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 1
 
 THE POETRY OF 
 PATHOS ^ DELIGHT
 
 JC'^Mxcu.'J'Aflr 
 
 ( (fve^/Ty t7*^0^*^€.
 
 THE POETRY OF 
 
 PATHOS & DELIGHT 
 
 From the Works of 
 COVENTRY PATMORE 
 
 Passages Selected by 
 ALICE MEYNELL 
 
 WITH A PORTRAIT AFTER J. S. SARGENT, A.R.A. 
 
 LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN 
 
 MDCCCXCVI
 
 All rigktt reserved
 
 ris 
 
 INTRODUCTORY NOTE 
 
 This book does not offer a selection in the usual 
 sense. The poetry of a master is selected before 
 it is written, and before it is conceived ; and the 
 mind that conceives it is selected. Mr. Coventry 
 Patmore's art and labour do but second that 
 original distinction. Therefore it is hardly neces- 
 sary to say that my intention has not been to 
 make a collection of " best passages." What has 
 been intended is to collect passages in which the 
 poet has dealt with two things — delight and 
 sorrow, those human and intelligible passions to 
 which all real poetry has access, but which this 
 poetry touches so close as to be mingled with 
 them and changed into them. 
 
 So to offer great poetiy to the natural human 
 sensibility, should be to gain for the poet's whole 
 work new readers. I confess that is my motive. 

 
 INTRODUCTORY NOTE 
 
 Because of their youth, which has not allowed 
 them to read very much, or because of accident, 
 there may be many readers still to gain. Among 
 them may be the fittest — not the less fit because 
 they have been for a time under the influence of a 
 fashion for inordinate haste, or for inordinate 
 leisure, of appreciation. Mr. Patmore's greatest 
 work is neither so new as to gratify the eagerness 
 of one fashion, nor so old as to flatter the reluctance 
 of the other. It is a work of the beginning of the 
 last quarter of our century. It is dated later than 
 Mr. Swinburne's best, for instance, but it had its 
 place in literature before the pi'esent young love 
 of poetry had taken life. Again, many poets are 
 heard because a chorus of contemporaries sings 
 with them and like them. Mr. Coventiy Patmore's 
 voice is single in his day, and single in our 
 literature. It makes part of no choir loud by 
 numbers, and so it needs an attentive ear. To 
 that attentive ear it sounds alone, as the divinest 
 voice of our time. 
 
 There is a dignity in Mr. Patmore's reputation 
 (attendant on the exceeding dignity of his art) 
 that might be offended — though it could not be 
 
 vi
 
 INTRODUCTORY NOTE 
 
 injured — by officious praises. But it is not inop- 
 portune to say thus much : Readers of this book 
 and of the entire poems may be promised a perfect 
 respite from the tedious controversy as to matter and 
 manner, thought and expression. They shall not 
 be invited to attend to discussions as to the relative 
 importance of two things that in truth have no 
 high im}x>rtance if they can be divided so as to be 
 merely related. The dispute is an inconsiderable 
 one ; it is perfectly opportune in the criticism of 
 all poetry below a certain perfectly definite standard 
 of art, and there only. Above that standard, 
 thought and foi-m are not opposed, nor merely 
 related ; they are one. It is not difficult to make 
 a definition of classical poetry, if classical poetry 
 may rightly be defined as all poetry — be its thought 
 what it may, and its form what it may — in which 
 thought and form are one. Classical poetry of 
 every age — and every age has had a little — is that 
 in which there is no antithesis, in which there is 
 more than a bond — union and fusion. The classical 
 poem may be a mere " To Althea from Prison," or 
 even a mere ''To Blossoms." In the small classic 
 the word is fused with its fancy, and in the great 
 vii
 
 INTRODUCTORY NOTE 
 
 it is fused with its passion ; and the greater the 
 passion the greater the splendour of the fire of 
 that fusion — the " integrity of fire." 
 
 The more essential passages of Mr. Coventry 
 Patmore's much earlier work — The Angel in the 
 Ho7ise — are classic, and very high in that noble 
 rank. He plays with this power of his art in the 
 brief metre, the symmetrical stanza, and the collo- 
 quial phrase. He has here accepted the dailiest 
 things and made them spirit and fire. There has 
 been something said against these colloquialisms ; 
 and indeed they would not be tolerable in hands 
 less austere and sweet. The newest Philistine, 
 who is afraid of the reproach of Philistinism, who 
 denies Philistinism in the name of a Philistine, and 
 ultimately i-eceives a Philistine's reward, has been 
 known to make light of some of Mr. Patmore's 
 couplets, which he finds too "domestic." But 
 such " domestic " couplets as those in " Olympus," 
 for instance, are a smiling defiance of Philistinism. 
 So are the brilliant stanzas, made of life, sense, 
 and spirit, in which the very accessories, — the 
 spoilt accessories — of a modern English wedding 
 are rendered grave and bhthe, and the bridegroom 
 viii
 
 INTRODUCTORY NOTE 
 
 is restored to the dignity of the sun. Mr. Patmore 
 makes the Wedding Sei-mon (at the close of The 
 Angel in the House') the improbable opportunity for 
 the finest wit and thought, tenderness, mystery, 
 and celestial knowledge. One of the things that 
 have baffled the trivial in these eai-ly poems is 
 probably what they have taken for triviality or 
 artlessness in the metre as well as in the word. 
 Locks and bars and bolts are less secure for the 
 locking away of a poet's privacy, than is his 
 unintelligible candoui*. In his solemnity the world 
 recognises a mystery ; but by his frank play and 
 simplicity it is sometimes baffled and misled into 
 disregard. 
 
 The Odes are greater than the earlier poems, 
 because they have greater capacity for the quality 
 that is in all Mr. Patmore's work. As for their 
 metre, it is their very poetry. They move with 
 indescribable dignity, and with the freedom of the 
 spirit. The wind bloweth where it listeth. With 
 absolute art the poet sighs, or pauses, or recovers 
 Ijreath, in the " irregular " line, with an effect of 
 infinite liberty and pathos. "Thou hearest the 
 sound thereof" One of Mr. Patmore's worthiest 
 
 ix
 
 INTRODUCTORY NOTE 
 
 conteni])orai-ies has said that the Odes are almost 
 too mournful to be readj because they are so close 
 to the thought : " the verse attending on the 
 thought, and having no independent life of its 
 own." This appreciation is insufficient, for there 
 is union rather than "attendance;" but it ex- 
 presses hastily the effect of this most sensitive and 
 vital line — precisely the effect, which, in another 
 art, results from the phrases of a Parsifal. Take 
 the regular stanza as answering to a symme- 
 trical melody ; you will perceive that neither 
 stanza nor tune can be so immediately sensitive as 
 are those sentences of music, and those lines of the 
 ode in the hands of a master. No other metrical 
 form could be so free and so living a communi- 
 cation. 
 
 What is here to be communicated is vital and 
 mortal pathos and felicity. Even as far as the 
 reader has capacity to perceive that passion, he is 
 aware that it is greater than his experience, and 
 he confesses that it was uttered out of a greater 
 capacity than his. Compassion with that greater 
 passion is a high and worthy manner of admiration. 
 It may be the " terror " that Aristotle joined to
 
 INTRODUCTORY NOTE 
 
 " pity." Compassion in the highest degree is the 
 divinest form of rehgion. The compassion of the 
 shghter acquaintance with sorrow for the greater, 
 and of the smaller capacity for the vaster, is a 
 remorse of tenderness, lowliness, and respect, the 
 paradox of worship. 
 
 Dexterity — the lower technique — may become 
 habitual, and the more brilliant kinds of habit are 
 often mistaken for the actual intention of great 
 art ; but great art is never habitual. Art has a 
 perpetually living intention. All the Imes and 
 passages here gathered together are proofs of this 
 instancy of art. And they are chosen as instant 
 communications of the two passions of happiness 
 and pain, because these are the most simple. It 
 would have been easy to represent Mr. Patmore 
 by an anthology proving him the poet of wit, or 
 the poet of beauty, or the poet of indignation. 
 But the most classic subject of classic poetry is the 
 most intelligible in kind, however enormous in 
 degree — felicity and infelicity. Of melancholy — 
 the black humour — none of Mr. Patmore's work 
 has a sign. 
 
 XI
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 To the llnhiown Eros Tage i 
 
 England 5 
 
 Re?nnant of Honour 8 
 
 'Victory in Defeat y 
 
 Saint Ualentine^s Day 12 
 
 The Wedding Sermon 15 
 
 The Paragon 16 
 
 The Rose of the World 18 
 
 215^ Lover 21 
 
 Heaven and Earth 23 
 
 The Letter 
 
 24 
 
 The Revelation 27 
 
 The Doubt 28 
 
 Security 29 
 
 7^^^ Spirit's Epochs 3c 
 
 7X^ Mtf/V 31 
 
 Acceptance 32 
 
 Betrothed 33 
 
 xiii
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 The Dance Tagc 34. 
 
 Entreaty 3^ 
 
 The Revulsion Z1 
 
 Praises 4° 
 
 Marriage 4 ' 
 
 The Rosy Bosomed Hours 42 
 
 Wind and Wave 4 5 
 
 Be at a 47 
 
 If I were Dead 48 
 
 Deliciee Sapientia de Amore 49 
 
 Mignonne 55 
 
 Mildred 57 
 
 Rfjected 5^ 
 
 Z-oz/^ f» Tears 59 
 
 Zoc/^'i Will be Done 61 
 
 F/r// Loj'^ Remembered 62 
 
 L(?j/ £o€'^ "5 
 
 Away 66 
 
 iJ^r/^^/ 72 
 
 2T^^ Voice of One I Knew 73 
 
 /» the Woods 7 5 
 
 £^/7/^ 77 
 
 Her Counsel 7 8 
 
 Spans a Dei 79 
 
 XIV
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 To the Body Tage 83 
 
 Auras of De light 86 
 
 Psyche 88 
 
 Dawn 89 
 
 The Edge of Bliss 90 
 
 Eros 9 1 
 
 Amelia 92 
 
 After Storm 96 
 
 l^enus and Death 98 
 
 Semele 99 
 
 7^£' Married Lover 100 
 
 7^^ Amaranth 102 
 
 7^^ Letters 103 
 
 O//^ Spring 109 
 
 M/z 5^//^ III 
 
 ^ Farewell 112 
 
 Departure 114 
 
 7^^ dixalea 116 
 
 Eurydice 118 
 
 T"-^^ Z)^j ^^T To-Morror? 121 
 
 Tired Memory 1 24 
 
 T'/f^ y^jj 128 
 
 Winter 130 
 
 L'Jllegro 133 
 
 eA Retrospect 136 
 
 XV
 
 TO THE UN- 
 KNOWN EROS. 
 
 What rumour'd heavens are these 
 
 Which not a poet sings, 
 
 O, Unknown Eros ? What this breeze 
 
 Of sudden wings 
 
 Speeding at far returns of time from interstellar 
 space 
 
 To fan ray very face. 
 
 And gone as fleet. 
 
 Through delicatest ether feathering soft their soli- 
 tary beat. 
 
 With ne'er a light plume dropp'd, nor any trace 
 
 To speak of whence they came, or whither they 
 depart ? 
 
 And why this palpitating heart. 
 
 This blind and unrelated joy. 
 
 This meaningless desire. 
 
 That moves me like the Child 
 
 Who in the flushing darkness troubled lies. 
 
 Inventing lonely prophecies.
 
 TO THE UNKNOWN EROS 
 
 Which even to his Mother mild 
 
 He dares not tell ; 
 
 To which himself is infidel ; 
 
 His heart not less on fire 
 
 With dreams impossible as wildest Arab Tale, 
 
 (So thinks the boy,) 
 
 With dreams that turn him red and pale, 
 
 Yet less impossible and wild 
 
 Than those which bashful Love, in his own way 
 and hour. 
 
 Shall duly bring to flower ? 
 
 O, Unknown Eros, sire of awful bliss. 
 
 What portent and what Delphic word, 
 
 Such as in form of snake forebodes the bird, 
 
 Is this ? 
 
 In me life's even flood 
 
 What eddies thus ? 
 
 What in its ruddy orbit lifts the blood. 
 
 Like a perturbed moon of Uranus, 
 
 Reaching to some great world in ungauged dark- 
 ness hid ; 
 
 And whence 
 
 This rapture of the sense 
 
 Which, by thy whisper bid. 
 
 Reveres with obscure rite and sacramental sign 
 
 A bond I know not of nor dimly can divine ;
 
 TO THE UNKNOWN EROS 
 
 This subject loyalty which longs 
 
 For chains and thongs 
 
 Woven of gossamer and adamant, 
 
 To bind me to my unguess'd want, 
 
 And so to lie. 
 
 Between those quivering plumes that thro' line 
 
 ether pant. 
 For hopeless, sweet eternity ? 
 What God unhonour'd hitherto in songs, 
 Or which, that now 
 Forgettest the disguise 
 
 That Gods must wear who visit human eyes. 
 Art Thou ? 
 
 Thou art not Amor ; or, if so, yon pyre. 
 That waits the willing victim, flames with vestal 
 
 fire ; 
 Nor mooned Queen of maids ; or, if thou'rt she. 
 Ah, then, from Thee 
 
 Let Bride and Bridegroom learn what kisses be ! 
 In what veil'd hymn 
 Or mystic dance 
 
 Would he that were thy Priest advance 
 Thine earthly praise, thy glory limn ? 
 Say, should the feet that feel thy thought 
 In double-center'd circuit run. 
 In that compulsive focus. Nought,
 
 TO THE UNKNOWN EROS 
 
 In this a furnace like the sun ; 
 
 And might some note of thy renown 
 
 And high behest 
 
 Thus in enigma be expressed : 
 
 ' There lies the crown 
 
 Which all thy longing cures. 
 
 Refuse it. Mortal, that it may be yours ! 
 
 It is a Spirit, though it seems red gold ; 
 
 And such may no man, but by shunning, hold. 
 
 Refuse it, till refusing be despair ; 
 
 And thou shalt feel the phantom in thy hair.'
 
 ENGLAND 
 
 J-jO, weary of the greatness of her ways, 
 
 There lies my Land, with hasty pulse and 
 
 hard. 
 Her ancient beauty marr'd. 
 And, in her cold and aimless roving sight, 
 Horror of light ; 
 
 Sole vigour left in her last lethargy. 
 Save when, at bidding of some dreadful breath. 
 The rising death 
 Rolls up with force ; 
 And then the furiously gibbering corse 
 Shakes, panglessly convuls'd, and sightless stares. 
 Whilst one Physician pours in rousing wines. 
 One anodynes. 
 And one declares 
 That nothing ails it but the pains of growth. 
 
