I pause. I think I have been speaking to you of some matters There was no need to speak of, have I not? You do not know how clearly those things stood Within my mind, which I have spoken of, Nor how they strove for utterance. Life all past Is like the sky when the sun sets in it, Clearest where furthest off. I told you how She scorned my parting gift and laughed. And yet A woman's laugh's another thing sometimes: I think they laugh in Heaven. I know last night I dreamed I saw into the garden of God, Where women walked whose painted images I have seen with candles round them in the church. They bent this way and that, one to another, Playing: and over the long golden hair Of each there floated like a ring of fire Which when she stooped stooped with her, and when she rose Rose with her. Then a breeze flew in among them, As if a window had been opened in heaven For God to give his blessing from, before This world of ours should set; (for in my dream I thought our world was setting, and the sun Flared, a spent taper;) and beneath that gust The rings of light quivered like forest-leaves. Then all the blessed maidens who were there Stood up together, as it were a voice N That called them; and they threw their tresses back, And smote their palms, and all laughed up at once, For the strong heavenly joy they had in them To hear God bless the world. Wherewith I woke: And looking round, I saw as usual That she was standing there with her long locks Pressed to her side; and her laugh ended theirs. For always when I see her now, she laughs. And yet her childish laughter haunts me too, The life of this dead terror; as in days When she, a child, dwelt with me. I must tell Something of those days yet before the end. I brought her from the city—one such day When she was still a merry loving child,— The earliest gift I mind my giving her; A little image of a flying Love Made of our coloured glass-ware, in his hands A dart of gilded metal and a torch. And him she kissed and me, and fain would know Why were his poor eyes blindfold, why the wings And why the arrow. What I knew I told Of Venus and of Cupid,—strange old tales. And when she heard that he could rule the loves Of men and women, still she shook her head And wondered; and, ‘Nay, nay,’ she murmured still, ‘So strong, and he a younger child than I!’ And then she'd have me fix him on the wall Fronting her little bed; and then again She needs must fix him there herself, because I gave him to her and she loved him so, And he should make her love me better yet, If women loved the more, the more they grew. But the fit place upon the wall was high For her, and so I held her in my arms: And each time that the heavy pruning-hook I gave her for a hammer slipped away As it would often, still she laughed and laughed And kissed and kissed me. But amid her mirth, Just as she hung the image on the nail, It slipped and all its fragments strewed the ground: And as it fell she screamed, for in her hand The dart had entered deeply and drawn blood. And so her laughter turned to tears: and ‘Oh!’ I said, the while I bandaged the small hand,— ‘That I should be the first to make you bleed, Who love and love and love you!’—kissing still The fingers till I got her safe to bed. And still she sobbed,—‘not for the pain at all,’ She said, ‘but for the Love, the poor good Love You gave me.’ So she cried herself to sleep. Another later thing comes back to me. 'Twas in those hardest foulest days of all, When still from his shut palace, sitting clean Above the splash of blood, old Metternich (May his soul die, and never-dying worms Feast on its pain for ever!) used to thin His year's doomed hundreds daintily, eachmonth Thirties and fifties. This time, as I think, Was when his thrift forbad the poor to take That evil brackish salt which the dry rocks Keep all through winter when the sea draws in. The first I heard of it was a chance shot In the street here and there, and on the stones A stumbling clatter as of horse hemmed round. Then, when she saw me hurry out of doors, My gun slung at my shoulder and my knife Stuck in my girdle, she smoothed down my hair And laughed to see me look so brave, and leaped Up to my neck and kissed me. She was still A child; and yet that kiss was on my lips So hot all day where the smoke shut us in. For now, being always with her, the first love I had—the father's, brother's love—was changed, I think, in somewise; like a holy thought Which is a prayer before one knows