Whom Love loves so?
When did Love’s moon less brightly seem to shine,
While to and fro,
And soft and slow,
Chill winds began to move in its decline?
When did the change come, thou who wast mine own?
When heard the rose
First far-off winds begin to moan,
At sunset’s close,
When sad Love goes
About the autumn woods to brood alone?
When did the change come in thy heart, sweetheart,--
Thy heart so dear to me?
In what thing did I fail to bear my part,--
My part to thee,
Whose deity
My soul confesses, and how fair thou art?
Alas for poor changed Love! We cannot say
What changes Love.
My love would not suffice to make your day
Now gladly move,
Though kisses strove
With answering kisses, in Love’s sweetest way.
But though I know you changed, right well I know
That should we meet,
Deep in your heart some love for me would glow;
Though not that heat
Which made it beat
So fast with joy two years--_one_ year ago.
PHILIP BOURKE MARSTON.
SUMMER’S RETURN.
Once more I walk mid summer days, as one
Returning to the place where first he met
The face that he till death may not forget;
I know the scent of roses just begun,
And how at evening and at morn the sun
Falls on the places that remember yet
What feet last year within their bounds were set,
And what sweet things were said and dreamt and done.
The sultry silence of the summer night
Recalls to me the loved voice far away;
Oh, surely I shall see some early day,
In places that last year with love were bright,
The face of her I love, and hear the low,
Sweet troubled music of the voice I know.
PHILIP BOURKE MARSTON.
MINE.
In that tranced hush when sound sank awed to rest,
Ere from her spirit’s rose-red, rose-sweet gate
Came forth to me her royal word of fate,
Did she sigh “Yes,” and droop upon my breast,
While round our rapture, dumb, fixed, unexpressed
By the seized senses, there did fluctuate
The plaintive surges of our mortal state,
Tempering the poignant ecstasy too blest.
Do I wake into a dream, or have we twain,
Lured by soft wiles to some unconscious crime,
Dared joys forbid to man? Oh, Light supreme,
Upon our brows transfiguring glory rain,
Nor let the sword of thy just angel gleam
On two who entered heaven before their time!
WESTLAND MARSTON.
AUBADE.
When fair Hyperion dons his night attire,
Purple and silver, and his eyes with sleep
Go trembling, and the lids a-kissing keep,
And up he wings the plains of heaven the higher
The starry meadows all uncurl and creep
With twinkling shoots that tremble out and leap
From buds into a blossoming of fire.
When Spring, with primrose fillet round her brows,
Drifts on the dawn into the hyacinth west,
And flings fresh handfuls hoarded in her nest
Of tasty flowers, to Flora making vows,
The snow leaps down the mountain-side, and, press’d
With weight of leaves, the earth at happiest,
Rills into rivers thick from blossom-boughs.
When Liris comes sometime at break of day
To take the vervain garlands from the door,
I’ve hung there fresh with dew an hour before,
And chances with soft eyes to look my way,
My heart brims out with love, and crowding o’er,
The passion-songs and rhythms spring and pour,
As storms in June, or blossom-boughs in May.
THEO. MARZIALS.
THE PHIAL AND THE PHILTRE.
My lady has a casket cut
In scarlet coral, crimson-red;
Like Cupid’s bow, to keep it shut,
Two pouting locks are tightenèd,
In cunning curvings chisellèd.
Some mighty wizard it did make,
So strong that nothing can undo;
And if you thence would treasure take,
You press your lips the clasping to;
The magic word’s “_I love but you!_”
You’ll find a row of pearls within,
As pure as scarce come from the sea,
And set the rose and crimson in,
Twinkling with sweetest symmetry,--
I trow most beautiful to see!
And eke the clasp ’s so cunning wrought,
That as it opens, treble clear,
There comes a music, glib befraught,
Like silver lutes, that to the ear
As sweet love-ditties do appear.
And there within, as peach and rose,
And pine and plum, most savoury choice,
Elixirs sweet my Lady stows,
To make the saddest heart rejoice,
Or passionate the poet’s voice.
A rich soul-philtre, that to sip
I swear must be to drain it dry,
And never take away your lip
Till time has toll’d your time to die,
Yet dying, love eternally.
THEO. MARZIALS.
NOT I, SWEET SOUL, NOT I.
All glorious as the Rainbow’s birth,
She came in Springtide’s golden hours;
When Heaven went hand-in-hand with Earth,
And May was crowned with buds and flowers.
The mounting devil at my heart
Clomb faintlier, as my life did win
The charmèd heaven she wrought apart,
To wake its better Angel in.