 My last look loth 
 Is taken ; and I turn, with the relief 
 Of knowing that my life-long hope and grief 
 
 5
 
 ENGLAND 
 
 Are surely vain. 
 
 To that unshapen time to come, when She, 
 
 A dim, heroic Nation long since dead. 
 
 The foulness of her agony forgot. 
 
 Shall all benignly shed 
 
 Through ages vast 
 
 The ghostly grace of her transfigured past 
 
 Over the present, harass'd and forlorn. 
 
 Of nations yet unborn ; 
 
 And this shall be the lot 
 
 Of those who, in the bird-voice and the 
 
 blast 
 Of her omniloquent tongue. 
 Have truly sung 
 Or greatly said. 
 To shew as one 
 
 With those who have best done, 
 And be as rays. 
 
 Thro' the still altering world, around her 
 changeless head. 
 Therefore no 'plaint be mine 
 
 Of listeners none. 
 
 No hope of render'd use or proud reward. 
 
 In hasty times and hard ; 
 
 But chants as of a lonely thrush's throat. 
 
 At latest eve, 
 
 6
 
 ENGLAND 
 
 That does in each calm note 
 
 Both joy and grieve ; 
 
 Notes few and strong and fine. 
 
 Gilt with sweet day's decline. 
 
 And sad with promise of a different sun.
 
 REMNANT 
 OF HONOUR 
 
 Remnant of Honour, brooding in the dark 
 
 Over your bitter cark. 
 
 Staring, as Rispah stared, astonied seven days 
 
 Upon the corpses of so many sons. 
 
 Who loved her once. 
 
 Dead in the dim and lion-haunted ways. 
 
 Who could have dreamt 
 
 That times should come like these ! 
 
 8
 
 VICTORY 
 IN DEFEAT 
 
 Ah, God, alas. 
 
 How soon it came to pass 
 
 The sweetness melted from thy barbed hook 
 
 Which I so simply took ; 
 
 And I lay bleeding on the bitter land. 
 
 Afraid to stir against thy least command, 
 
 But losing all my pleasant life-blood, whence 
 
 Force should have been heart's frailty to withstand. 
 
 Life is not life at all without delight, 
 
 Nor has it any might ; 
 
 And better than the insentient heart and brain 
 
 Is sharpest pain ; 
 
 And better for the moment seems it to rebel. 
 
 If the great Master, from his lifted seat. 
 
 Ne'er whispers to the wearied servant ' Well ! ' 
 
 Yet what returns of love did I endure, 
 
 When to be pardon'd seem'd almost more sweet 
 
 Than aye to have been pure ! 
 
 But day still faded to disastrous night, 
 
 9
 
 VICTORY IN DEFEAT 
 
 And thicker darkness changed to feebler light, 
 
 Until forgiveness, without stint renew 'd. 
 
 Was now no more with loving tears imbued, 
 
 Vowing no more offence. 
 
 Not less to thine Unfaithful didst thou cry, 
 
 'Come back, poor Child ; be all as 'twas before.' 
 
 But I, 
 
 ' No, no ; I will not promise any more ! 
 
 Yet, when I feel my hour is come to die. 
 
 And so I am secured of continence, 
 
 'I'hen may I say, though haply then in vain, 
 
 " My only, only Love, O, take me back again ! " ' 
 
 Thereafter didst thou smite 
 So hard that, for a space. 
 Uplifted seem'd Heav'n's everlasting door. 
 And I indeed the darling of thy grace. 
 But, in some dozen changes of the moon, 
 A bitter mockery seem'd thy bitter boon. 
 The broken pinion was no longer sore. 
 Again, indeed, I woke 
 Under so dread a stroke 
 
 That all the strength it left within my heart 
 Was just to ache and turn, and then to turn and 
 
 ache. 
 And some weak sign of war unceasingly to make. 
 And here I lie. 
 
 lO
 
 VICTORY IN DEFEAT 
 
 With no one near to mark. 
 
 Thrusting Hell's phantoms feebly in the dark, 
 
 And still at point more utterly to die. 
 
 O God, how long ! 
 
 Put forth indeed thy powerful right hand. 
 
 While time is yet. 
 
 Or never shall I see the blissful land ! 
 
 Thus I : then God, in pleasant speech and strong 
 (Which soon I shall forget) : 
 'The man who, though his fights be all defeats. 
 Still fights. 
 Enters at last 
 
 The heavenly Jerusalem's rejoicing streets 
 With glory more, and more triumphant rites 
 Than always-conquering Joshua's, when his blast 
 The frighted walls of Jericho down cast ; 
 And, lo, the glad surprise 
 Of peace beyond surmise. 
 More than in common Saints, for ever in his eyes. ' 
 
 II
 
 SAINT VALEN- 
 TINE'S DAY 
 
 Well dost thou. Love, thy solemn Feast to hold 
 
 In vestal February; 
 
 Not rather choosing out some rosy day 
 
 From the rich coronet of the coming May, 
 
 When all things meet to marry ! 
 
 O, quick, praevernal Power 
 That signall'st punctual through the sleepy mould 
 The Snowdrop's time to flower. 
 Fair as the rash oath of virginity 
 Which is first-love's first cry ; 
 O, Baby Spring, 
 
 That flutter'st sudden 'neath the breast of Earth 
 A month before the birth ; 
 Whence is the peaceful poignancy. 
 The joy contrite. 
 
 Sadder than sorrow, sweeter than delight. 
 That burthens now the breath of everything. 
 Though each one sighs as if to each alone 
 The cherish'd pang were known ? 
 
 12
 
 SAINT VALENTINE'S DAY 
 
 At dusk of dawn, on his dark spray apart. 
 
 With it the Blackbird breaks the young Day's 
 
 heart; 
 In evening's hush 
 
 About it talks the heavenly-minded Thrush ; 
 The hill with like remorse 
 
 Smiles to the Sun's smile in his westering course ; 
 The fisher's drooping skiff 
 In yonder sheltering bay ; 
 The choughs that call about the shining cliff; 
 The children, noisy in the setting ray ; 
 Own the sweet season, each thing as it may ; 
 Thoughts of strange kindness and forgotten peace 
 In me increase ; 
 And tears arise 
 
 Within my happy, happy Mistress' eyes. 
 And, lo, her lips, averted from my kiss. 
 Ask for Love's bounty, ah, much more than bliss ! 
 
 Is't the sequester'd and exceeding sweet 
 Of dear Desire electing his defeat ? 
 Is't the waked Earth now to yon purpling cope 
 Uttering first-love's first cry. 
 Vainly renouncing, with a Seraph's sigh. 
 Love's natural hope ? 
 
 Fair-meaning Earth, foredoom'd to perjury ! 
 Behold, all -amorous May, 
 
 13
 
 SAINT VALENTINE'S DAY 
 
 With roses heap'd upon her laughmg brows. 
 
 Avoids thee of thy vows ! 
 
 Were it for thee, with her waiin bosom near, 
 
 To abide the sharpness of the Seraph's sphere ? 
 
 Forget thy foohsh woi-ds ; 
 
 Go to her summons gay. 
 
 Thy heart with dead, wing'd Innocencies fill'd, 
 
 Ev'n as a nest with birds 
 
 After the old ones by the hawk are kill'd. 
 
 Well dost thou, Love, to celebrate 
 The noon of thy soft ecstasy. 
 Or e'er it be too late, 
 Or e'er the Snowdrop die ! 
 
 14
 
 THE WED- 
 DING SERMON 
 
 The truths of Love are like th e sea 
 
 For clearness a nd for mystery. 
 
 Of that sweet love which, startling, wakes 
 
 Maiden and Youth , and mostly breaks 
 
 The word of promise to the ear, 
 
 But keeps it, after many a year, 
 
 To the full spirit, how shall I speak ? 
 
 My memory with age is weak. 
 
 And I for hopes do oft suspect 
 
 The things I seem to recollect. 
 
 Yet who but must remember well 
 
 'Twas this made heaven intelligible 
 
 As motive, though 'twas small the power 
 
 The heart might have, for even an hour. 
 
 To hold possession of the height 
 
 Of nameless pathos and delight ! 
 
 15
 
 THE PARAGON 
 
 When I behold the skies aloft 
 
 Passing the pageantry of dreams. 
 The cloud whose bosom, cygnet-soft, 
 
 A couch for nuptial Juno seems. 
 The ocean broad, the mountains bright. 
 
 The shadowy vales with feeding herds, 
 I from my lyre the music smite. 
 
 Nor want for justly matching words. 
 All forces of the sea and air. 
 
 All interests of hill and plain, 
 I so can sing, in seasons fair. 
 
 That who hath felt may feel again. 
 Elated oft by such free songs, 
 
 I think with utterance free to raise 
 That hymn for which the whole world longs, 
 
 A worthy hymn in woman's praise ; 
 A hymn bright-noted like a bird's. 
 
 Arousing these song-sleepy times 
 
 i6
 
 THE PARAGON 
 
 With rhapsodies of perfect words. 
 
 Ruled by returning kiss of rhymes. 
 But when I look on her and hope 
 
 To tell with joy what I admire. 
 My thoughts lie cramp'd in narrow scope. 
 
 Or in the feeble birth expire ; 
 No mystery of well-woven speech, 
 
 No simplest phrase of tenderest fall, 
 No liken'd excellence can reach 
 
 Her, the most excellent of all. 
 The best half of creation's best, 
 
 Its heart to feel, its eye to see. 
 The crown and complex of the rest. 
 
 Its aim and its epitome. 
 Nay, might I utter my conceit, 
 
 'Twere after all a vulgar song. 
 For she's so simply, subtly sweet. 
 
 My deepest rapture does her wrong. 
 
 17
 
 THE ROSE OF 
 THE WORLD 
 
 Lo, when the Lord made North and South, 
 
 And sun and moon ordained. He, 
 Forthbringing each by word of mouth 
 
 In order of its dignity. 
 Did man from the crude clay express 
 
 By sequence, and, all else decreed. 
 He form'd the woman ; nor might less 
 
 Than Sabbath such a work succeed. 
 And still with favour singled out, 
 
 Marr'd less than man by mortal fall. 
 Her disposition is devout. 
 
 Her countenance angelical ; 
 The best things that the best believe 
 
 Are in her face so kindly writ 
 The faithless, seeing her, conceive 
 
 Not only heaven, but hope of it ; 
 No idle thought her instinct shrouds. 
 
 But fancy chequers settled sense. 
 Like alteration of the clouds 
 
 i8
 
 THE ROSE OF THE WORLD 
 
 On noonday's azure permanence ; 
 Pure dignity, composure, ease 
 
 Declare affections nobly fix'd. 
 And impulse sprung from due degrees 
 
 Of sense and spirit sweetly mix'd. 
 Her modesty, her chiefest grace. 
 
 The cestus clasping Venus' side. 
 How potent to deject the face 
 
 Of him who would affront its pride ! 
 Wrong dares not in her presence speak. 
 
 Nor spotted thought its taint disclose 
 Under the protest of a cheek 
 
 Outbragging Nature's boast the rose. 
 In mind and manners how discreet ; 
 
 How artless in her very art ; 
 How candid in discourse ; how sweet 
 
 The concord of her lips and heai't ; 
 How simple and how circumspect ; 
 
 How subtle and how fancy-free ; 
 Though sacred to her love, how deck'd 
 
 With unexclusive courtesy ; 
 How quick in talk to see from far 
 
 The way to vanquish or evade ; 
 How able her persuasions are 
 
 To prove, her reasons to persuade ; 
 How (not to call true instinct's bent 
 
 19
 
 THE ROSE OF THE WORLD 
 
 And woman's very nature, harm), 
 How amiable and innocent 
 
 Her pleasure in her power to charm ; 
 How humbly careful to attract. 
 
 Though crown'd with all the soul desires. 
 Connubial aptitude exact. 
 
 Diversity that never tires. 
 
 20
 
 THE LOVER 
 
 He meets, by heavenly chance express. 
 
 The destined maid ; some hidden hand 
 Unveils to him that loveliness 
 
 Which others cannot understand. 
 His merits in her presence grow. 
 
 To match the promise in her eyes, 
 And round her happy footsteps blow 
 
 The authentic airs of Paradise. 
 For joy of her he cannot sleep ; 
 
 Her beauty haunts him all the night ; 
 It melts his heart, it makes him weep 
 
 For wonder, worship, and delight. 
 O, paradox of love, he longs. 
 
 Most humble when he most aspires, 
 To suffer scorn and cruel wronars 
 
 From her he honours and desires. 
 Her graces make him rich, and ask 
 
 No guerdon ; this imperial style 
 Affronts him ; he disdains to bask. 
 
 21
 
 THE LOVER 
 
 The pensioner of her priceless smile. 
 He prays for some hard thing to do. 
 
 Some work of fame and labour immense. 
 To stretch the languid bulk and thew 
 
 Of love's fresh-born magnipotence. 
 No smallest boon were bought too dear. 
 
 Though barter'd for his love-sick life ; 
 Yet trusts he, with undaunted cheer. 
 
 To vanquish heaven, and call her Wife. 
 He notes how queens of sweetness still 
 
 Neglect their crowns, and stoop to mate ; 
 How, self-consign'd with lavish will. 
 
 They ask but love proportionate ; 
 How swift pursuit by small degrees. 
 
 Love's tactic, works like miracle ; 
 How valour, clothed in courtesies. 
 
 Brings dowii the haughtiest citadel ; 
 And therefore, though he merits not 
 
 To kiss the braid upon her skirt. 
 His hope, discouraged ne'er a jot. 
 
 Out-soars all possible desert. 
 
 22
 
 HEAVEN AND 
 EARTH 
 
 How long shall men deny the flower 
 
 Because its roots are in the earth. 
 And crave with tears from God the dower 
 
 They have, and have despised as dearth, 
 Aad scorn as low their human lot. 
 
 With frantic pride, too blind to see 
 That standing on the head makes not 
 
 Either for ease or dignity ! 
 But fools shall feel like fools to find 
 
 (Too late inform'd) that angels' mirth 
 Is oae in cause, and mode, and kind 
 
 With that which they profaned on earth. 
 