of it. The first time I perceived this, I remember, Was once when after hunting I came home Weary, and she brought food and fruit for me, And sat down at my feet upon the floor Leaning against my side. But when I felt Her sweet head reach from that low seat of hers So high as to be laid upon my heart, I turned and looked upon my darling there And marked for the first time how tall she was; And my heart beat with so much violence Under her cheek, I thought she could not choose But wonder at it soon and ask me why; And so I bade her rise and eat with me. And when, remembering all and counting back The time, I made out fourteen years for her And told her so, she gazed at me with eyes As of the sky and sea on a grey day, And drew her long hands through her hair, and asked me If she was not a woman; and then laughed: And as she stooped in laughing, I could see Beneath the growing throat the breasts half globed Like folded lilies deepset in the stream. Yes, let me think of her as then; for so Her image, Father, is not like the sights Which come when you are gone. She had a mouth Made to bring death to life,—the underlip Sucked in, as if it strove to kiss itself. Her face was ever pale, as when one stoops Over wan water; and the dark crisped hair And the hair's shadow made it paler still:— Deep-serried locks, the darkness of the cloud Where the moon's gaze is set in eddying gloom. Her body bore her neck as the tree's stem Bears the top branch; and as the branch sustains The flower of the year's pride, her high neck bore That face made wonderful with night and day. Her voice was swift, yet ever the last words Fell lingeringly; and rounded finger-tips She had, that clung a little where they touched And then were gone o' the instant. Her great eyes, That sometimes turned half dizzily beneath The passionate lids, as faint, when she would speak, Had also in them hidden springs of mirth, Which under the dark lashes evermore Shook to her laugh, as when a bird flies low Between the water and the willow-leaves, And the shade quivers till he wins the light. I was a moody comrade to her then, For all the love I bore her. Italy, The weeping desolate mother, long has claimed Her sons' strong arms to lean on, and their hands To lop the poisonous thicket from her path, Cleaving her way to light. And from her need Had grown the fashion of my whole poor life Which I was proud to yield her, as my father Had yielded his. And this had come to be A game to play, a love to clasp, a hate To wreak, all things together that a man Needs for his blood to ripen: till at times All else seemed shadows, and I wondered still To see such life pass muster and be deemed Time's bodily substance. In those hours, no doubt, To the young girl my eyes were like my soul,— Dark wells of death-in-life that yearned for day. And though she ruled me always, I remember That once when I was thus and she still kept Leaping about the place and laughing, I Did almost chide her; whereupon she knelt And putting her two hands into my breast Sang me a song. Are these tears in my eyes? 'Tis long since I have wept for anything. I thought that song forgotten out of mind, And now, just as I spoke of it, it came All back. It is but a rude thing, ill rhymed, Such as a blind man chaunts and his dog hears Holding the platter, when the children run To merrier sport and leave him. Thus it goes:— * She wept, sweet lady, And said in weeping: ‘What spell is keeping The stars so steady? Why does the power Of the sun's noon-hour To sleep so move me? And the moon in heaven, Stained where she passes As a worn-out glass is,— Wearily driven, Why walks she above me? ‘Stars, moon, and sun too, I'm tired of either And all together! Whom speak they unto That I should listen? For very surely, Though my arms and shoulders Dazzle beholders, And my eyes glisten, All's nothing purely! What are words said for At all about them, If he they are made for Can do without them?’ She laughed, sweet lady, And said in laughing: ‘His hand clings half in My own already! Oh! do you love me? Oh! speak of passion In no new fashion, No loud inveighings, But the old sayings You once said of me. ‘You said: “As summer, Through boughs grown brittle, Comes back a little Ere frosts benumb her,— So bring'st thou to me All leaves and flowers, Though autumn's gloomy To-day in the bowers.” ‘Oh! does he love me, When my voice teaches The very speeches He then spoke of me? Alas! what flavour Still with me lingers?’ (But she laughed as my kisses Glowed in her fingers With love's old blisses.) ‘Oh! what one favour Remains to woo him, Whose whole poor savour Belongs not to him?’ La bella donna* Piangendo disse: ‘Come son fisse Le stelle in cielo! Quel fiato anelo Dello stanco sole, Quanto m'assonna! E la luna, macchiata Come uno specchio Logoro e vecchio,— Faccia affannata, Che cosa vuole? ‘Chè stelle, luna, e sole, Ciascun m'annoja E m'annojano insieme; Non me ne preme Nè ci prendo gioja. E veramente, Che le spalle sien franche E le braccia bianche E il seno caldo e tondo, Non mi fa niente. Chè cosa al mondo Posso più far di questi Se non piacciono a te, come dicesti?’ La donna rise E riprese ridendo:— ‘Questa mano che prendo E dunque mia? Tu m'ami dunque? Dimmelo ancora, Non in modo qualunque, Ma le parole Belle e precise Che dicesti pria. ‘Siccome suole La state talora (Dicesti) un qualche istante Tornare innanzi inverno, Così tu fai ch'io scerno Le foglie tutte quante, Ben ch'io certo tenessi Per passato l'autunno. ‘Eccolo il mio alunno! Io debbo insegnargli Quei cari detti istessi Ch'ei mi disse una volta! Oimè! Che cosa dargli,’ (Ma ridea piano piano Dei baci in sulla mano,) ‘Ch'ei non m'abbia da lungo tempo tolta?’ That I should sing upon this bed!—with you To listen, and such words still left to say! Yet was it I that sang? The voice seemed hers, As on the very day she sang to me; When, having done, she took out of my hand Something that I had played with all the while And laid it down beyond my reach; and so Turning my face round till it fronted hers,— ‘Weeping or laughing, which was best?’ she said. But these are foolish tales. How should I show The heart that glowed then with love's heat, each day More and more brightly?—when for long years now The very flame that flew about the heart, And gave it fiery wings, has come to be The lapping blaze of hell's environment Whose tongues all bid the molten heart despair. Yet one more thing comes back on me to-night Which I may tell you: for it bore my soul Dread firstlings of the brood that rend it now. It chanced that in our last year's wanderings We dwelt at Monza, far away from home, If home we had: and in the Duomo there I sometimes entered with her when she prayed. An Image of Our Lady stands there, wrought In marble by some great Italian hand In the great days when she and Italy Sat on one throne together: and to her And to none else my loved one told her heart. She was a woman then; and as she knelt,— Her sweet brow in the sweet brow's shadow there,— They seemed two kindred forms whereby our land (Whose work still serves the world for miracle) Made manifest herself in womanhood. Father, the day I speak of was the first For weeks that I had borne her company Into the Duomo; and those weeks had been Much troubled, for then first the glimpses came Of some impenetrable restlessness Growing in her to make her changed and cold. And as we entered there that day, I bent My eyes on the fair Image, and I said Within my heart, ‘Oh turn her heart to me!’ And so I left her to her prayers, and went To gaze upon the pride of Monza's shrine, Where in the sacristy the light still falls Upon the Iron Crown of Italy, On whose crowned heads the day has closed, nor yet The daybreak gilds another head to crown. But coming back, I wondered when I saw That the sweet Lady of her prayers now stood Alone without her; until further off, Before some new Madonna gaily decked, Tinselled and gewgawed, a slight German toy, I saw her kneel, still praying. At my step She rose, and side by side we left the church. I was much moved, and sharply questioned her Of her transferred devotion; but she seemed Stubborn and heedless; till she lightly laughed And said: ‘The old Madonna? Aye indeed, ‘She had my old thoughts,—this one has my new.’ Then silent to the soul I held my way: And from the fountains of the public place Unto the pigeon-haunted pinnacles, Bright wings and water winnowed the bright air; And stately with her laugh's subsiding smile She went, with clear-swayed waist and towering neck And hands held light before her; and the face Which long had made a day in my life's night Was night in day to me; as all men's eyes Turned on her beauty, and she seemed to tread Beyond my heart to the world made for her. Ah there! my wounds will snatch my sense again: The pain comes billowing on like a full cloud Of thunder, and the flash that breaks from it Leaves my brain burning. That's the wound he gave, The Austrian whose white coat I still made match With his white face, only the two were red As suits his trade. The devil makes them wear White for a livery, that the blood may show Braver that brings them to him. So he looks Sheer o'er the field and knows his own at once. Give me a draught of water in that cup; My voice feels thick; perhaps you do not hear; But you must hear. If you mistake my words And so absolve me, I am sure the blessing Will burn my soul. If you mistake my words And so absolve me, Father, the great sin Is yours, not mine: mark this: your soul shall burn With mine for it. I have seen pictures where Souls burned with Latin shriekings in their mouths: Shall my end be as theirs? Nay, but I know 'Tis you shall shriek in Latin. Some bell rings, Rings through my brain: it strikes the hour in hell. You see I cannot, Father; I have tried, But cannot, as you see. These twenty times Beginning, I have come to the same point And stopped. Beyond, there are but broken words Which will not let you understand my tale. It is that then we have her with us here, As when she wrung her hair out in my dream To-night, till all the darkness reeked of it. Her hair is always wet, for she has kept Its tresses wrapped about her side for years; And when she wrung them round over the floor, I heard the blood between her fingers hiss; So that I sat up in my bed and screamed Once and again; and once to once, she laughed. Look that you turn not now,—she's at your back: Gather your robe up, Father, and keep close, Or she'll sit down on it and send you mad. At Iglio in the first thin shade o' the hills The sand is black and red. The black was black When what was spilt that day sank into it, And the red scarcely darkened. There I stood This night with her, and saw the sand the same. * * * * * * What would you have me tell you? Father, father, How shall I make you know? You have not known The dreadful soul of woman, who one day Forgets the old and takes the new to heart, Forgets what man remembers, and therewith Forgets the man. Nor can I clearly tell How the change happened between her and me. Her eyes looked on me from an emptied heart When most my heart was full of her; and still In every corner of myself I sought To find what service failed her; and no less Than in the good time past, there all was hers. What do you love? Your Heaven? Conceive it spread For one first year of all eternity All round you with all joys and gifts of God; And then when most your soul is blent with it And all yields song together,—then it stands O' the sudden like a pool that once gave back Your image, but now drowns it and is clear Again,—or like a sun bewitched, that burns Your shadow from you, and still shines in sight. How could you bear it? Would you not cry out, Among those eyes grown blind to you, those ears That hear no more your voice you hear the same,— ‘God! what is left but hell for company, But hell, hell, hell?’—until the name so breathed Whirled with hot wind and sucked you down in fire? Even so I stood the day her empty heart Left her place empty in our home, while yet I knew not why she went nor where she went Nor how to reach her: so I stood the day When to my prayers at last one sight of her Was granted, and I looked on heaven made pale With scorn, and heard heaven mock me in that laugh. O sweet, long sweet! Was that some ghost of you Even as your ghost that haunts me now,—twin shapes Of fear and hatred? May I find you yet Mine when death wakes? Ah! be it even in flame, We may have sweetness yet, if you but say As once in childish sorrow: ‘Not my pain, My pain was nothing: oh your poor poor love, Your broken love!’ My Father, have I not Yet told you the last things of that last day On which I went to meet her by the sea? O God, O God! but I must tell you all. Midway upon my journey, when I stopped To buy the dagger at the village fair, I saw two cursed rats about the place I knew for spies—blood-sellers both. That day Was not yet over; for three hours to come I prized my life: and so I looked around For safety. A poor painted mountebank Was playing tricks and shouting in a crowd. I knew he must have heard my name, so I Pushed past and whispered to him who I was, And of my danger. Straight he hustled me Into his booth, as it were in the trick, And brought me out next minute with my face All smeared in patches and a zany's gown; And there I handed him his cups and balls And swung the sand-bags round to clear the ring