Ballads and Sonnets (1881), proof Signature Y (Delaware Museum, third revise, WMR's copy) Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1 Text courtesy of The Delaware Art Museum Ballads and Sonnets Dante Gabriel Rossetti F. S. Ellis Chiswick Press, C. Whittingham and Co. London 1881 May 18 (circa) proof 321-336 4 DGR Y8 Library, Delaware Art Museum 10 point; 6 point leading roman 17 2 cm 3.8 cm 2 cm 2.5 cm 19 x 12.8cm (crown octavo) Commentary
Introduction

This is WMR's complete copy of the final revise proof for Signature Y. WMR's notes and suggestions appear on pages 326, 332, and 334, and the text shows some printer's notations as well.

Textual History: Composition

Textual History: Revision

Besides this copy of the third revise proof, the Delaware proofs for Signature Y include the following: a complete copy of the first author's proof, with many corrections; an author's first revise with various corrections; a partial set of a second revise, (comprising pages 321,329-332); two sets of the third revise, a complete set with two further DGR revisions to the sonnet ordering, and this set, WMR's copy. The British Library proofs have another complete copy of the first revise proof for this signature (dated 10 May).

Printing History

Reception History

Historical

Literary

Translation

Autobiographical

Bibliographic

Y <title> <hi rend="c">WORDS ON THE WINDOW-PANE.</hi> <hi rend="sup">1</hi> DID she in summer write it, or in spring, Or with this wail of autumn at her ears, Or in some winter left among old years Scratched it through tettered cark? A certain thing That round her heart the frost was hardening, Not to be thawed of tears, which on this pane Channelled the rime, perchance, in fevered rain, For false man's sake and love's most bitter sting. Howbeit, between this last word and the next Unwritten, subtly seasoned was the smart, And here at least the grace to weep: if she, Rather, midway in her disconsolate text, Rebelled not, loathing from the trodden heart That thing which she had found man's love to be.