 23
 
 THE LETTER 
 
 ' O, MORE than dear, be more than just, 
 
 ' And do not deafly shut the door ! 
 ' I claim no right to speak ; I trust 
 
 * Mercy, not right ; yet who has more ? 
 ' For, if more love makes not more fit, 
 
 ' Of claimants here none's more nor less, 
 ' Since your great woi-th does not permit 
 
 ' Degrees in our unworthiness, 
 ' Yet, if there's aught that can be done 
 
 ' With arduous labour of long yearSj 
 ' By which you'll say that you'll be won, 
 
 ' O tell me, and I'll dry my teai's. 
 ' Ah, no ; if loving cannot move, 
 
 ' How foolishly must labour fail ! 
 ' The use of deeds is to show love ; 
 
 ' If signs suffice let these avail : 
 ' Your name pronounced brings to my heart 
 
 ' A feeling like the violet's breath, 
 ' Which does so much of heaven impart 
 
 24
 
 THE LETTER 
 
 ' It makes me amorous of death ; 
 ' The winds that in the garden toss 
 ' The Guelder-roses give me pain, 
 
 * Alarm me with the dread of loss, 
 
 ' Exhaust me with the dream of gain ; 
 
 * I'm troubled by the clouds that move ; 
 
 ' Tired by the breath which I respire ; 
 ' And ever, like a torch, my love, 
 
 ' Thus agitated, flames the higher ; 
 ' All's hard that has not you for goal ; 
 
 ' I scarce can move my hand to write, 
 ' For love engages all my soul, 
 
 ' And leaves the body void of might ; 
 ' The wings of will spread idly, as do 
 
 ' The bird's that in a vacuum lies ; 
 ' My breast, asleep with dreams of you, 
 
 ' Forgets to breathe, and bursts in sighs ; 
 ' I see no rest this side the gx*ave, 
 
 ' No rest nor hope, from you apart ; 
 ' Your life is in the rose you gave, 
 
 ' Its perfume suffocates my heart ; 
 ' There's no refreshment in the breeze ; 
 
 ' The heaven o'erwhelms me with its blue ; 
 ' I faint beside the dancing seas ; 
 
 ' Winds, skies, and waves are only you ; 
 ' The thought or act which not intends 
 
 25
 
 THE LETTER 
 
 ' You service, seems a sin and shame ; 
 
 * In that one only object ends 
 
 ' Conscience, religion, honour, fame. 
 ' Ah, could I put off' love ! Could we 
 
 ' Never have met ! What calm, what ease ! 
 ' Nay, but, alas, this remedy 
 
 ' Were ten times worse than the disease ! 
 ' For when, indifferent, I pursue 
 
 * The world's best pleasures for relief, 
 ' My heart, still sickening back to you, 
 
 * Finds none like memory of its grief ; 
 
 * And, though 'twere very hell to hear 
 
 * You felt such misery as I, 
 
 * All good, save you, were far less dear 
 
 * Than is that ill with which I die ! 
 ' Where'er I go, wandering forlorn, 
 
 ' You are the world's love, life, and glee : 
 
 * Oh, wretchedness not to be borne 
 
 ' If she that's Love should not love me ! ' 
 
 26
 
 THE REVE- 
 LATION 
 
 An idle poet, here and there. 
 
 Looks round him ; but, for all the rest, 
 The world, unfathomably fair. 
 
 Is duller than a witling's jest. 
 Love wakes men, once a lifetime each ; 
 
 They lift their heavy lids, and look ; 
 And, lo, what one sweet page can teach. 
 
 They read with joy, then shut the book. 
 And some give thanks, and some blaspheme. 
 
 And most forget ; but, either way. 
 That and the Child's unheeded dream 
 
 Is all the light of all their day 
 
 27
 
 THE DOUBT 
 
 The moods of love are like the wind. 
 
 And none knows whence or why they rise 
 I ne'er before felt heart and mind 
 
 So much affected through mine eyes. 
 How cognate with the flatter'd air, 
 
 How form'd for earth's familiar zone, 
 She moved ; how feeling and how fair 
 
 For others' pleasure and her own ! 
 And, ah, the heaven of her face ! 
 
 How, when she laugh'd I seem'd to see 
 The gladness of the primal grace. 
 
 And how, when grave, its dignity ! 
 Of all she was, the least not less 
 
 Delighted the devoted eye ; 
 No fold or fashion of her dress 
 
 Her fairness did not sanctify. 
 I could not else than grieve. What cause .'' 
 
 Was I not blest ? Was she not thei-e .'' 
 Ivikely my own ? Ah, that it was : 
 
 How like seem'd ' likely ' to despair ! 
 
 28
 
 SECURITY 
 
 But as we talk'd, my spirit quaff" 'd 
 
 The sparkling winds ; the candid skies 
 At our untruthful strangeness laugh'd ; 
 
 I kiss'd with mine her smiling eyes ; 
 And sweet familiamess and awe 
 
 Prevail'd that hour on either part, 
 And in the eternal hght I saw 
 
 That she was mine ; though yet my heart 
 Could not conceive, nor would confess 
 
 Such contentation ; and there grew 
 More form and more fair stateliness 
 
 Than heretofore between us two. 
 
 29
 
 THE SPIRIT'S 
 EPOCHS 
 
 Not in the crises of events. 
 
 Of compass'd hopes, or fears fulfill'd. 
 Or acts of gravest consequence, 
 
 Are life's delight and depth reveal'd. 
 The day of days was not the day ; 
 
 That went before, or was postponed ; 
 The night Death took our lamp away 
 
 Was not the night on which we groan'd. 
 I drew my bride, beneath the moon. 
 
 Across my threshold ; happy hour ! 
 But, ah, the walk that afternoon 
 
 We saw the water-flags in flower ! 
 
 30
 
 THE MAID 
 
 She wearies with an ill unknown ; 
 
 In sleep she sobs and seems to float, 
 A water-lily, all alone 
 
 Within a lonely castle moat 
 And as the full-moon, spectral, lies 
 
 Within the crescent's gleaming arms, 
 The present shows her heedless eyes 
 
 A future dim with vague alarms. 
 She sees, and yet she scarcely sees. 
 
 For, life-in-life not yet begun, 
 Too many are its mysteries 
 
 For thought to fix on any one. 
 
 31
 
 ACCEPTANCE 
 
 Twice rose, twice died my trembling word ; 
 
 The faint and frail Cathedral chimes 
 Spake time in music, and we heard 
 
 The chafers rustling in the limes. 
 Her dress, that touch'd me where I stood. 
 
 The warmth of her confided arm. 
 Her bosom's gentle neighbourhood. 
 
 Her pleasure in her power to charm ; 
 Her look, her love, her form, her touch, 
 
 The least seem'd most by blissful turn, 
 Blissful but that it pleased too much. 
 
 And taught the wayward soul to yearn. 
 It was as if a harp with wires 
 
 Was traversed by the breath I drew ; 
 And oh, sweet meeting of desires. 
 
 She, answering, own'd that she loved too. 
 
 32
 
 BETROTHED 
 
 What fortune did my heart foretell ? 
 
 What shook my spirit, as I woke, 
 Like the vibration of a bell 
 
 Of which I had not heard the stroke ? 
 Was it some happy vision shut 
 
 From memory by the sun's fresh ray ? 
 Was it that linnet's song ; or but 
 
 A natural gratitude for day ? 
 Or the mere joy the senses weave, 
 
 A wayward ecstasy of life ? 
 Then I remember'd, yester-eve 
 
 I won Honoria for my Wife. 
 
 33
 
 THE DANCE 
 
 But there danced she, who from the leaven 
 
 Of ill preserv'd my heart and wit 
 All unawares, for she was heaven. 
 
 Others at best but fit for it. 
 One of those lovely things she was 
 
 In whose least action there can be 
 Nothing so transient but it has 
 
 An air of immortality. 
 I mark'd her step, with peace elate. 
 
 Her brow more beautiful than morn, 
 Her sometime look of girlish state 
 
 Which sweetly waived its right to scorn 
 The giddy crowd, she grave the while. 
 
 Although, as 'twere beyond her will. 
 Around her mouth the baby smile. 
 
 That she was born with, linger'd still. 
 Her ball-dress seem'd a breathing mist. 
 
 From the fair form exhaled and shed. 
 Raised in the dance with arm and wrist 
 
 34
 
 THE DANCE 
 
 All warmth and light, unbraceleted. 
 Her motion, feeling 'twas beloved. 
 
 The pensive soul of tune express'd. 
 And, oh, what perfume, as she moved, 
 
 Came from the flowers in her breast ! 
 Ah, none but I discern'd her looks. 
 
 When in the throng she pass'd me by, 
 For love is like a ghost, and brooks 
 
 Only the chosen seer's eye ; 
 And who but she could e'er divine 
 
 The halo and the happy trance. 
 When her bright arm reposed on mine. 
 
 In all the pauses of the dance ! 
 
 35
 
 ENTREATY 
 
 ' O Dearest, tell me how to prove 
 
 'Goodwill which cannot be express'd ; 
 
 ' The beneficial heart of love 
 'Is labour in an idle breast.' 
 
 36
 
 THE REVULSION 
 
 'TwAs when the spousal time of May 
 
 Hangs all the hedge with bridal wreaths, 
 And air's so sweet the bosom gay 
 
 Gives thanks for every breath it breathes ; 
 When like to like is gladly moved. 
 
 And each thing joins in Spring's refi*ain, 
 ' Let those love now who never loved ; 
 
 ' Let those who have loved love again ; ' 
 That I, in whom the sweet time wrought. 
 
 Lay streteh'd within a lonely glade, 
 Abandon'd to delicious thought, 
 
 Beneath the softly twinklmg shade. 
 
 And so I mused, till musing brought 
 A dream that shook my house of clay. 
 
 And, in my humbled heart, I thought, 
 To me there yet may come a day 
 
 With this the single vestige seen 
 Of comfort, earthly or divine. 
 
 37
 
 THE REVULSION 
 
 My sorrow some time must have been 
 
 Her portion, had it not been mine. 
 Then I, who knew, from watching hfe. 
 
 That blows foreseen are slow to fall. 
 Rehearsed the losing of a wife. 
 
 And faced its terrors each and all. 
 The self-chastising fancy show'd 
 
 The coffin with its ghastly breath ; 
 The innocent sweet face that owed 
 
 None of its innocence to death ; 
 The lips that used to laugh ; the knell 
 
 That bade the world beware of mirth ; 
 The heartless and intolerable 
 
 Indignity of ' earth to earth ;' 
 At morn remembering by degrees 
 
 That she I dream'd about was dead ; 
 Love's still recurrent jubilees. 
 
 The days that she was born, won, wed'; 
 The duties of my life the same. 
 
 Their meaning for the feelings gone ; 
 Friendship impertinent, and fame 
 
 Disgusting ; and, more harrowing none, 
 Small household troubles fall'n to me. 
 
 As, ' What time would I dine to-day ? ' 
 And, oh, how could I bear to see 
 
 The noisy children at their play. 
 
 38
 
 THE REVULSION 
 
 Besides, where all things limp and halt. 
 
 Could I go straight, should I alone 
 Have kept my love without default 
 
 Pitch'd at the true and heavenly tone ? 
 The festal-day might come to mind 
 
 That miss'd the gift which more endears ; 
 The hour which might have been more kind. 
 
 And now less fertile in vain tears ; 
 The good of common intercourse. 
 
 For daintier pleasures then despised. 
 Now with what passionate remorse. 
 
 What poignancy of hunger prized ! 
 The little wrong, now greatly rued. 
 
 Which no repentance now could right ; 
 And love, in disbelieving mood. 
 
 Deserting his celestial height. 
 Withal to know, God's love sent grief 
 
 To make me less the world's, and more 
 Meek-hearted : ah, the sick relief! 
 
 Why bow'd I not my heart before ? 
 
 39
 
 PRAISES 
 
 I PRAISED her^ but no praise could fill 
 
 The depths of her desire to please. 
 Though dull to others as a Will 
 
 To them that have no learacies. 
 The more I praised the more she shone. 
 
 Her eyes incredulously bright. 
 And all her happy beauty blown 
 
 Beneath the beams of my delight. 
 Sweet rivalry was thus begot ; 
 
 By turns, my speech, in passion's style. 
 With flatteries the truth o'ershot. 
 
 And she surpass'd them with her smile. 
 
 * Nature to you was more than kind ; 
 
 ' 'Twas fond perversity to dress 
 ' So much simplicity of mind 
 
 ' In such a pomp of loveliness ! 
 
 40
 
 MARRIAGE 
 
 Forth, from the glittering spirit's peace 
 
 And gaiety ineffable, 
 Stream'd to the heart delight and ease, 
 
 As from an overflowing well ; 
 And, orderly deriving thence 
 
 Its pleasure perfect and allow'd. 
 Bright with the spirit shone the sense. 
 
 As with the sun a fleecy cloud. 
 
 41
 
 THE ROSY BOSOM'D 
 HOURS 
 
 A FLORIN to the willing Guard 
 
 Secured, for half the way, 
 (He lock'd us in, ah, lueky-starr'd,) 
 
 A curtain'd, front coupe. 
 The sparkling sun of August shone ; 
 
 The wind was in the West ; 
 Your gown and all that you had on 
 
 Was what became you best ; 
 And we were in that seldom mood 
 
 When soul with soul agrees. 
 Mingling, like flood with equal flood, 
 
 In agitated ease. 
 Far round, each blade of harvest bare 
 
 Its little load of bread ; 
 Each furlong of that journey fair 
 
 With separate sweetness sped. 
 The calm of use was coming o'er 
 
 The wonder of our wealth. 
 And now, maybe, 'twas not much more 
 
 42
 
 THE ROSY BOSOM'D HOURS 
 
 Than Eden's common health. 
 We paced the sunny platform, while 
 
 The train at Havant changed : 
 What made the people kindly smile, 
 
 Or stare with looks estranged ? 
 Too radiant for a wife you seem'd, 
 
 Serener than a bride ; 
 Me happiest born of men I deem'd. 
 
 And show'd perchance my pride. 
 I loved that girl, so gaunt and tall. 
 
 Who whispered loud, ' Sweet Thing ! ' 
 Scanning your figure, slight yet all 
 
 Round as your own gold ring. 
 At Salisbury you stray'd alone 
 
 Within the shafted glooms. 
 Whilst I was by the Verger shown 
 
 The brasses and the tombs. 
 At tea we talk'd of matters deep. 
 