With radiant mien she trode serene,
And passed me smiling by!
Oh! who that looked could help but love?
Not I, sweet soul, not I.
The dewy eyelids of the Dawn
Ne’er oped such heaven as hers did show:
It seemed her dear eyes might have shone
As jewels in some starry brow.
Her face flashed glory like a shrine
Of lily-bell with sunburst bright,
Where came and went love-thoughts divine,
As low winds walk the leaves in light:
She wore her beauty with the grace
Of Summer’s star-clad sky;
Oh! who that looked could help but love?
Not I, sweet soul, not I.
Her budding breasts like fragrant fruit
Of love were ripening to be pressed:
Her voice, that shook my heart’s red root,
Might not have broken a Babe’s rest,--
More liquid than the running brooks,
More vernal than the voice of Spring,
When Nightingales are in their nooks,
And all the leafy thickets ring.
The love she coyly hid at heart
Was shyly conscious in her eye;
Oh! who that looked could help but love?
Not I, sweet soul, not I.
GERALD MASSEY.
AT DINNER SHE IS HOSTESS.
At dinner she is hostess, I am host.
Went the feast ever cheerfuller? She keeps
The topic over intellectual deeps
In buoyancy afloat. They see no ghost.
With sparkling surface-eyes we ply the ball.
It is in truth a most contagious game:
HIDING THE SKELETON shall be its name.
Such play as this the devils might appall!
But here’s the greater wonder; in that we,
Enamoured of our acting and our wits,
Admire each other like true hypocrites.
Warm lighted glances, Love’s Ephemeræ,
Shoot gaily o’er the dishes and the wine.
We waken envy of our happy lot.
Fast, sweet, and golden, shows our marriage-knot.
Dear guests, you now have seen Love’s corpse-light shine!
GEORGE MEREDITH.
LOVE WITHIN THE LOVER’S BREAST.
Love within the lover’s breast
Burns like Hesper in the West,
O’er the ashes of the sun,
Till the day and night are done;
Then, when dawn drives up his car--
Lo! it is the morning star.
Love! thy love pours down on mine,
As the sunlight on the vine,
As the snow rill on the vale,
As the salt breeze on the sail;
As the song unto the bird
On my lips thy name is heard.
As a dewdrop on the rose
In thy heart my passion glows;
As a skylark to the sky,
Up into thy breast I fly;
As a sea-shell of the sea
Ever shall I sing of thee.
GEORGE MEREDITH.
A DEAD MARCH.
Play me a march low-toned and slow,--a march for a silent tread,
Fit for the wandering feet of one who dreams of the silent dead,
Lonely, between the bones below and the souls that are overhead.
Here for a while they smiled and sang, alive in the interspace,
Here with the grass beneath the foot, and the stars above the face,
Now are their feet beneath the grass, and whither has flown their grace?
Who shall assure us whence they come or tell us the way they go?
Verily, life with them was joy, and now they have left us, woe.
Once they were not, and now they are not, and this is the sum we know.
Orderly range the seasons due, and orderly roll the stars.
How shall we deem the soldier brave who frets of his wounds and scars?
Are we as senseless brutes that we should dash at the well-seen bars?
No, we are here with feet unfixed, but ever as if with lead
Drawn from the orbs which shine above to the orb on which we tread,
Down to the dust from which we came and with which we shall mingle dead.
No, we are here to wait and work, and strain our banished eyes,
Weary and sick of soil and toil, and hungry and fain for skies
Far from the reach of wingless men and not to be scaled with cries.
Why do we mourn the days that go,--for the same sun shines each day,
Ever a spring her primrose hath, and ever a May her may,--
Sweet as the rose that died last year, is the rose that is born to-day.
Do we not too return, we men, as ever the round earth whirls?
Never a head is dimmed with gray but another is sunned with curls.
She was a girl and he was a boy, but yet there are boys and girls.
Ah, but alas for the smile of smiles that never but one face wore!
Ah, for the voice that has flown away like a bird to an unseen shore!
Ah, for the face--the flower of flowers--that blossoms on earth no more!
COSMO MONKHOUSE.
FAIR STAR THAT ON THE SHOULDER OF YON HILL.
Fair star that on the shoulder of yon hill
Peepest, a little eye of tranquil night,
Come forth. Nor sun nor moon there is to kill
Thy ray with broader light.
Shine, star of eve that art so bright and clear;
Shine, little star, and bring my lover here.
My lover! oh, fair word for maid to hear!