For half an hour. The spies came once and looked; And while they stopped, and made all sights and sounds Sharp to my startled senses, I remember A woman laughed above me. I looked up And saw where a brown handsome harlot leaned Half through a tavern window thick with vine. Some man had come behind her in the room And caught her by her arms, and she had turned With that coarse empty laugh. I saw him there Munching her neck with kisses, while the vine Crawled in her back. And three hours afterwards, When she that I had run all risks to meet Laughed as I told you, my life burned to death Within me, for I thought it like the laugh Heard at the fair. She had not left me long; But all she might have changed to, or might change to, (I know nought since—she never speaks a word—) Seemed in that laugh. Have I not told you yet, Not told you all this time what happened, Father, When I had offered her the little knife, And bade her keep it for my sake that loved her, And she had laughed? Have I not told you yet? ‘Take it,’ I said to her the second time, ‘Take it and keep it.’ And then came a fire That burnt my hand; and then the fire was blood. And sea and sky were blood and fire, and all The day was one red blindness; till it seemed Within the whirling brain's entanglement That she or I or all things bled to death. And then I found her lying at my feet And knew that I had stabbed her, and saw still The look she gave me when she took the knife Deep in her heart, even as I bade her then, And fell, and her stiff bodice scooped the sand Into her bosom. And she keeps it, see, Do you not see she keeps it?—there, beneath Wet fingers and wet tresses, in her heart. For look you, when she stirs her hand, it shows The little hilt of horn and pearl,—even such A dagger as our women of the coast Twist in their garters. Father, I have done: And from her side now she unwinds the thick Dark hair; all round her side it is wet through, But like the sand at Iglio does not change. Now you may see the dagger clearly. Father, I have told all: tell me at once what hope Can reach me still. For now she draws it out Slowly, and only smiles as yet: look, Father, She scarcely smiles: but I shall hear her laugh Soon, when she shows the crimson blade to God. O <hi rend="c">JENNY.</hi>

“Vengeance of Jenny's case! Fie on her! Never name her, child!”—(Mrs. Quickly.)

 Lazy laughing languid Jenny, Fond of a kiss and fond of a guinea, Whose head upon my knee to-night Rests for a while, as if grown light With all our dances and the sound To which the wild tunes spun you round: Fair Jenny mine, the thoughtless queen Of kisses which the blush between Could hardly make much daintier:—Nay, Poor flower left torn since yesterday Until to-morrow leave you bare; Poor handful of bright spring-water Flung in the whirlpool's shrieking face!— Poor shameful Jenny, full of grace Thus with your head upon my knee;— Whose person or whose purse may be The lodestar of your reverie? This room of yours, my Jenny, looks A change from mine so full of books, Whose serried ranks hold fast, forsooth, So many captive hours of youth,— The hours they thieve from day and night To make one's cherished work come right, And leave it wrong for all their theft, Even as to-night my work was left: Until I vowed that since my brain And eyes of dancing seemed so fain, My feet should have some dancing too:— And thus it was I met with you. Well, I suppose 'twas hard to part, For here I am. And now, sweetheart, You seem too tired to get to bed. It was a careless life I led When rooms like this were scarce so strange Not long ago. What breeds the change,— The many aims or the few years? Because to-night it all appears. Something I do not know again. The cloud's not danced out of my brain,— The cloud that made it turn and swim While hour by hour the books grew dim. Why, Jenny, as I watch you there,— For all your wealth of loosened hair, Your silk ungirdled and unlac'd And warm sweets open to the waist, All golden in the lamplight's gleam,— You know not what a book you seem, Half-read by lightning in a dream! How should you know, my Jenny? Nay, And I should be ashamed to say:— Poor beauty, so well worth a kiss! But while my thought runs on like this With wasteful whims more than enough, I wonder what you're thinking of. If of myself you think at all, What is the thought?—conjectural On sorry matters best unsolved?— Or inly is each grace revolved To fit me with a lure?