 Of joy that never dies ; 
 We laugh'd, till love was mix'd with sleep 
 
 Within your great sweet eyes. 
 The next day, sweet with luck no less 
 
 And sense of sweetness past. 
 The full tide of our happiness 
 
 Rose higher than the last. 
 At Dawlish, 'mid the pools of brine. 
 
 43
 
 THE ROSY BOSOM'D HOURS 
 
 You stept from rock to rock, 
 One hand quick tightening upon mine. 
 
 One hokhng up your frock. 
 On starfish and on weeds alone 
 
 You seem'd intent to be : 
 Flash'd those great gleams of hope unknown 
 
 From you, or from the sea ? 
 Ne'er came before, ah, when again 
 
 Shall come two days like these : 
 Such quick delight within the brain. 
 
 Within the heart such peace ? 
 I thought, indeed, by magic chance, 
 
 A third from Heaven to win. 
 But as, at dusk, we reach'd Penzance, 
 
 A drizzling rain set in. 
 
 44
 
 WIND AND WAVE 
 
 The wedded light and heat. 
 Winnowing the witless space. 
 Without a let. 
 
 What are they till they beat 
 Against the sleepy sod, and there beget 
 Perchance the violet ! 
 Is the One found. 
 
 Amongst a wilderness of as happy grace. 
 To make Heaven's bound ; 
 So that in Her 
 
 All which it hath of sensitively good 
 Is sought and understood 
 After the nan-ow mode the mighty Heavens 
 
 prefer ? 
 She, as a little breeze 
 Following still Night, 
 Ripples the spirit's cold, deep seas 
 Into dehght ; 
 But, in a -while, 
 
 45
 
 WIND AND WAVE 
 
 The immeasurable smile 
 
 Is broke by fresher airs to flashes blent 
 
 With darkling discontent : 
 
 And all the subtle zephyr hurries gay. 
 
 And all the heaving ocean heaves one way, 
 
 T'ward the void sky-line and an unguess'd weal . 
 
 Until the vanward billows feel 
 
 The agitating shallows, and divine the goal, 
 
 And to foam roll. 
 
 And spread and stray 
 
 And traverse wildly, like delighted hands, 
 
 The fair and fleckless sands ; 
 
 And so the whole 
 
 Unfathomable and immense 
 
 Triumphing tide comes at the last to reach 
 
 And burst in wind-kiss'd splendours on the deaf- 
 
 'ning beach. 
 Where forms of children in first innocence 
 Laugh and fling pebbles on the rainbow'd crest 
 Of its untii-ed unrest. 
 
 46
 
 BEATA 
 
 Of infinite Heaven the rays, 
 Piercing some eyelet in our cavern black. 
 Ended their viewless track 
 On thee to smite 
 
 Solely, as on a diamond stalactite. 
 And in mid-darkness lit a rainbow's blaze, 
 Wherein the absolute Reason, Power, and Love, 
 That erst could move 
 Mainly in me but toil and weariness. 
 Renounced their deadening might. 
 Renounced their undistinguishable stress 
 Of withering white. 
 
 And did with gladdest hues my spirit caress, 
 Nothing of Heaven in thee showing infinite, 
 Save the dehght. 
 
 47
 
 IF I WERE DEAD 
 
 'If I were dead, you'd sometimes say, Poor 
 Child ! ' 
 The deal' hps quiver'd as they spake. 
 And the tears brake 
 
 Fi-om eyes which, not to grieve me, brightly smiled. 
 Poor Child, poor Child ! 
 
 I seem to hear your laugh, your talk, your song. 
 It is not true that Love will do no wrong. 
 Poor Child ! 
 
 And did you think, when you so cried and smiled, 
 How I, in lonely nights, should lie awake. 
 And of those words your full avengers make ? 
 Poor Child, poor Child ! 
 And now, unless it be 
 
 That sweet amends thrice told are come to thee, 
 O God, have Thou 710 mercy upon me ! 
 Poor Child ! 
 
 48
 
 DELICI^ SAPIENTI^ 
 DE AMORE 
 
 49 
 
 Love, light for me 
 Thy ruddiest blazing torch. 
 That I, albeit a beggar by the Porch 
 Of the glad Palace of Virginity, 
 May gaze within, and sing the pomp I see ; 
 For, crown'd with roses all, 
 'Tis there, O Love, they keep thy festival ! 
 But first warn off the beatific spot 
 Those wretched who have not 
 Even afar beheld the shining wall. 
 And those who, once beholding, have forgot. 
 And those, most vile, who dress 
 The chamel spectre drear 
 Of utterly dishallow'd nothingness 
 In that refulgent fame. 
 And cry, Lo, here ! 
 And name 
 
 The Lady whose smiles inflame 
 The sphere. 
 
 D
 
 DELICIiE SAPIENTIiE DE AMORE 
 
 BrinfT, Love, .anear. 
 
 And bid be not afraid 
 
 Young Lover true, and Love-foreboding Maid, 
 
 And wedded Spouse, if virginal of thought ; 
 
 For I will sing of nought 
 
 Less sweet to hear 
 
 Than seems 
 
 A music in their half-remember'd dreams. 
 
 The magnet calls the steel : 
 Answers the iron to the magnet's breath ; 
 What do they feel 
 But death ! 
 
 The clouds of summer kiss in flame and rain. 
 And are not found again ; 
 
 But the heavens themselves eternal are with fire 
 Of unapproach'd desire. 
 
 By the aching heart of Love, which cannot rest. 
 In blissfullest pathos so indeed possess'd. 
 O, spousals high ; 
 O, doctrine blest. 
 
 Unutterable in even the happiest sigh ; 
 This know ye all 
 Who can recall 
 
 With what a welling of indignant tears 
 Love's simpleness first hears 
 The meaning of his mortal covenant, 
 
 50
 
 DELICI^ SAPIENTI^ DE AMORE 
 
 And from what pride comes down 
 
 To wear the crown 
 
 Of which 'twas very heaven to feel the want. 
 
 How envies he the ways 
 
 Of yonder hopeless star. 
 
 And so would laugh and yearn 
 
 With trembling lids eterne. 
 
 Ineffably content from infinitely far 
 
 Only to gaze 
 
 On his bright Mistress's responding rays, 
 
 That never know eclipse ; 
 
 And, once in his long year. 
 
 With praeternuptial ecstasy and fear. 
 
 By the delicious law of that ellipse 
 
 Wherein all citizens of ether move. 
 
 With hastening pace to come 
 
 Nearer, though never near, 
 
 His Love 
 
 And always inaccessible sweet Home ; 
 
 There on his path doul)ly to burn, 
 
 Kiss'd by her doubled light 
 
 That whispers of its source. 
 
 The ardent secret ever clothed with Night, 
 
 Then go forth in new force 
 
 Towards a new return. 
 
 Rejoicing as a Bridegroom on his course ! 
 
 51
 
 DELICI^: SAPIENTI^ DE AMORE 
 
 This know ye all ; 
 
 Therefore gaze bold. 
 
 That so in you be joyful hope increas'd, 
 
 Thorough the Palace portals, and behold 
 
 The dainty and unsating Marriage-Feast. 
 
 O, hear 
 
 Them singing clear 
 
 ' Cor meum et caro mea ' round the ' I am,' 
 
 The Husband of the Heavens, and the Lamb 
 
 Whom they for ever follow there that kept, 
 
 Or losing, never slept 
 
 Till they reconquer'd had in mortal fight 
 
 The standard white. 
 
 O, hear 
 
 From the harps they bore from Earth, five-strung, 
 
 what music springs. 
 While the glad Spirits chide 
 The wondering strings ! 
 And how the shining sacrificial Choirs, 
 Offering for aye their dearest hearts' desires. 
 Which to their hearts come back beatified. 
 Hymn, the bright aisles along. 
 The nuptial song. 
 
 Song ever new to us and them, that saith, 
 ' Hail Virgin in Virginity a Spouse ' ' 
 Heard first below 
 
 52
 
 DELICI^ SAPIENTI^ DE AMORE 
 
 Within the little house 
 
 At Nazareth ; 
 
 Heard yet in many a cell where brides of Christ 
 
 Lie hid, emparadised. 
 
 And where, although 
 
 By the hour 'tis night. 
 
 There's light. 
 
 The Day still lingering in the lap of snow. 
 
 Gaze and be not afraid 
 
 Ye wedded few that honour, in sweet thought 
 
 And glittering will. 
 
 So freshly from the garden gather still 
 
 The hly sacrificed ; 
 
 For ye, though self-suspected here for nought. 
 
 Are highly styled 
 
 With the thousands twelve times twelve of unde- 
 
 filed. 
 Gaze and be not afraid 
 
 Young Lover true and love-foreboding Maid. 
 The full noon of deific vision bright 
 Abashes nor abates 
 
 No spark minute of Nature's keen delight. 
 'Tis there your Hymen waits ! 
 There where in courts afar, all unconfiised, they 
 
 crowd. 
 As fumes the starlight soft 
 
 53
 
 DELICI^ SAPIENTI.E DE AMORE 
 
 In gulfs of cloud, 
 
 And each to the other, well-content. 
 
 Sighs oft, 
 
 ' 'Twas this we meant ! ' 
 
 Gaze without blame 
 
 Ye in whom living Love yet blushes foi* dead 
 
 shame. 
 There of pure Virgins none 
 Is fairer seen. 
 Save One, 
 
 Than Maiy Magdalene. 
 Gaze without doubt or fear 
 
 Ye to whom generous Love, by any name, is dear 
 Love makes the life to be 
 A fount perpetual of virginity ; 
 For, lo, the Elect 
 
 Of generous Love, how nam'd soe'er, affect 
 Nothing but God, 
 Or mediate or direct. 
 Nothing but God, 
 The Husband of the Heavens : 
 And who Him love, in potence great or small, 
 Are, one and all. 
 Heirs of the Palace glad. 
 And inly clad 
 With the*bridal robes of ardour virginal. 
 
 54
 
 MIGNONNE 
 
 Whate'er thou dost thou'rt dear. 
 
 Uncertain troubles sanctify 
 
 That magic well-spring of the willing tear, 
 
 Thine eye. 
 
 Thy jealous fear. 
 
 With not the rustle of a rival near ; 
 
 Thy careless disregard of all 
 
 My tenderest care ; 
 
 Thy dumb despair 
 
 When thy keen wit my worship may construe 
 
 Into contempt of thy divinity ; 
 
 They please me too ! 
 
 But should it once befall 
 
 These accidental charms to disappear. 
 
 Leaving withal 
 
 Thy sometime self the same throughout the year. 
 
 So glowing, grave and shy. 
 
 Kind, talkative and dear 
 
 As now thou sitt'st to ply 
 
 55
 
 MIGNONNE 
 
 The fireside tune 
 
 Of that neat engine deft at which thou sew'st 
 
 With fingers mild and foot like the new moon, 
 
 O, then what cross of any further fate 
 
 Could my content abate ? 
 
 Forget, then, (but I know 
 
 Thou canst not so,) 
 
 Thy customs of some praediluvian state. 
 
 I am no Bullfinch, fair my Butterfly, 
 
 That thou should'st try 
 
 Those zigzag courses, in the welkin clear ; 
 
 Nor cruel Boy that, fledd'st thou straight 
 
 Or paused, mayhap 
 
 Might catch thee, for thy colours, with his cap. 
 
 56
 
 MILDRED 
 
 Mildred's of Earth, yet happier far 
 Than most men's thoughts of Heaven are. 
 
 57
 
 REJECTED 
 
 ' Perhaps she's dancing somewhere now ! ' 
 
 The thoughts of light and music wake 
 Sharp jealousies, that grow and grow 
 
 Till silence and the darkness ache. 
 He sees her step, so proud and gay, 
 
 Which, ere he spake, foretold despair ; 
 Thus did she look, on such a day. 
 
 And such the fashion of her hair ; 
 And thus she stood, when, kneehng low, ^ 
 
 He took the bramble from her dress, 
 And thus she laugh'd and talk'd, whose 'No' 
 
 Was sweeter than another's ' Yes. ' 
 He feeds on thoughts that most deject ; 
 
 He impudently feigns her charms, 
 So reverenced in his own respect. 
 
 Dreadfully clasp'd by other arms ; 
 And turns, and puts his brows, that ache. 
 
 Against the pillow where 'tis cold. 
 If only now his heart would break ! 
 
 But, oh, how much a heart can hold. 
 
 58
 
 LOVE IN TEARS 
 
 If fate Love's dear ambition mar. 
 
 And load his breast with hopeless pain. 
 And seem to blot out sun and star. 
 
 Love, won or lost, is countless gain ; 
 His sorrow boasts a secret bliss 
 
 Which sorrow of itself beguiles. 
 And Love in tears too noble is 
 
 For pity, save of Love in smiles. 
 
 59
 
 DENIED 
 
 The storm-cloud, whose portentous shade 
 
 Fumes from a core of smother'd fire, 
 His livery is whose worshipp'd maid 
 
 Denies herself to his desire. 
 Ah, grief that almost crushes life. 
 
 To lie upon his lonely bed. 
 And fancy her another's wife ! 
 
 His brain is flame, his heart is lead. 
 Sinking at last, by nature's course, 
 
 Cloak'd round with sleep from his despair, 
 He does but sleep to gather force 
 
 That goes to his exhausted care. 
 He wakes renew'd for all the smart. 
 
 His only Love, and she is wed ! 
 His fondness comes about his heart. 
 
 As milk comes, when the babe is dead. 
 The wretch, whom she found fit for scorn. 
 
 His own allegiant thoughts despise ; 
 And far into the shining morn 
 
 Lazy with misery he lies. 
 
 60
 
 LOVE'S WILL 
 BE DONE 
 
 Not loss, not death, my love shall tire. 
 A mystery does my heart foretell ; 
 Nor do I press the oracle 
 For explanations. Leave me alone. 
 And let in me love's will be done. 
 