1 For a woman's fragmentary inscription.

 <hi rend="c">WINTER</hi>. HOW large that thrush looks on the bare thorn-tree! A swarm of such, three little months ago, Had hidden in the leaves and let none know Save by the outburst of their minstrelsy. A white flake here and there—a snow-lily Of last night's frost—our naked flower-beds hold; And for a rose-flower on the darkling mould The hungry redbreast gleams. No bloom, no bee. The current shudders to its ice-bound sedge: Nipped in their bath, the stark reeds one by one Flash each its clinging diamond in the sun: 'Neath winds which for this Winter's sovereign pledge Shall curb great king-masts to the ocean's edge And leave memorial forest-king's o'erthrown. Printer marks lines 5 and 8 for improved character spacing. <hi rend="c">SPRING</hi>. SOFT-LITTERED is the new-year's lambing-fold, And in the hollowed haystack at its side The shepherd lies o'nights now, wakeful-eyed At the ewes' travailing call through the dark cold. The young rooks cheep 'mid the thick caw o'the old: And near unpeopled stream-sides, on the ground, By her spring-cry the moorhen's nest is found, Where the drained flood-lands flaunt their marigold. Chill are the gusts to which the pastures cower, And chill the current where the young reeds stand As green and close as the young wheat on land: Yet here the cuckoo and the cuckoo-flower Plight to the heart Spring's perfect imminent hour Whose breath shall soothe you like your dear one's hand. Printer marks line 4 for improved character spacing. <hi rend="c">THE CHURCH-PORCH</hi>. SISTER, first shake we off the dust we have Upon our feet, lest it defile the stones Inscriptured, covering their sacred bones Who lie i'the aisles which keep the names they gave, Their trust abiding round them in the grave; Whom painters paint for visible orisons, And to whom sculptors pray in stone and bronze; Their voices echo still like a spent wave. Without here, the church-bells are but a tune, And on the carven church-door this hot noon Lays all its heavy sunshine here without: But having entered in, we shall find there Silence, and sudden dimness, and deep prayer, And faces of crowned angels all about. <hi rend="c">PLACE DE LA BASTILLE, PARIS</hi>. HOW dear the sky has been above this place! Small treasures of this sky that we see here Seen weak through prison-bars from year to year; Eyed with a painful prayer upon God's grace To save, and tears that stayed along the face Lifted at sunset. Yea, how passing dear, Those nights when through the bars a wind left clear The heaven, and moonlight soothed the limpid space! So was it, till one night the secret kept Safe in low vault and stealthy corridor Was blown abroad on gospel-tongues of flame. O ways of God, mysterious evermore! How many on this spot have cursed and wept That all might stand here now and own Thy Name. WMR's marginal notation to close up the character spacing in the word “autumn” in line 7. <hi rend="c">UNTIMELY LOST</hi>.<lb/> <hi rend="sc">(OLIVER MADOX BROWN. BORN 1855; </hi> <lb/> <hi rend="sc">DIED 1874.)</hi> UPON the landscape of his coming life A youth high-gifted gazed, and found it fair: The heights of work, the floods of praise, were there. What friendships, what desires, what love, what wife?— All things to come. The fanned springtide was rife With imminent solstice; and the ardent air Had summer sweets and a utumn fires to bear;— Heart's ease full-pulsed with perfect strength for strife. A mist has risen: we see the youth no more: Does he see on and strive on? And may we Late-tottering worldworn hence, find his to be The young strong hand which helps us up that shore? Or, echoing the No More with Nevermore, Must Night be ours and his? We hope: and he? Printer marks line 9 for improved character spacing. <hi rend="c">“FOUND.”</hi> <lb/> <hi rend="c">(FOR A PICTURE.)</hi> “THERE is a budding morrow in midnight:”— So sang our Keats, our English nightingale. And here, as lamps across the bridge turn pale In London's smokeless resurrection-light, Dark breaks to dawn. But o'er the deadly blight Of love deflowered and sorrow of none avail Which makes this man gasp and this woman quail, Can day from darkness ever again take flight? Ah! gave not these two hearts their mutual pledge, Under one mantle sheltered 'neath the hedge In gloaming courtship? And O God! to-day He only knows he holds her;—but what part Can life now take? She cries in her locked heart,— “Leave me—I do not know you—go away!” <hi rend="c">A SEA-SPELL</hi>.<lb/> <hi rend="c">FOR A PICTURE.)</hi> HER lute hangs shadowed in the apple-tree, While flashing fingers weave the sweet-strung spell Between its chords; and as the wild notes swell, The sea-bird for those branches leaves the sea. But to what sound her listening ear stoops she? What netherworld gulf-whispers doth she hear, In answering echoes from what planisphere, Along the wind, along the estuary? She sinks into her spell: and when full soon Her lips move and she soars into her song, What creatures of the midmost main shall throng In furrowed surf-clouds to the summoning rune: Till he, the fated mariner, hears her cry, And up her rock, bare-breasted, comes to die? <hi rend="c">FIAMMETTA</hi>.