—or (sad To think!) perhaps you're merely glad That I'm not drunk or ruffianly And let you rest upon my knee. For sometimes, were the truth confess'd, You're thankful for a little rest,— Glad from the crush to rest within, From the heart-sickness and the din Where envy's voice at virtue's pitch Mocks you because your gown is rich; And from the pale girl's dumb rebuke, Whose ill-clad grace and toil-worn look Proclaim the strength that keeps her weak And other nights than yours bespeak; And from the wise unchildish elf, To schoolmate lesser than himself Pointing you out, what thing you are:— Yes, from the daily jeer and jar, From shame and shame's outbraving too, Is rest not sometimes sweet to you?— But most from the hatefulness of man Who spares not to end what he began, Whose acts are ill and his speech ill, Who, having used you at his will, Thrusts you aside, as when I dine I serve the dishes and the wine. Well, handsome Jenny mine, sit up, I've filled our glasses, let us sup, And do not let me think of you, Lest shame of yours suffice for two. What, still so tired? Well, well then, keep Your head there, so you do not sleep; But that the weariness may pass And leave you merry, take this glass. Ah! lazy lily hand, more bless'd If ne'er in rings it had been dress'd Nor ever by a glove conceal'd! Behold the lilies of the field, They toil not neither do they spin; (So doth the ancient text begin,— Not of such rest as one of these Can share.) Another rest and ease Along each summer-sated path From its new lord the garden hath, Than that whose spring in blessings ran Which praised the righteous husbandman, Ere yet, in days of hankering breath, The lilies sickened unto death. What, Jenny, are your lilies dead? Aye, and the snow-white leaves are spread Like winter on the garden-bed. But you had roses left in May,— They were not gone too. Jenny, nay, But must your roses die, and those Their purfelled buds that should unclose? Even so; the leaves are curled apart, Still red as from the broken heart, And here's the naked stem of thorns. Nay, nay, mere words. Here nothing warns As yet of winter. Sickness here Or want alone could waken fear,— Nothing but passion wrings a tear. Except when there may rise unsought Haply at times a passing thought Of the old days which seem to be Much older than any history That is written in any book; When she would lie in fields and look Along the ground through the blown grass, And wonder where the city was, Far out of sight, whose broil and bale They told her then for a child's tale. Jenny, you know the city now. A child can tell the tale there, how Some things which are not yet enroll'd In market-lists are bought and sold Even till the early Sunday light, When Saturday night is market-night Everywhere, be it dry or wet, And market-night in the Haymarket. Our learned London children know, Poor Jenny, all your mirth and woe; Have seen your lifted silken skirt Advertize dainties through the dirt; Have seen your coach-wheels splash rebuke On virtue; and have learned your look When, wealth and health slipped past, you stare Along the streets alone, and there, Round the long park, across the bridge, The cold lamps at the pavement's edge Wind on together and apart, A fiery serpent for your heart. Let the thoughts pass, an empty cloud! Suppose I were to think aloud,— What if to her all this were said? Why, as a volume seldom read Being opened halfway shuts again, So might the pages of her brain Be parted at such words, and thence Close back upon the dusty sense. For is there hue or shape defin'd In Jenny's desecrated mind, Where all contagious currents meet, A Lethe of the middle street? Nay, it reflects not any face, Nor sound is in its sluggish pace, But as they coil those eddies clot, And night and day remember not. Why, Jenny, you're asleep at last!