 6t
 
 FIRST LOVE 
 REMEMBEHED 
 
 Asj ere the Spring has any power. 
 The almond branch all turns to flower. 
 Though not a leaf is out, so she 
 The bloom of life provoked in me ; 
 And, hard till then and selfish, I 
 Was thenceforth nought but sanctity 
 And service : life was mere delight 
 In being wholly good and right. 
 As she was ; just, without a slur ; 
 Honouring myself no less than her ; 
 Obeying, in the loneliest place, 
 Ev'n to the slightest gesture, grace. 
 Assured that one so fair, so true. 
 He only served that was so too. 
 For me, hence weak towards the weak. 
 No more the unnested blackbird's shriek 
 Startled the light-leaved wood ; on high 
 Wander'd the gadding butterfly, 
 Unscared by my flung cap ; the bee, 
 
 62
 
 FIRST LOVE REMEMBERED 
 
 Rifling the hollyhock in glee, 
 Was no more trapp'd with his own flower, 
 And for his honey slain. Her power. 
 From great things even to the grass 
 Through which the unfenced footways pass, 
 Was law, and that which keeps the law. 
 Cherubic gaiety and awe ; 
 Day was her doing, and the lark 
 Had reason for his song ; the dark 
 In anagram innumerous spelt 
 Her name with stars that throbb'd and felt ; 
 'Twas the sad summit of delight 
 To wake and weep for her at night ; 
 She tum'd to triumph or to shame 
 The strife of every childish game ; 
 The heart would come into my throat 
 At rosebuds ; howsoe'er remote. 
 In opposition or consent. 
 Each thing, or person, or event. 
 Or seeming neutral howsoe'er. 
 All, in the live, electric air. 
 Awoke, took aspect, and confess'd 
 In her a centre of unrest, 
 Yea, stocks and stones within me bred 
 Anxieties of joy and dread. 
 O, bright apocalyptic sky 
 
 63
 
 FIRST LOVE REMEMBERED 
 
 O'erarching childhood ! Far and nigh 
 
 Mystery and obscuration none. 
 
 Yet nowhere any moon or sun ! 
 
 What reason for these sighs ? What hope. 
 
 Daunting with its audacious scope 
 
 The disconcerted heart, affects 
 
 These ceremonies and respects ? 
 
 Why stratagems in everything ? 
 
 Why, why not kiss her in the ring ? 
 
 'Tis nothing strange that warriors bold. 
 
 Whose fierce, forecasting eyes behold 
 
 The city they desire to sack. 
 
 Humbly begin their proud attack 
 
 By delving ditches two miles off. 
 
 Aware how the fair place would scoff 
 
 At hasty wooing ; but, O child. 
 
 Why thus approach thy playmate mild ? 
 
 64
 
 LOST LOVE 
 
 Fashion'd by Heaven and by art 
 So is she^ that she makes the heart 
 Ache and o'erfow with tears^ that grace 
 So lovely fair should have for place, 
 (Deeming itself at home the while,) 
 The unworthy earth ! To see her smile 
 Amid this waste of pain and sin. 
 As only knowing the heaven within. 
 Is sweet, and does for pity stir 
 Passion to be her minister : 
 Wherefore last night I lay awake. 
 And said, ' Ah, Lord, for thy love's sake. 
 Give not this darling child of thine 
 To care less reverent than mine ! ' 
 And, as true faith was in my word, 
 I trust, I trust that I was heard. 
 
 65 
 
 E
 
 AWAY 
 
 The multitude of voices blythe 
 Of early day, the hissing scythe 
 Across the dew drawn and withdrawn, 
 The noisy peacock on the lawn. 
 These, and the sun's eye-gladding gleam. 
 This morning, chased the sweetest dream 
 That e'er shed penitential grace 
 On life's forgetful commonplace ; 
 Yet 'twas no sweeter than the spell 
 To which I woke to say farewell. 
 Noon finds me many a mile removed 
 From her who must not be beloved ; 
 And us the waste sea soon shall part. 
 Heaving for aye, without a heart ! 
 
 Beholding one like her, a man 
 Longs to lay down his life ! How can 
 Aught to itself seem thus enough 
 When I have so much need tliereof ? 
 
 66
 
 AWAY 
 
 Blest in her place, blissful is she ; 
 
 And I, departing, seem to be 
 
 Like the strange waif that comes to run 
 
 A few days flaming near the sun. 
 
 And carries back, through boundless night. 
 
 Its lessening memory of light. 
 
 Had I but her, ah, what the gain 
 Of owning aught but that domain ! 
 Nay, heaven's extent, however much, 
 Cannot be more than many such ; 
 And, she being mine, should God to me 
 Say * Lo ! my Child, I give to thee 
 All heaven besides,' what could I then, 
 But, as a child, to Him comj)lain 
 That whereas my dear Father gave 
 A little space for me to have 
 In His great garden, now, o'erblest, 
 I've that, indeed, but all the rest. 
 Which, somehow, makes it seem I've 
 
 got 
 All but my only cared-for plot. 
 Enough was that for my weak hand 
 To tend, my heart to understand. 
 
 Oh, the sick fact, 'twixt her and me 
 There's naught, and half a world of sea. 
 
 67
 
 AWAY 
 
 Yet, latterly, with strange delight. 
 Rich tides have risen in the night. 
 And sweet dreams chased the fancies dense 
 Of waking life's dull somnolence. 
 I see her as I knew her, grace 
 Already glory in her face ; 
 I move about, I cannot i*est, ' 
 For the proud brain and joyful breast 
 I have of her. Or else I float. 
 The pilot of an idle boat. 
 Alone, alone with sky and sea, 
 And her, the third simplicity. 
 Or with me, in the Ball-Room's blaze. 
 Her brilliant mildness thrids the maze ; 
 Our thoughts are lovely, and each word 
 Is music in the music heard. 
 And all things seem but parts to be 
 Of one persistent harmony. 
 By which I'm made divinely bold ; 
 The secret, which she knows, is told ; 
 And, laughing with a lofty bliss 
 Of innocent accord, we kiss ; 
 About her neck my pleasure weeps ; 
 Against my lip the silk vein leaps ; 
 Then says an Angel, ' Day or night, 
 ' If yours you seek, not her delight, 
 
 68
 
 AWAY 
 
 ' Although by some strange witchery 
 ' It seems you kiss her, 'tis not she ; 
 ' But, whilst you languish at the side 
 ' Of a fair-foul phantasmal bride, 
 ' Surely a dragon and strong tower 
 ' Guard the true lady in her bower.' 
 And I say, ' Dear my Lord, Amen ! ' 
 And the true lady kiss again. 
 Or else some wasteful malady 
 Devours her shape and dims her eye ; 
 No charms are left, where all were rife, 
 Except her voice, which is her life, 
 Wherewith she, for her foolish fear. 
 Says trembling, ' Do you love me. Dear } ' 
 And I reply, ' Sweetest, I vow 
 ' I never loved but half till now.' 
 She turns her face to the wall at this. 
 And says, 'Go, Love, 'tis too much bliss.' 
 And then a sudden pulse is sent 
 About the sounding firmament 
 In smitings as of silver bars ; 
 The bright disorder of the stars 
 Is solved by music ; far and near. 
 Through infinite distinctions clear. 
 Their twofold voices' deeper tone 
 Utters the Name which all things own. 
 
 69
 
 AWAY 
 
 And each ecstatic treble dwells 
 On one whereof none other tells ; 
 And we, sublimed to song and fire. 
 Take order in the wheeling quire, 
 Till from the throbbing sphere I start. 
 Waked by the heaving of my heart. 
 
 There comes a smile acutely sweet 
 Out of the picturing dark ; I meet 
 The ancient frankness of her gaze. 
 That soft and heart-surprising blaze 
 Of great goodwill and innocence. 
 And perfect joy proceeding thence ! 
 Ah ! made for earth's delight, yet such 
 The mid-sea air's too gross to touch. 
 At thought of which, the soul in me 
 Is as the bird that bites a bee. 
 And darts abroad on frantic wing. 
 Tasting the honey and the sting. 
 
 I grew so idle, so despised 
 Myself, my powers, by Her unprized. 
 Honouring my post, but nothing more, 
 And lying, when I lived on shore. 
 So late of mornings : weak tears streani'd. 
 For such slight cause, — if only gleam'd, 
 
 70
 
 AWAY 
 
 Remotely, beautifully bright. 
 On clouded eves at sea, the light 
 Of English headlands in the sun, — 
 That soon I deem'd 'twere better done 
 To lay this poor, complaining wraith 
 Of unreciprocated faith. 
 
 71
 
 RACHEL 
 
 You loved her, and would lie all night 
 
 Thinking how beautiful she was. 
 And what to do for her delight. 
 
 Now both are bound with alien laws ! 
 Be patient ; put your heart to school ; 
 
 Weep if you will, but not despair ; 
 The trust that nought goes wrong by rule 
 
 Should ease this load the many bear. 
 Love, if there's heav'n, shall meet his dues. 
 
 Though here unmatch'd, or match 'd amiss : 
 Meanwhile, the gentle cannot choose 
 
 But learn to love the lips they kiss. 
 Ne'er hurt the homely sister's ears 
 
 With Rachel's beauties ; secret be 
 The lofty mind whose lonely tears 
 
 Protest against mortality. 
 
 72
 
 THE VOICE OF 
 ONE I KNEW 
 
 All the bright past seems. 
 Now, but a splendour in my dreams, 
 Which shows, albeit the dreamer wakes, 
 The standard of right life. Life aches 
 To be therewith conform'd ; but, oh. 
 The world's so stolid, dark, and low ! 
 That and the mortal element 
 Forbid the beautiful intent. 
 And, like the unborn butterfly. 
 It feels the wings, and wants the sky. 
 
 But perilous is the lofty mood 
 Which cannot yoke with lowly good 
 Right life, for me, is life that wends 
 By lowly ways to lofty ends. 
 I well perceive, at length, that haste 
 T'ward heaven itself is only waste ; 
 And thus I dread the impatient spur 
 Of aught that speaks too plain of Her 
 There's little here that story tells ; 
 
 73
 
 THE VOICE OF ONE I KNEW 
 
 But music talks of nothing else. 
 Therefore, when music breathes, I say, 
 (And urge my task,) Away, away ! 
 Thou art the voice of one I knew. 
 But what thou say'st is not yet true ; 
 Thou art the voice of her I loved. 
 And I would not be vainly moved. 
 
 74
 
 IN THE AVOODS 
 
 And then, as if I sweetly dream'd, 
 I half-remember'd how it seem'd 
 When I, too, was a little child 
 About the wild wood roving wild. 
 Pure breezes from the far-off height 
 Melted the blindness from my sight, 
 Until, with rapture, grief, and awe, 
 I saw again as then I saw. 
 As then I saw, I saw again 
 The harvest-waggon in the lane, 
 With high-hung tokens of its pride 
 Left in the elms on either side ; 
 The daisies coming out at dawn 
 In constellations on the lawn ; 
 The glory of the daffodil ; 
 The three black windmills on the hill. 
 Whose magic arms, flung wildly by. 
 Sent magic shadows o'er the rye. 
 Within the leafy coppice, lo. 
 
 75
 
 IN THE WOODS 
 
 More wealth than miser's dreams could show. 
 
 The blackbird's warm and woolly brood. 
 
 Five golden beaks agape for food ; 
 
 The Gipsies, all the summer seen 
 
 Native as poppies to the Green ; 
 
 The winter, with its frosts and thaws 
 
 And opulence of hips and haws ; 
 
 The lovely marvel of the snow ; 
 
 The Tamar, with its altering show 
 
 Of gay ships sailing up and down. 
 
 Among the fields and by the Town ; 
 
 And, dearer far than anything. 
 
 Came back the songs you used to sing. 
 
 And, as to men's retreating eyes. 
 
 Beyond high momitains higher rise. 
 
 Still farther back there shone to me 
 
 The dazzling dusk of infancy. 
 
 Thither I look'd, as, sick of night. 
 
 The Alpine shepherd looks to the height. 
 
 And does not see the day, 'tis true. 
 
 But sees the rosy tops that do. 
 
 Debtor to few, forgotten hours 
 Am I, that truths for me are powers. 
 Ah, happy hours, 'tis something yet 
 
 Not to forget that I forget ! 
 
 76
 
 LEAH 
 
 Your love lacks joy, your letter says. 
 
 Yes ; love requires the focal space 
 
 Of recollection or of hope. 
 
 E'er it can measure its own scope. 
 
 Too soon, too soon comes Death to show 
 
 We love more deeply than we know ! 
 
 The rain, that fell upon the height 
 
 Too gently to be call'd delight. 
 
 Within the dark veil reappears 
 
 As a wild cataract of tears ; 
 
 And love in life should sti-ive to see 
 
 Sometimes what love in death would be ! 
 
 No magic of her voice or smile 
 
 Suddenly raised a fairy isle, 
 
 But fondness for her underwent 
 
 An unregarded increment. 
 
 Like that which lifts, through centuries. 
 
 The coral-reef within the seas. 
 
 Till, lo ! the land where was the wave. 
 
 Alas ! 'tis everywhere her grave. 
 
 77
 
 HER COUNSEL 
 
 Oh, should the mournful honeymoon 
 Of death be over strangely soon. 
 And life-long resolutions, made 
 In grievous haste, as quickly fade. 
 Seeming the truth of grief to mock. 
 Think, Dearest, 'tis not by the clock 
 That sorrow goes. A month of tears 
 Is more than many, many years 
 Of common time. Shun, if you can. 
 However, any passionate plan. 
 Grieve with the heart ; let not the head 
 Grieve on, when grief of heart is dead ; 
 For all the powers of life defy 
 A superstitious constancy. 
 
 78
 
 SPONSA DEI 
 
 What is this Maiden fair. 
 
 The laughing of whose eye 
 
 Is in man's heart renew'd virginity ; 
 
 Who yet sick longing breeds 
 
 For marriage which exceeds 
 
 The inventive guess of Love to satisfy 
 
 With hope of utter binding, and of loosing endless 
 
 dear despair ? 
 What gleams about her shine, 
 More transient than delight and more divine ! 
 If she does something but a little sweet. 
 As gaze towards the glass to set her hair. 
 See how his soul falls humbled at her feet ! 
 Her gentle step, to go or come. 
 Gains her more merit than a martyrdom ; 
 And, if she dance, it doth such grace confer 
 As opes the heaven of heavens to more than her. 
 And makes a rival of her worshipper. 
 To die unknown for her were httle cost ! 
 
 79
 
 SPONSA DEI 
 
 So is she without guile. 
 
 Her mere refused smile 
 
 Makes up the sum of that which may be lost ! 
 
 Who is this Fair 
 
 Whom each hath seen. 
 
 The darkest once in this bewailed dell. 
 