<lb/> <hi rend="c">FOR A PICTURE</hi> BEHOLD Fiammetta, shown in Vision here. Gloom-girt 'mid Spring-flushed apple-growth she stands; And as she sways the branches with her hands, Along her arm the sundered bloom falls sheer, In separate petals shed, each like a tear; While from the quivering bough the bird expands His wings. And lo! thy spirit understands Life shaken and shower'd and flown, and Death drawn near. All stirs with change. Her garments beat the air: The angel circling round her aureole Shimmers in flight against the tree's grey bole: While she, with reassuring eyes most fair, A presage and a promise stands; as 'twere On Death's dark storm the rainbow of the Soul. Printer marks line 2 for improved character spacing. <hi rend="c">THE DAY-DREAM</hi>.<lb/> <hi rend="sc">(FOR A PICTURE.)</hi> THE thronged boughs of the shadowy sycamore Still bear young leaflets half the summer through; From when the robin 'gainst the unhidden blue Perched dark, till now, deep in the leafy core, The embowered throstle's urgent wood-notes soar Through summer silence. Still the leaves come new; Yet never rosy-sheathed as those which drew Their spiral tongues from spring-buds heretofore. Within the branching shade of Reverie Dreams even may spring till autumn; yet none be Like woman's budding day-dream spirit-fann'd. Lo! tow'rd deep skies, not deeper than her look, She dreams; till now on her forgotten book Drops the forgotten blossom from her hand. <hi rend="c">ASTARTE SYRIACA</hi>.<lb/> <hi rend="c">(FOR A PICTURE.)</hi> MYSTERY: lo! betwixt the sun and moon Astarte of the Syrians: Venus Queen Ere Aphrodite was. In silver sheen Her twofold girdle clasps the infinite boon Of bliss whereof the heaven and earth commune: And from her neck's inclining flower-stem lean Love-freighted lips and absolute eyes that wean The pulse of hearts to the spheres' dominant tune. Torch-bearing her sweet ministers compel All thrones of light beyond the sky and sea The witness of Beauty's face to be: That face, of Love's all-penetrative spell Amulet, talisman, and oracle,— Betwixt the sun and moon a mystery. I don't think an [accent grave] is wanted WMR's note to “saràn” in line 8. <foreign lang="italian"> <hi rend="c">PROSERPINA</hi> </foreign>.<lb/> <foreign lang="italian"> <hi rend="c">(PER UN QUADRO.)</hi> </foreign> LUNGI è la luce che in sù questo muro Rifrange appena, un breve istante scorta Del rio palazzo alla soprana porta. Lungi quei fiori d'Enna, O lido oscuro, Dal frutto tuo fatal che omai m'è duro. Lungi quel cielo dal tartareo manto Che quì mi cuopre: e lungi ahi lungi ahi quanto Le notti che saràn dai dì che furo. Lungi da me mi sento; e ognor sognando Cerco e ricerco, e resto ascoltatrice; E qualche cuore a qualche anima dice, (Di cui mi giunge il suon da quando in quando, Continuamente insieme sospirando,)— “Oimè per te, Proserpina infelice!” <hi rend="c">PROSERPINA</hi>.<lb/> <hi rend="c">(FOR A PICTURE.)</hi> AFAR away the light that brings cold cheer Unto this wall,—one instant and no more Admitted at my distant palace-door. Afar the flowers of Enna from this drear Dire fruit, which, tasted once, must thrall me here. Afar those skies from this Tartarean grey That chills me: and afar, how far away, The nights that shall be from the days that were. Afar from mine own self I seem, and wing Strange ways in thought, and listen for a sign: And still some heart unto some soul doth pine, (Whose sounds mine inner sense is fain to bring, Continually together murmuring,)— “Woe's me for thee, unhappy Proserpine!” I am afraid the word is sia: I don't thinkthere is sii or rather think there is sii but only for imperative—Perhaps the two otherrhymes wd bear the a (cutting out e before pia) WMR's note to the last word in line 113.. <foreign lang="italian"> <hi rend="c">LA BELLA MANO</hi> </foreign>.<lb/> <foreign lang="italian"> <hi rend="sc">(PER UN QUADRO.)</hi> </foreign> O BELLA Mano, che ti lavi e piaci In quel medesmo tuo puro elemento Donde la Dea dell' amoroso avvento Nacque, (e dall' onda s'infuocar le faci Di mille inispegnibili fornaci):— Come a Venere a te l'oro e l'argento Offron gli Amori; e ognun riguarda attento La bocca che sorride e te che taci. In dolce modo dove onor t'invii Vattene adorna, e porta insiem fra tante Di Venere e di vergine sembiante; Umilemente in luoghi onesti e pii Bianca e soave ognora; infin che sii, O Mano, mansueta in man d'amante. <foreign lang="italian"> <hi rend="c">LA BELLA MANO</hi> </foreign>.<lb/> <hi rend="sc">(FOR A PICTURE.)</hi> O LOVELY hand, that thy sweet self dost lave In that thy pure and proper element, Whence erst the Lady of Love's high advènt Was born, and endless fires sprang from the wave:— Even as her Loves to her their offerings gave, For thee the jewelled gifts they bear; while each Looks to those lips, of music-measured speech The fount, and of more bliss than man may crave. In royal wise ring-girt and bracelet-spann'd, A flower of Venus' own virginity, Go shine among thy sisterly sweet band; In maiden-minded converse delicately Evermore white and soft; until thou be, O hand! heart-handsel'd in a lover's hand. justified, centered.

Will be published immediately. A New Edition, with Additions POEMS, BY DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI. Crown 8vo, bound from the author's design. Price 12 s.

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Revised and Re-arranged Edition, crown 8vo, price 14s. DANTE AND HIS CIRCLE; WITH THE ITALIAN POETS PRECEDING HIM (1100-1200-1300). A Collection of Lyrics, Edited and Translated in the Original Metres, BY D. G. ROSSETTI. This work includes a translation of THE VITA NUOVA OF DANTE.