— Asleep, poor Jenny, hard and fast,— So young and soft and tired; so fair, With chin thus nestled in your hair, Mouth quiet, eyelids almost blue As if some sky of dreams shone through! Just as another woman sleeps! Enough to throw one's thoughts in heaps Of doubt and horror,—what to say Or think,—this awful secret sway, The potter's power over the clay! Of the same lump (it has been said) For honour and dishonour made, Two sister vessels. Here is one. My cousin Nell is fond of fun, And fond of dress, and change, and praise, So mere a woman in her ways: And if her sweet eyes rich in youth Are like her lips that tell the truth, My cousin Nell is fond of love. And she's the girl I'm proudest of. Who does not prize her, guard her well? The love of change, in cousin Nell, Shall find the best and hold it dear: The unconquered mirth turn quieter Not through her own, through others' woe: The conscious pride of beauty glow Beside another's pride in her, One little part of all they share. For Love himself shall ripen these In a kind soil to just increase Through years of fertilizing peace. Of the same lump (as it is said) For honour and dishonour made, Two sister vessels. Here is one. It makes a goblin of the sun. So pure,—so fall'n! How dare to think Of the first common kindred link? Yet, Jenny, till the world shall burn It seems that all things take their turn; And who shall say but this fair tree May need, in changes that may be, Your children's children's charity? Scorned then, no doubt, as you are scorn'd! Shall no man hold his pride forewarn'd Till in the end, the Day of Days, At Judgment, one of his own race, As frail and lost as you, shall rise,— His daughter, with his mother's eyes? Each of such curdled lives alike A life for which my twelve hours strike And time must be and time must end. Hard to keep sight of! What might tend To give the thought clear presence? Well, Remember it is possible, Whether I please or do not please, That in the making each of these A separate man has lost his soul. Fair shines the gilded aureole In which our highest painters place Some living woman's simple face. And the stilled features thus descried As Jenny's long throat droops aside,— The loving underlip drawn in, The shadows where the cheeks are thin, And pure wide curve from ear to chin,— With Raffael's or Da Vinci's hand To show them to men's souls, might stand, Whole ages long, the whole world through, For preachings of what God can do. What has man done here? How atone, Great God, for this which man has done? And for the body and soul which by Man's pitiless doom must now comply With lifelong hell, what lullaby Of sweet forgetful second birth Remains? All dark. No sign on earth What measure of God's rest endows The many mansions of his house. If but a woman's heart might see Such erring heart unerringly For once! But that can never be. Like a rose shut in a book In which pure women may not look, For its base pages claim control To crush the flower within the soul; Where through each dead rose-leaf that clings, Pale as transparent psyche-wings, To the vile text, are traced such things As might make lady's cheek indeed More than a living rose to read; So nought save foolish foulness may Watch with hard eyes the sure decay; And so the life-blood of this rose, Puddled with shameful knowledge, flows Through leaves no chaste hand may unclose: Yet still it keeps such faded show Of when 'twas gathered long ago, That the crushed petals' lovely grain, The sweetness of the sanguine stain, Seen of a woman's eyes, must make Her pitiful heart, so prone to ache, Love roses better for its sake:— Only that this can never be:— Even so unto her sex is she. Yet, Jenny, looking long at you, The woman almost fades from view. A cypher of man's changeless sum Of lust, past, present, and to come, Is left. A riddle that one shrinks To challenge from the scornful sphinx. Like a toad within a stone Seated while Time crumbles on; Which sits there since the earth was curs'd For Man's transgression at the first; Which, living through all centuries, Not once has seen the sun arise; Whose life, to its cold circle charmed, The earth's whole summers have not warmed; Which always—whitherso the stone Be flung—sits there, deaf, blind, alone;— Aye, and shall not be driven out Till that which shuts him round about Break at the very Master's stroke, And the dust thereof vanish as smoke, And the seed of Man vanish as dust:— Even so within this world is Lust. Come, come, what use in thoughts like this? Poor little Jenny, good to kiss,— You'd not believe by what strange roads Thought travels, when your beauty goads A man to-night to think of toads! Jenny, wake up. . . . Why, there's the dawn! And there's an early waggon drawn To market, and some sheep that jog Bleating before a barking dog; And the old streets come peering through Another night that London knew; And all as ghostlike as the lamps. So on the wings of day decamps My last night's frolic. Glooms begin To shiver off as lights creep in Past the gauze curtains half drawn-to, And the lamp's doubled shade grows blue,— Your lamp, my Jenny, kept alight, Like