 Be he not destin'd for the glooms of hell ? 
 
 Whom each hath seen 
 
 And known, with sharp remorse and sweet, as 
 
 Queen 
 And tear-glad Mistress of his hopes of bliss. 
 Too fair for man to kiss ? 
 Who is this only happy She, 
 Whom, by a frantic flight of courtesy. 
 Bom of despair 
 
 Of better lodging for his Spirit fair. 
 He adores as Margaret, Maude, or Cecily ? 
 And what this sigh. 
 
 That each one heaves for Earth's last lowlihead 
 And the Heaven high 
 Ineffably lock'd in dateless bridal-bed ? 
 Are all, then, mad, or is it prophecy ? 
 ' Sons now we are of God,' as we have heard, 
 ' But what we shall be hath not yet appear'd.' 
 O, Heart, remember thee. 
 That Man is none, 
 
 80
 
 SPONSA DEI 
 
 Save One. 
 
 What if this Lady be thy Soul, and He 
 
 Who claims to enjoy her sacred beauty be. 
 
 Not Thou, but God ; and thy sick fire 
 
 A female vanity. 
 
 Such as a Bride, viewing her mirror'd charms. 
 
 Feels when she sighs, ' All these are for his arms ! ' 
 
 A reflex heat 
 
 Flash'd on thy cheek from His immense desire. 
 
 Which waits to crown, beyond thy brain's conceit. 
 
 Thy nameless, secret, hopeless longing sweet. 
 
 Not by-and-by, but now. 
 
 Unless deny Him thou ! 
 
 8i
 
 BONDS 
 
 For, ah, who can express 
 
 How full of bonds and simpleness 
 
 Is God, 
 
 How narrow is He, 
 
 And how the wide, waste field of possibility 
 
 Is only trod 
 
 Straight to His homestead in the human heart, 
 
 And all His art 
 
 Is as the babe's that wins his Mother to repeat 
 
 Her little song so sweet ! 
 
 82
 
 TO THE BODY 
 
 Creation's and Creator's crowning good ; 
 
 Wall of infinitude ; 
 
 Foundation of the sky, 
 
 In Heaven forecast 
 
 And long'd for from eternity. 
 
 Though laid the last ; 
 
 Reverberating dome. 
 
 Of music cunningly built home 
 
 Against the void and indolent disgrace 
 
 Of unresponsive space ; 
 
 Little, sequester'd pleasure-house 
 
 For God and for His Spouse ; 
 
 Elaborately, yea, past conceiving, fair, 
 
 Since, from the graced decorum of the hair, 
 
 Ev'n to the tingling, sweet 
 
 Soles of the simple, earth-confiding feet, 
 
 And from the inmost heart 
 
 Outwards unto the thin 
 
 Silk curtains of the skin, 
 
 83
 
 TO THE BODY 
 
 Every least part 
 Astonish'd hears 
 And sweet replies to some like region of the 
 
 spheres ; 
 Form'd for a dignity prophets but darkly name. 
 Lest shameless men cry ' Shame ! ' 
 So rich with wealth conceal'd 
 That Heaven and Hell fight chiefly for this field ; 
 Clinging to everything that pleases thee 
 With indefectible fidelity ; 
 Alas, so true 
 
 To all thy friendships that no grace 
 Thee from thy sin can wholly disembrace ; 
 Which thus 'bides with thee as the Jebusite, 
 That, maugre all God's promises could do, 
 The chosen People never conquer'd quite ; 
 Who therefore lived with them. 
 And that by formal truce and as of right. 
 In metropolitan Jerusalem. 
 For which false fealty 
 Thou needs must, for a season, lie 
 In the grave's arms, foul and unshriven. 
 Albeit, in Heaven, 
 Thy crimson-throbbing Glow 
 Into its old abode aye pants to go, 
 And does with envy see 
 
 84
 
 TO THE BODY 
 
 Enoch, Elijah, and the Lady, she 
 Who left the roses in her body's lieu. 
 O, if the pleasures I have known in thee 
 But my poor faith's poor first-fruits be, 
 WTiat quintessential, keen, ethereal bliss 
 Then shall be his 
 
 Who has thy birth-time's consecrating dew 
 For death's sweet chrism retain'd. 
 Quick, tender, virginal, and unprofaned ! 
 
 85
 
 AURAS OF DELIGHT 
 
 And Him I thank, who can make Hve again 
 
 The dust, but not the joy we once profane. 
 
 That I, of ye. 
 
 Beautiful habitations, auras of dehght. 
 
 In childish years and since had sometime sense 
 
 and sight. 
 But that ye vanish'd quite. 
 Even from memory, 
 Ere I could get my breath, and whisper ' See ! ' 
 
 But did for me 
 They altogether die. 
 
 Those trackless glories glimps'd in upper sky ? 
 Were they of chance, or vain. 
 Nor good at all again 
 For curb of heart or fret ? 
 Nay, though, by grace. 
 Lest, haply, I refuse God to his face. 
 Their likeness wholly I forget, 
 Ah, yet, 
 
 86
 
 AURAS OF DELIGHT 
 
 Often in straits which else for me were ill, 
 
 I mind me still 
 
 I did respire the lonely auras sweetj 
 
 I did the blest abodes behold, and, at the moun- 
 tains' feet, 
 
 Bathed in the holy Stream by Hermon's thymy 
 hill. 
 
 87
 
 PSYCHE 
 
 ' What awful pleasure do thine eyes bespeak, 
 What shame is in thy childish cheek, 
 What terror on thy brow ? 
 Is this my Psyche, once so pale and meek ? 
 
 • • ■ • • 
 
 And all thy life looks troubled like a tree's 
 Whose boughs wave many ways in one great 
 breeze.' 
 
 88
 
 DAWN 
 
 ' Ah, say not yet, farewell ! ' 
 
 ' Nay, that's the Blackbird's note, the sweet 
 
 Night's knell.' 
 ' Thou leav'st me now, like to the moon at dawn, 
 A little, vacuous world alone in air.' 
 
 89
 
 THE EDGE OF BLISS 
 
 ' Sadness and change and pain 
 
 Shall me for ever stain ; 
 
 For, though my blissful fate 
 
 Be for a billion years, 
 
 How shall I stop my tears 
 
 That life was once so low and Love arrived so 
 
 late ! ' 
 ' Sadness is beauty's savour, and pain is 
 The exceedingly keen edge of bliss ; 
 Nor, without swift mutation, would the heav'ns 
 
 be aught.' 
 
 90
 
 EROS 
 
 ' Accept the sweet, and say 'tis sacrifice ! 
 Sleep, Centre to the tempest of my love. 
 And dream thereof, 
 
 And keep the smile which sleeps within thy face 
 Like sunny eve in some forgotten place ! ' 
 
 91
 
 AMELIA 
 
 Whene'er mine eyes do my Amelia greet 
 It is with such emotion 
 
 As when, in childhood^ turning a dim street, 
 I first beheld the ocean. 
 
 There, where the little, bright, surf-breathing 
 town. 
 That shew'd me first her beauty and the sea. 
 Gathers its skirts against the gorse-lit doAvn 
 And scatters gardens o'er the southern lea. 
 Abides this Maid 
 
 Within a kind yet sombre Mother's shade. 
 Who of her daughter's graces seems almost afraid, 
 Viewing them ofttimes with a scared forecast, 
 Caught, haply, from obscure love-peril past. 
 Howe'er that be. 
 She scants me of my right, 
 Is cunning careful evermore to balk 
 Sweet separate talk. 
 And fevers my delight 
 
 92
 
 AMELIA 
 
 By frets, if, on Amelia's cheek of peach, 
 
 I touch the notes which music cannot reach. 
 
 Bidding ' Good-night ! ' 
 
 • • • • 
 
 And there Ameha stood, for fairness shewn 
 Like a young apple-tree, in flush'd array 
 Of white and ruddy flow'r, auroral, gay. 
 With chilly blue the maiden branch between ; 
 And yet to look on her moved less the mind 
 To say ^ How beauteous ! ' than ' How good and 
 kind!' 
 
 And so we went alone 
 By walls o'er which the lilac's numerous plume 
 Shook down perfume ; 
 Trim plots close blown 
 With daisies, in conspicuous myriads seen, 
 Engross'd each one 
 
 With single ardour for her spouse, the sun ; 
 Garths in their glad array 
 Of white and ruddy branch, auroral, gay. 
 With azure chill the maiden flow'r between ; 
 Meadows of fervid green. 
 With sometime sudden prospect of untold 
 Cowslips, like chance-found gold ; 
 And broadcast buttercups at joyful gaze. 
 Rending the air with praise, 
 
 93
 
 AMELIA 
 
 Like the six-hundred-thousand-voiced shout 
 
 Of Jacob camp'd in Midian put to rout ; 
 
 Then through the Park, 
 
 Where Spring to liveher gloom 
 
 Quicken'd the cedars dark, 
 
 And, 'gainst the clear sky cold. 
 
 Which shone afar 
 
 Crowded with sunny alps oracular. 
 
 Great chestnuts raised themselves abroad like 
 
 cliffs of bloom ; 
 And everywhere. 
 
 Amid the ceaseless rapture of the lark. 
 With wonder new 
 
 We caught the solemn voice of single air, 
 ' Cuckoo ! ' 
 
 • • • • • 
 
 Now would I keep my promise to her Mother ; 
 Now I arose, and raised her to her feet, 
 My best Amelia, fresh-born from a kiss. 
 Moth-like, full-blown in birthdew shuddering 
 
 sweet. 
 With great, kind eyes, in whose brown shade 
 Bright Venus and her Baby play'd ! 
 
 At iiunost heart well pleased with one 
 another, 
 What time the slant sun low 
 
 94
 
 AMELIA 
 
 Through the plough'd field does each clod sharply 
 
 shew. 
 And softly fills 
 
 With shade the dimples of our homeward hills. 
 With little said. 
 
 We left the Vilder'd garden of the dead, 
 And gain'd the gorse-lit shoulder of the down 
 That keeps the north-wind from the nestling 
 
 town, 
 And caught, once more, the vision of the wave. 
 Where, on the horizon's dip, 
 A many-sailed ship 
 
 Pursued alone her distant purpose grave ; 
 And, by steep steps rock-hewn, to the dim street 
 I led her sacred feet ; 
 And so the Daughter gave. 
 Soft, moth-Hke, sweet. 
 Showy as damask-rose and shy as musk. 
 Back to her Mother, anxious in the dusk. 
 And now ' Good-night ! ' 
 
 Me shall the phantom months no more affright. 
 For heaven's gates to open well waits he 
 Who keeps himself the key. 
 
 95
 
 AFTER STORM 
 
 So lay the Earth that saw the skies 
 
 Grow clear and bright above. 
 As the repentant spirit lies 
 
 In God's forgiving love. 
 The lark forsook the waning day. 
 
 And all loud songs did cease ; 
 The robin, from a wither'd spray, 
 
 Sang like a soul at peace. 
 Far to the South, in sunset glow'd 
 
 The peaks of Dartmoor ridge. 
 And Tamar, full and tranquil, flow'd 
 
 Beneath the Gresson Bridge. 
 There, conscious of the numerous noise 
 
 Of rain-awaken'd rills. 
 And gathering deep and sober joys 
 
 From the heart-enlarging hills, 
 I sat, until the first white star 
 
 Appear' d, with dewy rays. 
 And the fair moon began to bar 
 
 96
 
 AFTER STORM 
 
 With shadows all the ways. 
 O, well is thee, whate'er thou art, 
 
 And happy shalt thou be, 
 If thou hast known, within thy heart. 
 
 The peace that came to me. 
 O, well is thee, if aught shall win 
 
 Thy spirit to confess, 
 God proffers all, 'twere grievous sin 
 
 To live content in less ! 
 
 97
 
 VENUS AND DEATH 
 
 With fetters gold her captivated feet 
 
 Lay, sunny sweet ; 
 
 In that palm was the poppy. Sleep ; in this 
 
 The apple. Bliss ; 
 
 Against the mild side of his Spouse and Mother 
 
 One small God throve, and in't, meseem'd, another. 
 
 By these a Death-in-Life did foully breathe 
 
 Out of a face that was one gi-ate of teeth. 
 
 Lift, O kind Angels, lift her eyelids loth, 
 
 Lest he devour her and her Godlets both ! 
 
 98
 
 SEMELE 
 
 No praise to me ! 
 
 My joy 'twas to be nothing but the glass 
 
 Thro' which the general boon of Heaven should 
 
 pass. 
 To focus upon thee. 
 Nor is't thy blame 
 Thou first should'st glow, and, after, fade i' the 
 
 flame. 
 It takes more might 
 Than God has given thee. Dear, so long to feel 
 
 delight. 
 Shall I, alas. 
 
 Reproach thee with thy change and my regret ? 
 Blind fumblers that we be 
 About the portals of felicity ! 
 
 The wind of words would scatter, tears would wash 
 Quite out the little heat 
 Beneath the silent and chill-seeming ash. 
 Perchance, still slumbering sweet. 
 
 99
 
 THE MARRIED LOVER 
 
 Why, having won her, do I woo ? 
 
 Because her spirit's vestal grace 
 Provokes me always to pursue. 
 
 But, spirit-like, eludes embrace ; 
 Because her womanhood is such 
 
 That, as on court-days subjects kiss 
 The Queen's hand, yet so near a touch 
 
 Affirms no mean familiarness. 
 Nay, rather marks more fair the height 
 
 Which can with safety so neglect 
 To dread, as lower ladies might. 
 
 That grace could meet with disrespect. 
 Thus she with happy favour feeds 
 
 Allegiance from a love so high 
 That thence no false conceit proceeds 
 
 Of difference bridged, or state put by ; 
 Because, although in act and word 
 
 As lowly as a wife can be. 
 Her manners, when they call me lord, 
 
 100
 
 THE MARRIED LOVER 
 
 Remind me 'tis by courtesy ; 
 Not with her least consent of will, 
 
 Which would my proud aiFection hurt. 
 But by the noble style that still 
 
 Imputes an unattain'd desert ; 
 Because her gay and lofty brows. 
 
 When all is won which hope can ask. 
 Reflect a light of hopeless snows 
 
 That bright in virgin ether bask ; 
 Because, though free of the outer court 
 
 I am, this Temple keeps its shrine 
 Sacred to Heaven ; because, in short. 
 