My lover who was yesterday my friend!
Oh, strange we did not know before how near
Our stream of life smoothed to its fated end!
Shine, star of eve, as Love’s self bright and clear;
Shine, little star, and bring my lover here.
He comes! I hear the echo of his feet.
He comes! I fear to stay, I cannot go.
O Love, that thou art shame-fast, bitter-sweet;
Mingled with pain, and conversant with woe!
Shine, star of eve, more bright as night draws near;
Shine, little star, and bring my lover here.
LEWIS MORRIS.
THY SHADOW, O TARDY NIGHT.
Thy shadow, O tardy night,
Creeps onward by valley and hill,
And scarce to my streaming sight
Show the white road-reaches still.
O night, stay now a little, little space,
And let me see the light of my beloved’s face!
My love is late, O night,
And what has kept him away?
For I know that he takes not delight
In the garish joys of day.
Haste, night, dear night, that bring’st my love to me!
What if his footsteps halt and tarry but for thee!
Nay, what if his footsteps slide
By the swaying bridge of pine,
And whirled seaward by the tide
Is the loved form I counted mine!
O night, dear night, that comest yet dost not come,
How shall I wait the hour that brings my darling home?
LEWIS MORRIS.
THE FIRST LYRIC.
Love is enough: though the World be a waning
And the woods have no voice but the voice of complaining,
Though the sky be too dark for dim eyes to discover
The gold-cups and daisies fair blooming thereunder,
Though the hills be held shadows, and the sea a dark wonder,
And this day draw a veil over all deeds passed over,
Yet their hands shall not tremble, their feet shall not falter;
The void shall not weary, the fear shall not alter
These lips and these eyes of the loved and the lover.
WILLIAM MORRIS.
THE CONCLUDING LYRIC.
Love is enough: ho, ye who seek saving,
Go no further; come hither; there have been who have found it,
And these know the House of Fulfilment of Craving;
These know the Cup with the roses around it;
These know the World’s wound and the balm that hath bound it:
Cry out, the World heedeth not, “Love, lead us home!”
He leadeth, he hearkeneth, he cometh to you-ward;
Set your faces as steel to the fears that assemble
Round his goad for the faint, and his scourge for the froward:
Lo, his lips, how with tales of last kisses they tremble!
Lo, his eyes of all sorrow that may not dissemble!
Cry out, for he heedeth, “O Love, lead us home.”
Oh, hearken the words of his voice of compassion:
“Come cling round about me, ye faithful who sicken
Of the weary unrest and the world’s passing fashion!
As the rain in mid-morning your troubles shall thicken,
But surely within you some Godhead doth quicken,
As ye cry to me heeding, and leading you home.
“Come--pain ye shall have, and be blind to the ending!
Come--fear ye shall have, mid the sky’s over-casting!
Come--change ye shall have, for far are ye wending!
Come--no crown ye shall have for your thirst and your fasting
But the kissed lips of Love and fair life ever-lasting!
Cry out, for one heedeth who leadeth you home!”
Is he gone? was he with us? ho, ye who seek saving,
Go no further; come hither; for have we not found it?
Here is the House of Fulfilment of Craving,
Here is the Cup with the roses around it;
The World’s wound well healed, and the balm that hath bound it:
Cry out! for he heedeth, fair Love that led home.
WILLIAM MORRIS.
BESIDE A BIER.
I had never kissed her her whole life long,--
Now I stand by her bier, does she feel
How with love that the waiting years made strong,
I set on her lips my seal?
Will she wear my kiss in the grave’s long night,
And wake sometimes with a thrill,
From dreams of the old life’s missed delight,
To feel that the grave is chill?
“It was warm,” will she say, “in that world above;
It was warm, but I did not know
How he loved me there, with his whole life’s love,--
It is cold down here below.”
LOUISE CHANDLER MOULTON.
HEREAFTER.
In after years a twilight ghost shall fill
With shadowy presence all thy waiting room:
From lips of air thou canst not kiss the bloom;
Yet at old kisses will thy pulses thrill,
And the old longing that thou couldst not kill,
Feeling her presence in the gathering gloom,
Will mock thee with the hopelessness of doom,
While she stands there and smiles, serene and still.
Thou canst not vex her, then, with passion’s pain:
Call, and the silence will thy call repeat;
But she will smile there, with cold lips and sweet,
Forgetful of old tortures, and the chain
That once she wore, the tears she wept in vain,
At passing from her threshold of thy feet.
LOUISE CHANDLER MOULTON.