a wise virgin's, all one night! And in the alcove coolly spread Glimmers with dawn your empty bed; And yonder your fair face I see Reflected lying on my knee, Where teems with first foreshadowings Your pier-glass scrawled with diamond rings. And somehow in myself the dawn Among stirred clouds and veils withdrawn Strikes greyly on her. Let her sleep. But will it wake her if I heap These cushions thus beneath her head Where my knee was? No,—there's your bed, My Jenny, while you dream. And there I lay among your golden hair Perhaps the subject of your dreams, These golden coins. For still one deems That Jenny's flattering sleep confers New magic on the magic purse,— Grim web, how clogged with shrivelled flies! Between the threads fine fumes arise And shape their pictures in the brain. There roll no streets in glare and rain, Nor flagrant man-swine whets his tusk; But delicately sighs in musk The homage of the dim boudoir; Or like a palpitating star Thrilled into song, the opera-night Breathes faint in the quick pulse of light; Or at the carriage-window shine Rich wares for choice; or, free to dine, Whirls through its hour of health (divine For her) the concourse of the Park. And though in the discounted dark Her functions there and here are one, Beneath the lamps and in the sun There reigns at least the acknowledged belle Apparelled beyond parallel. Ah Jenny, yes, we know your dreams. For even the Paphian Venus seems A goddess o'er the realms of love, When silver-shrined in shadowy grove: Aye, or let offerings nicely placed But hide Priapus to the waist, And whoso looks on him shall see An eligible deity. Why, Jenny, waking here alone May help you to remember one! I think I see you when you wake, And rub your eyes for me, and shake My gold, in rising, from your hair, A Danaë for a moment there. Jenny, my love rang true! for still Love at first sight is vague, until That tinkling makes him audible. And must I mock you to the last, Ashamed of my own shame,—aghast Because some thoughts not born amiss Rose at a poor fair face like this? Well, of such thoughts so much I know: In my life, as in hers, they show, By a far gleam which I may near, A dark path I can strive to clear. Only one kiss. Goodbye, my dear. <hi rend="c">THE PORTRAIT.</hi> This is her picture as she was: It seems a thing to wonder on, As though mine image in the glass Should tarry when myself am gone. I gaze until she seems to stir,— Until mine eyes almost aver That now, even now, the sweet lips part To breathe the words of the sweet heart:— And yet the earth is over her. In painting her I shrined her face Mid mystic trees, where light falls in Hardly at all; a covert place Where you might think to find a din Of doubtful talk, and a live flame Wandering, and many a shape whose name Not itself knoweth, and old dew, And your own footsteps meeting you, And all things going as they came. P A deep dim wood; and there she stands As in that wood that day. At least, Thus was the movement of her hands And thus the carriage of her waist. And passing fair the type must seem, Unknown the presence and the dream. 'Tis she: though of herself, alas! Less than her shadow on the grass Or than her image in the stream. That day we met there, I and she One with the other all alone; And we were blithe; yet memory Saddens those hours, as when the moon Looks upon daylight. And with her I stooped to drink the spring-water, Athirst where other waters sprang; And where the echo is, she sang,— My soul another echo there. Last night at last I could have slept, And yet delayed my sleep till dawn, Still wandering. Then it was I wept: For unawares I came upon Those glades where then she walked with me: And as I stood there suddenly, All wan with traversing the night, Upon the desolate verge of light Yearned loud the iron-bosomed sea. Even so, where Heaven holds breath and hears The beating heart of Love's own breast,— Where round the secret of all spheres All angels lay their wings to rest,— How shall my soul stand rapt and awed, When, by the new birth borne abroad Throughout the music of the suns, It enters in her soul at once And knows the silence there for God! Here with her face doth memory sit Meanwhile, and wait the day's decline, Till other eyes shall look from it, Eyes of the spirit's Palestine, Even than the old gaze tenderer: While hopes and aims long lost with her Stand round her image side by side, Like tombs of pilgrims that have died About the Holy Sepulchre.