 She's not and never can be mine. 
 
 lOI
 
 THE AMARANTH 
 
 Feasts satiate ; stars distress with height ; 
 
 Friendship means well, but misses reach, 
 And wearies in its best delight 
 
 Vex'd with the vanities of speech ; 
 Too long regarded, roses even 
 
 Afflict the mind with fond unrest ; 
 And to converse direct with Heaven 
 
 Is oft a labour in the breast ; 
 Whate'er the up-looking soul admires, 
 
 Whate'er the senses' banquet be. 
 Fatigues at last with vain desires. 
 
 Or sickens by satiety ; 
 But truly my delight was more 
 
 In her to whom I'm bound for aye 
 Yesterday than the day before, 
 
 And more to-day than yesterday. 
 
 I02
 
 THE LETTERS 
 
 Let me^ Beloved, while gratitude 
 Is garrulous with coming good. 
 Or ere the tongue of happiness 
 Be silenced by your soft caress. 
 Relate how, musing here of you. 
 The clouds, the intermediate blue. 
 The air that rings with larks, the grave 
 And distant rumour of the wave. 
 The solitary sailing skiff. 
 The gusty corn-field on the cliff. 
 The corn-flower by the crumbling ledge. 
 Or, far-down at the shingle's edge. 
 The sighing sea's recurrent crest 
 Breaking, resign'd to its unrest. 
 All whisper, to my home-sick thought. 
 Of charms in you till now uncaught. 
 Or only caught as dreams, to die 
 Ere they were own'd by memory. 
 High and ingenious Decree 
 
 103
 
 THE LETTERS 
 
 Of joy-devising Deity ! 
 
 You whose ambition only is 
 
 The assurance that you make my bliss, 
 
 (Hence my first debt of love to show 
 
 That you, past showing, indeed do so !) 
 
 Trust me, the world, the firmament. 
 
 With diverse-natured worlds besprent. 
 
 Were rear'd in no mere undivine 
 
 Boast of omnipotent design. 
 
 The lion differing from the snake 
 
 But for the trick of difference sake. 
 
 And comets darting to and fro 
 
 Because in circles planets go ; 
 
 But rather that sole love might be 
 
 Refi-esh'd throughout eternity 
 
 In one sweet faith, for ever strange, 
 
 Mirror'd by circumstantial change. 
 
 For, more and more, do I perceive 
 
 That everything is relative 
 
 To you, and that there's not a star. 
 
 Nor nothing in't, so strange or far. 
 
 But, if 'twere scanned, 'twould chiefly mean 
 
 Somewhat, till then, in you unseen. 
 
 Something to make the bondage strait 
 
 Of you and me more intimate. 
 
 Some unguess'd opportunity 
 
 104
 
 THE LETTERS 
 
 Of nuptials in a new degree. 
 
 Butj ohj with what a novel force 
 Your best-conn'd beauties, by remorse 
 Of absence, touch ; and, in my heart, 
 How bleeds afresh the youthful smart 
 Of passion fond, despairing still 
 To utter infinite good-will 
 By worthy service ! Yet I know 
 That love is all that love can owe. 
 And this to offer is no less 
 Of worth, in kind speech or caress. 
 Than if my life-blood I should give. 
 For good is God's prerogative. 
 And Love's deed is but to prepare 
 The flatter'd, dear Belov'd to dare 
 Acceptance of His gifts. When first 
 On me your happy beauty burst, 
 Honoria, verily it seem'd 
 That naught beyond you could be dream'd 
 Of beauty and of heaven's delight. 
 Zeal of an unknown infinite 
 Yet bade me ever wish you more 
 Beatified than e'er before. 
 Angelical were your replies 
 To my prophetic flatteries ; 
 And sweet was the compulsion strong 
 
 105
 
 THE LETTERS 
 
 That drew me in the course along 
 Of heaven's increasing bright allure. 
 With j)rovocations fresh of your 
 Victorious capacity. 
 Whither may love, so fledged, not fly ? 
 
 Did not mere Earth hold fast the string 
 Of this celestial soaring thing, 
 So measure and make sensitive. 
 And still, to the nerves, nice notice give 
 Of each minutest increment 
 Of such interminable ascent. 
 The heart would lose all count, and beat 
 Unconscious of a height so sweet. 
 And the spirit-pursuing senses strain 
 Their steps on the stairy track in vain ! 
 But, reading now the note just come. 
 With news of you, the babes, and home, 
 I think, and say, ' To-morrow eve 
 ' With kisses me will she receive ; ' 
 And, thinking, for extreme delight 
 Of love's extremes, I laugh outright. 
 
 Dearest, my Love and Wife, 'tis long 
 Ago I closed the unfinish'd song 
 Which never could be finish'd ; nor 
 Will ever Poet utter more 
 
 io6
 
 THE LETTERS 
 
 Of love than I did, watching well 
 To lure to speech the unspeakable ! 
 ' Why, haviiig won her, do I woo ? ' 
 That final strain to the last height flew 
 Of written joy, which wants the smile 
 And voice that are, indeed, the while 
 They last, the very things you speak, 
 Honoria, who mak'st music weak 
 With ways that say, ' Shall I not be 
 ' As kind to all as Heaven to me ? ' 
 And yet, ah, twenty-fold my Bride ! 
 Rising, this twentieth festal-tide. 
 You still soft sleeping, on this day 
 Of days, some words I long to say. 
 Some words superfluously sweet 
 Of fresh assurance, thus to greet 
 Your waking eyes, which never grow 
 Weary of telling what I know 
 So well, yet only well enough 
 To wish for further news thereof. 
 
 How sing of such things save to her. 
 Love's self, so love's interpreter ? 
 How the supreme rewards confess 
 Which crown the austere voluptuousness 
 Of heart, that earns, in midst of wealth. 
 
 107
 
 THE LETTERS 
 
 The Hj)petite of want and health. 
 
 Relinquishes the pomp of life 
 
 And beauty to the pleasant Wife 
 
 At home, and does all joy despise 
 
 As out of place but in her eyes ? 
 
 How praise the years and gravity 
 
 That make each favour seem to be 
 
 A lovelier weakness for her lord ? 
 
 And, ah, how find the tender word 
 
 To tell aright of love that glows 
 
 The fairer for the fading rose ? 
 
 Of frailty which can weight the arm 
 
 To lean with thrice its girlish charm ? 
 
 Of grace which, like this autumn day. 
 
 Is not the sad one of decay. 
 
 Yet one whose pale brow pondereth 
 
 The far-off majesty of death ? 
 
 How tell the crowd, whom passion 
 
 rends. 
 That love grows mild as it ascends ? 
 That joy's most high and distant mood 
 Is lost, not found, in dancing blood ; 
 Albeit kind acts and smiling eyes, 
 And all those fond realities 
 Which are love's words, in us mean more 
 Delight than twenty years before ? 
 
 1 08
 
 ONE SPRING 
 
 For many a dreadful day. 
 In sea-side lodgings sick she lay. 
 Noteless of love, nor seem'd to hear 
 The sea, on one side, thundering near. 
 Nor, on the other, the loud Ball 
 Held nightly in the public hall ; 
 Nor vex'd they my short slumbers, though 
 I woke up if she breathed too low. 
 Thus, for three months, with terrors rife. 
 The pending of her precious life 
 I watch'd o'er ; and the danger, at last. 
 The kind Physician said, was past. 
 Howbeit, for seven harsh weeks the East 
 Breathed witheringly, and Spring's growth 
 
 ceased. 
 And so she only did not die ; 
 Until the bright and blighting sky 
 Changed into cloud, and the sick flowers 
 Remember'd their perfumes, and showers 
 
 109
 
 ONE SPRING 
 
 Of warm, small rain refreshing flew 
 
 Before the Souths and the Park grew. 
 
 In three nights, thick with green. Then she 
 
 Revived, no less than flower and tree. 
 
 In the mild air, and, the fourth day, 
 
 Look'd supernaturally gay 
 
 With large, thanksgiving eyes, that shone. 
 
 The while I tied her bonnet on. 
 
 So that I led her to the glass. 
 
 And bade her see how fair she was. 
 
 And how love visibly could shine. 
 Profuse of hers, desiring mine. 
 
 And mindful I had loved her most 
 
 When beauty seem'd a vanish 'd boast. 
 
 She laugh'd. I press'd her then to me. 
 
 Nothing but soft humility ; 
 
 Nor e'er enhanced she with such charms 
 
 Her acquiescence in my arms. 
 
 no
 
 MA BELLE 
 
 Farewell, dear Heart ! Since needs it must I 
 
 Dear Heart, farewell ! 
 
 Fain would I stay, but that I love thee so. 
 
 One kiss, ma Belle ! 
 
 What hope lies in the Land we do not know 
 
 Who, Dear, can tell ? 
 
 But thee I love, and let thy plaint be, ' Lo, 
 
 He loved me well ! ' 
 
 III
 
 A FAREWELL 
 
 With all my will, but much against my heart. 
 
 We two now part. 
 
 My Very Dear, 
 
 Our solace is, the sad road lies so clear. 
 
 It needs no art. 
 
 With faint, averted feet 
 
 And many a tear. 
 
 In our opposed paths to persevere. 
 
 Go thou to Etist, I West. 
 
 We will not say 
 
 There's any hope, it is so far away. 
 
 But, O, My Best, 
 
 When the one darling of our widowhead. 
 
 The nursling Grief, 
 
 Is dead. 
 
 And no dews blur our eyes 
 
 To see the peach-bloom come in evening skies. 
 
 Perchance we may. 
 
 Where now this night is day, 
 
 112
 
 A FAREWELL 
 
 Aiid even through faith of still averted feet. 
 Making full circle of our banishment. 
 Amazed meet ; 
 
 The bitter journey to the bourne so sweet 
 Seasoning the termless feast of our content 
 With tears of recognition never diy. 
 
 "3 
 
 H
 
 DEPARTURE 
 
 It was not like your great and gracious ways ! 
 
 Do you, that have nought other to lament, 
 
 Never, my Love, repent 
 
 Of how, that July afternoon. 
 
 You went. 
 
 With sudden, unintelligible phrase. 
 
 And frighten'd eye, 
 
 Upon your journey of so many days. 
 
 Without a single kiss, or a good-bye ? 
 
 I knew, indeed, that you were parting soon ; 
 
 And so we sate, within the low sun's rays. 
 
 You whispering to me, for your voice was weak. 
 
 Your harrowing praise. 
 
 Well, it was well. 
 
 To hear you such things speak. 
 
 And I could tell 
 
 What made your eyes a growing gloom of love. 
 
 As a warm South-wind sombres a March grove. 
 
 And it was like your great and gracious ways 
 
 114
 
 DEPARTURE 
 
 To turn your talk on daily things, my Dear, 
 
 Lifting the himinous, pathetic lash 
 
 To let the laughter flash. 
 
 Whilst I drew near. 
 
 Because you spoke so low that I could scarcely 
 
 hear. 
 But all at once to leave me at the last. 
 More at the wonder than the loss aghast, 
 With huddled, unintelligible phrase. 
 And frighten'd eye. 
 And go your journey of all days 
 With not one kiss, or a good-bye. 
 And the only loveless look the look with which 
 
 you pass'd : 
 Twas all unlike your great and gracious ways. 
 
 "5
 
 4 
 
 THE AZALEA 
 
 There, where the sun shines first 
 Against our room. 
 
 She train'd the gold Azalea, whose perfume 
 She, Spring-like, from her breathmg grace dis- 
 persed. 
 Last night the delicate crests of saffron bloom. 
 For this their dainty likeness watch'd and nurst. 
 Were just at point to burst. 
 At dawn I dream'd, O God, that she was dead. 
 And groan'd aloud upon my wretched bed. 
 And waked, ah, God, and did not waken her. 
 But lay, with eyes still closed. 
 Perfectly bless'd in the delicious sphere 
 By which I knew so well that she was near. 
 My heart to speechless thankfulness composed. 
 Till 'gan to stir 
 
 A dizzy somewhat in my troubled head — 
 It was the azalea's breath, and she 7ms dead ! 
 The warm night had the lingering buds disclosed, 
 
 ii6
 
 THE AZALEA 
 
 And I had fall'n asleep with to my breast 
 
 A chance-foiind letter press'd 
 
 In which she said, 
 
 ' Soj till to-morrow eve, my Own, adieu ! 
 
 Parting's well-paid with soon again to meet. 
 
 Soon in your arms to feel so small and sweet. 
 
 Sweet to myself that am so sweet to you ! * 
 
 117
 
 EURYDICE 
 
 Is this the portent of the day nigh past. 
 
 And of a restless grave 
 
 O'er which the eternal sadness gathers fast ; 
 
 Or but the heaped wave 
 
 Of some chance, wandering tide. 
 
 Such as that world of awe 
 
 Whose circuit, listening to a foreign law. 
 
 Conjunctures ours at unguess'd dates and wide. 
 
 Does in the Spirit's tremulous ocean draw. 
 
 To pass unfateful on, and so subside ? 
 
 Thee, whom ev'n more than Heaven loved I 
 
 have, 
 And yet have not been true 
 Even to thee, 
 
 I, dreaming, night by night, seek now to see. 
 And, in a mortal sorrow, still pursue 
 Thro' sordid streets and lanes 
 And houses brown and bare 
 And many a haggard stair 
 
 ii8
 
 EURYDICE 
 
 Ochrous with ancient stains, 
 
 And infamous doors, opening on hapless rooms. 
 
 In whose unhaunted glooms 
 
 Dead pauper generations, witless of the sun. 
 
 Their course have run ; 
 
 And ofttimes my pursuit 
 
 Is check'd of its dear fruit 
 
 By things brimful of hate, my kith and kin. 
 
 Furious that I should keep 
 
 Their forfeit power to weep. 
 
 And mock, with living fear, their mournful malice 
 
 thin. 
 But ever, at the last, my way I win 
 To Avhere, with perfectly sad patience, nurst 
 By sori-y comfort of assured worst, 
 Ingrain'd in fretted cheek and lips that pine. 
 On pallet poor 
 Thou lyest, stricken sick. 
 Beyond love's cure. 
 
 By all the world's neglect, but chiefly mine. 
 Then sweetness, sweeter than my tongue can 
 
 tell. 
 Does in my bosom well. 
 And tears come free and quick 
 And more and more abound 
 For piteous passion keen at naving found, 
 
 119
 
 EURYDICE 
 
 After exceeding ill^ a little good ; 
 
 A little good 
 
 Which, foi the while. 
 
