"_Festo quid potius die
Neptuni faciam._"
HORACE, _Odes_, iii. 28.
Spring grew to perfect summer in one day,
And we lay there among the vines, to gaze
Where Circe's isle floats purple, far away
Above the golden haze:
And on our ears there seemed to rise and fall
The burden of an old world song we knew,
That sang, "To-day is Neptune's festival,
And we, what shall we do?"
Go down brown-armed Campagna maid of mine,
And bring again the earthen jar that lies
With three years' dust above the mellow wine;
And while the swift day dies,
You first shall sing a song of waters blue,
Paphos and Cnidos in the summer seas,
And one who guides her swan-drawn chariot through
The white-shored Cyclades;
And I will take the second turn of song,
Of floating tresses in the foam and surge
Where Nereid maids about the sea-god throng;
And night shall have her dirge.
1881.
"IF ANY ONE RETURN"
I would we had carried him far away
To the light of this south sun land.
Where the hills lean down to some red-rocked bay
And the sea's blue breaks into snow-white spray
As the wave dies out on the sand.
Not there, not there, where the winds deface!
Where the storm and the cloud race by!
But far away in this flowerful place
Where endless summers retouch, retrace,
What flowers find heart to die.
And if ever the souls of the loved, set free,
Come back to the souls that stay,
I could dream he would sit for a while with me
Where I sit by this wonderful tideless sea
And look to the red-rocked bay,
By the high cliff's edge where the wild weeds twine,
And he would not speak or move,
But his eyes would gaze from his soul at mine,
My eyes that would answer without one sign,
And that were enough for love.
And I think I should feel as the sun went round
That he was not there any more,
But dews were wet on the grass-grown mound
On the bed of my love lying underground,
And evening pale on the shore.
1879.
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