 Fleets with the current sorrow of the blood, 
 
 Though no good here has heart enough to smile. 
 
 I20
 
 THE DAY AFTER 
 TO-MORROW 
 
 Perchance she droops within the hollow gulf 
 
 Which the great wave of coming pleasure draws. 
 
 Not guessing the glad cause ! 
 
 Ye Clouds that on your endless journey go. 
 
 Ye Winds that westward flow, 
 
 Thou heaving Sea 
 
 That heav'st 'twixt her and me. 
 
 Tell her I come ; 
 
 Then only sigh your pleasure, and be dumb ; 
 
 For the sweet secret of our either self 
 
 We know. 
 
 Tell her I come. 
 
 And let her heart be still'd. 
 
 One day's controlled hope, and then one more. 
 
 And on the third our lives shall be fulfill'd ! 
 
 Yet all has been before : 
 
 Palm placed in palm, twin smiles, and words 
 
 astray. 
 What other should we say .'' 
 
 121
 
 THE DAY AFTER TO-MORROW 
 
 But shall I not, with ne'er a sign, perceive. 
 
 Whilst her sweet hands I hold. 
 
 The myriad threads and meshes manifold 
 
 Which Love shall round her weave : 
 
 The pulse in that vein making alien pause 
 
 And varying beats from this ; 
 
 Down each long finger felt, a differing strand 
 
 Of silvery welcome bland ; 
 
 And in her breezy palm 
 
 And silken wrist. 
 
 Beneath the touch of my like numerous bliss 
 
 Complexly kiss'd, 
 
 A diverse and distinguishable calm ? 
 
 What should we say ! 
 
 It all has been before ; 
 
 And yet our lives shall now be first fulfill'd. 
 
 And into their summ'd sweetness fall distill'd 
 
 One sweet drop more ; 
 
 One sweet drop more, in absolute increase 
 
 Of unrelapsing peace. 
 
 O, heaving Sea, 
 That heav'st as if for bliss of her and me. 
 And separatest not dear heart from heart. 
 Though each 'gainst other beats too far apart. 
 For yet awhile 
 Let it not seem that I behold her smile. 
 
 122
 
 THE DAY AFTER TO-MORROW 
 
 O, weaiy Love, O, folded to her bi-east. 
 
 Love in each moment years and years of rest. 
 
 Be calm, as being not. 
 
 Ye oceans of intolerable delight. 
 
 The blazing photosphere of central Night, 
 
 Be ye forgot. 
 
 Terror, thou swarthy Groom of Bi-ide-bliss coy. 
 
 Let me not see thee toy. 
 
 O, Death, too tardy with thy hope intense 
 
 Of kisses close beyond conceit of sense ; 
 
 O, Life, too liberal, while to take her hand 
 
 Is more of hope than heart can understand ; 
 
 Perturb my golden patience not with joy. 
 
 Nor, through a wish, profane 
 
 The peace that should pertain 
 
 To him who does by her attraction move. 
 
 Has all not been before ? 
 
 One day's controlled hope, and one again. 
 
 And then the third, and ye shall have the rein, 
 
 O Life, Death, Terror, Love ! 
 
 But soon let your unrestful rapture cease. 
 
 Ye flaming Ethers thin. 
 
 Condensing till the abiding sweetness win 
 
 One sweet drop more ; 
 
 One sweet drop moi*e in the measureless increase 
 
 Of honied peace. 
 
 123
 
 TIRED MEMORY 
 
 The stony rock of death's insensibility 
 
 Well'd yet awhile with honey of thy love 
 
 And then was dry ; 
 
 Nor could thy picture, nor thine empty glove. 
 
 Nor all thy kind, long letters, nor the band 
 
 Which really spann'd 
 
 Thy body chaste and warm, 
 
 Henceforward move 
 
 Upon the stony rock their wearied charm. 
 
 At last, then, thou wast dead. 
 
 Yet would I not despair. 
 
 But wi'ought my daily task, and daily said 
 
 Many and many a fond, unfeeling prayer. 
 
 To keep my vows of faith to thee from harm 
 
 In vain. 
 
 ' For 'tis,' I said, ' all one. 
 
 The wilful faith, which has no joy or pain. 
 
 As if 'twere none.' 
 
 Then look'd I miserably round 
 
 124
 
 TIRED MEMORY 
 
 If aught of duteous love were left undone. 
 
 And nothing found. 
 
 But, kneeling in a Church one Easter-Day, 
 
 It came to me to say : 
 
 ' Though there is no intelligible rest. 
 
 In Earth or Heaven, 
 
 For me, but on her breast, 
 
 I yield her up, again to have her given. 
 
 Or not, as. Lord, Thou wilt, and that for aye.' 
 
 And the same night, in slumber lying, 
 
 I, who had dream'd of thee as sad and sick and 
 
 dying. 
 And only so, nightly for all one year. 
 
 Did thee, my own most Dear, 
 
 Possess, 
 
 In gay, celestial beauty nothing coy. 
 
 And felt thy soft caress 
 
 With heretofore unknown reality of joy. 
 
 But, in our mortal air. 
 
 None thrives for long upon the happiest dream. 
 
 And fresh despair 
 
 Bade me seek round afresh for some extreme 
 
 Of unconceiv'd, interior sacrifice 
 
 Whereof the smoke might rise 
 
 To God, and 'mind him that one pray'd below. 
 
 And so, 
 
 125
 
 TIRED MEMORY 
 
 In agony, I cried : 
 
 ' My Lord, if thy strange will be this, 
 
 That I should crucify my heart. 
 
 Because my love has also been my pride, 
 
 I do submit, if I saw how, to bliss 
 
 Wherein She has no part.' 
 
 And I was heard. 
 
 And taken at my own remorseless word. 
 
 O, my most Dear, 
 
 Was't treason, as I fear } 
 
 'Twere that, and worse, to plead thy veiled mind. 
 
 Kissing thy babes, and murmuring in mine ear, 
 
 ' Thou canst not be 
 
 Faithful to God, and faithless unto me ! ' 
 
 Ah, prophet kind ! 
 
 I heard, all dumb and blind 
 
 With tears of protest ; and I cannot see 
 
 But faith was broken. Yet, as I have said. 
 
 My heart was dead. 
 
 Dead of devotion and tired memory. 
 
 When a strange grace of thee 
 
 In a fair stranger, as I take it, bred 
 
 To her some tender heed. 
 
 Most innocent 
 
 Of purpose therewith blent. 
 
 And pure of faith, I think, to thee ; yet such 
 
 126
 
 TIRED MEMORY 
 
 That the pale reflex of an alien love. 
 
 So vaguely, sadly shown, 
 
 Did her heart touch 
 
 Above 
 
 All that, till then, had wooed her for its own. 
 
 And so the fear, which is love's chilly dawn, 
 
 Flush'd faintly upon lids that droop'd like thine. 
 
 And made me weak. 
 
 By thy delusive likeness doubly drawn. 
 
 And Nature's long suspended breath of flame 
 
 Persuading soft, and whispering Duty's name. 
 
 Awhile to smile and speak 
 
 With this thy Sister sweet, and therefore mine ; 
 
 Thy Sister sweet. 
 
 Who bade the wheels to stir 
 
 Of sensitive delight in the poor brain. 
 
 Dead of devotion and tired memory. 
 
 So that I lived again. 
 
 And, strange to aver. 
 
 With no relapse into the void inane. 
 
 For thee ; 
 
 But (treason was't ?) for thee and also her. 
 
 127
 
 THE TOYS 
 
 My little Son, who look'd from thoughtful eyes 
 
 And moved and spoke in quiet grown-up wise. 
 
 Having my law the seventh time disobey'd, 
 
 I struck him, and dismiss'd 
 
 With hard words and unkiss'd. 
 
 His Mother, who was patient, being dead. 
 
 Then, fearing lest his grief should hinder sleep, 
 
 I visited his bed. 
 
 But found him slumbering deep. 
 
 With darken'd eyelids, and their lashes yet 
 
 From his late sobbing wet. 
 
 And I, with moan. 
 
 Kissing away his tears, left others of my own ; 
 
 For, on a table drawn beside his head, 
 
 He had put, within his reach, 
 
 A box of counters, and a red-vein'd stone, 
 
 A piece of glass abraded by the beach 
 
 And six or seven shells, 
 
 A bottle with bluebells 
 
 128
 
 THE TOYS 
 
 And two French copper coins, rang'd there with 
 
 careful art. 
 To comfort his sad heart. 
 So when that night I pray'd 
 To God, I wept, and said : 
 Ah, when at last we lie with tranced breath. 
 Not vexing Thee in death. 
 And Thou rememberest of what toys 
 We made our joys, 
 How weakly understood. 
 Thy great commanded good. 
 Then, fatherly not less 
 
 Than I whom Thou hast moulded from the clay, 
 Thou'lt leave Thy wrath, and say, 
 ' I will be sorry for their childishness.' 
 
 129
 
 WINTER 
 
 1, SINGULARLY ITIOVed 
 
 To love the lovely that ai'e not beloved. 
 
 Of all the Seasons, most 
 
 Love Winter, and to trace 
 
 The sense of the Trophonian pallor on her face. 
 
 It is not death, but plenitude of peace ; 
 
 And the dim cloud that does the world enfold 
 
 Hath less the characters of dark and cold 
 
 Than warmth and light asleep. 
 
 And correspondent breathing seems to keep 
 
 With the infant harvest, breathing soft below 
 
 Its eider coverlet of snow. 
 
 Nor is in field or garden anything 
 
 But, duly look'd into, contains serene 
 
 The substance of things hoped for, in the Spring, 
 
 And evidence of Summer not yet seen. 
 
 On every chance-mild day 
 
 That visits the moist shaw, 
 
 The honeysuckle, 'sdaining to be cvost 
 
 130
 
 WINTER 
 
 In urgence of sweet life by sleet or frost, 
 
 'Voids the time's law 
 
 With still increase 
 
 Of leaflet new, and little, wandering spray ; 
 
 Often, in sheltering brakes. 
 
 As one from rest disturb'd in the first hour, 
 
 Primrose or violet be^vilder'd wakes, 
 
 And deems 'tis time to flower ; 
 
 Though not a whisper of her voice he hear, 
 
 The buried bulb does know 
 
 The signals of the year. 
 
 And hails far Summer with his lifted spear. 
 
 The gorse-field dark, by sudden, gold caprice, 
 
 Turns, here and there, into a Jason's fleece ; 
 
 LiUes, that soon in Autumn slipp'd their gowns of 
 
 green. 
 And vanish'd into earth. 
 And came again, ere Autumn died, to birth. 
 Stand fuU-array'd, amidst the wavering shower. 
 And perfect for the Summer, less the flower ; 
 In nook of pale or crevice of crude bark, 
 Thou canst not miss, 
 If close thou spy, to mark 
 The ghostly chrysalis. 
 
 That, if thou touch it, stirs in its dream dark ; 
 And the flush'd Robin, in the evenings hoar, 
 
 131
 
 WINTER 
 
 Does of Love's Day, as if he saw it, sing ; 
 
 But sweeter yet than dream or song of Summer 
 
 or Spring 
 Are Winter's sometime smiles, that seem to well 
 From infancy ineffable ; 
 Her wandering, languorous gaze, 
 So unfamiliar, so without amaze. 
 On the elemental, chill adversity. 
 The uncomprehended rudeness ; and her sigh 
 And solemn, gathering tear. 
 And look of exile from some great repose, the 
 
 sphere 
 Of ether, moved by ether only, or 
 By something still more tranquil. 
 
 132
 
 L'ALLEGRO 
 
 Felicity ! 
 
 Who ope'st to none that knocks, yet, laughing weak, 
 
 Yield'st all to Love that will not seek, 
 
 And who, though won, wilt droop and die. 
 
 Unless wide doors bespeak thee free. 
 
 How safe's the bond of thee and me. 
 
 Since thee I cherish and defy ! 
 
 Is't Love or Friendship, Dearest, we obey ? 
 
 Ah, thou art young, and I am gray ; 
 
 But happy man is he who knows 
 
 How well time goes, 
 
 With no unkind intruder by, 
 
 Between such friends as thou and I ! 
 
 'Twould wrong thy favour. Sweet, were I to say, 
 
 'Tis best by far. 
 
 When best things are not possible, 
 
 To make the best of those that are ; 
 
 For, though it be not May, 
 
 Sure, few delights of Spring excel 
 
 133
 
 L'ALLEGRO 
 
 The beauty of this mild September day ! 
 
 So with me walk, 
 
 And view the dreaming field and bossy Autumn 
 
 wood. 
 And how in humble russet goes 
 The Spouse of Honour, fair Repose, 
 Far from a world whence love is fled 
 And truth is dying because joy is dead ; 
 And, if we hear the i-oaring wheel 
 Of God's remoter service, public zeal, 
 Let us to stiller place retire 
 And glad admire 
 
 How, near Him, sounds of working cease 
 In little fervour and much peace ; 
 And let us talk 
 
 Of holy things in happy mood. 
 Learnt of thy blest twin-sister. Certitude ; 
 Or let's about our neighbours chat, 
 "Well praising this, less praising that. 
 And judging outer strangers by 
 Those gentle and unsanction'd lines 
 To which remorse of equity 
 Of old hath moved the School divines. 
 Or linger where this willow bends, 
 And let us, till the melody be caught. 
 Hearken that sudden, singing thought, 
 
 134
 
 L'ALLEGRO 
 
 On which unguess'd increase to Hfe perchance 
 
 depends. 
 He ne'er hears twice the same who hears 
 The songs of heaven's unanimous spheres, 
 And this may be the song to make, at last, amends 
 For many sighs and boons in vain long sought ! 
 
 135
 
 A RETROSPECT 
 
 I, TRUSTING that the truly sweet 
 
 Would still be sweetly found the true, 
 Sang, darkling, taught by heavenly heat, 
 
 Songs which were wiser than I knew. 
 To the unintelligible dream 
 
 That melted like a gliding star, 
 I said : ' We part to meet, fair Gleam ! 
 
 You are eternal, for you are.' 
 To Love's strange riddle, fiery writ 
 
 In flesh and spirit of all create, 
 ' Mocker,' I said, ' of mortal wit. 
 
 Me you shall not mock. I can wait.' 
 
 Printed by Ballantyne, Hanson & Co. 
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