FORTUNIO’S SONG.
FROM THE FRENCH OF ALFRED DE MUSSET.
Comrades! in vain ye seek to learn
For whom I burn;
Not for a kingdom would I dare
Her name declare.
But we will chant in chorus still,--
If so you will,--
That she I love is blonde and sweet,
As blades of wheat.
Whate’er her wayward fancies ask
Becomes my task;
Should she my very life demand,
’Tis in her hand.
The pain of passion unrevealed
Can scarce be healed:
Such pain within my heart I bear,
To my despair:
Nathless I love her all too well
Her name to tell;
And I would sooner die than e’er
Her name declare.
GEORGE MURRAY.
SPLENDIDE MENDAX.
When God some day shall call my name
And scorch me with a blaze of shame,
Bringing to light my inmost thought
And all the evil I have wrought,
Tearing away the veils I wove
To hide my foulness from my love,
And leaving my transgressions bare
To the whole heaven’s clear, cold air--
When all the angels weep to see
The branded outcast soul of me,
One saint at least will hide her face,--
She will not look at my disgrace.
“At least, O God, O God Most High,
He loved me truly!” she will cry,
And God will pause before He send
My soul to find its fitting end.
Then, lest heaven’s light should leave her face
To think one loved her and was base,
I will speak out at judgment day,--
“I never loved her!” I will say.
E. NESBIT.
THE KISS.
The snow is white on wood and wold,
The wind is in the firs,
So dead my heart is with the cold,
No pulse within it stirs,
Even to see your face, my dear,
Your face that was my sun;
There is no spring this bitter year,
And summer’s dreams are done.
The snakes that lie about my heart
Are in their wintry sleep;
Their fangs no more deal sting and smart,
No more they curl and creep.
Love with the summer ceased to be;
The frost is firm and fast.
God keep the summer far from me,
And let the snakes’ sleep last!
Touch of your hand could not suffice
To waken them once more;
Nor could the sunshine of your eyes
A ruined spring restore.
But ah--your lips! You know the rest:
The snows are summer rain,
My eyes are wet, and in my breast
The snakes’ fangs meet again.
E. NESBIT.
THE MILL.
The wheel goes round, the wheel goes round
With drip and whir and plash,
It keeps all green the grassy ground,
The alder, beech, and ash.
The ferns creep out mid mosses cool,
Forget-me-nots are found
Blue in the shadow by the pool--
And still the wheel goes round.
Round goes the wheel, round goes the wheel,
The foam is white like cream,
The merry waters dance and reel
Along the stony stream.
The little garden of the mill,
It is enchanted ground,
I smell its stocks and wall-flowers still,
And still the wheel goes round.
The wheel goes round, the wheel goes round,
And life’s wheel too must go,--
But all their clamour has not drowned
A voice I used to know.
Her window’s blank. The garden’s bare
As her chill new-made mound,
But still my heart’s delight is there,
And still the wheel goes round.
E. NESBIT.
A PASTORAL.
My love and I among the mountains strayed,
When heaven and earth in summer heat were still,
Aware anon that at our feet were laid,
Within a sunny hollow of the hill,
A long-haired shepherd lover and a maid.
They saw nor heard us, who a space above,
With hands clasped close as hers were clasped in his,
Marked how the gentle golden sunlight strove
To play about their leaf-crowned curls, and kiss
Their burnished slender limbs, half-barèd to his love.
But grave or pensive seemed the boy to grow,
For while upon the grass unfingered lay
The slim twin-pipes, he ever watched with slow
Dream-laden looks the ridge that far away
Surmounts the sleeping midsummer with snow.
These things we saw; moreover we could hear
The girl’s soft voice of laughter, grown more bold
With the utter noonday silence, sweet and clear:
“Why dost thou think? By thinking one grows old.
Wouldst thou for all the world be old, my dear?”
Here my love turned to me, but her eyes told
Her thought with smiles before she spoke a word;
And being quick their meaning to behold,
I could not chuse but echo what we heard:
“Sweetheart, wouldst thou for all the world be old?”
J. B. B. NICHOLS.
VIGILATE ITAQUE.
The restless years that come and go,
The cruel years so swift and slow,
Once in our lives perchance will show
What they can give that we may know;
Too soon perchance, or else too late;
We may look back or we may wait;
The years are incompassionate,
And who shall touch the robe of fate?
Once only; haply if we keep
Watch with our lamps and do not sleep,
Our eyes shall, when the night is deep,
Behold the bridegroom’s face,--and weep.
Alas! for better far it were
That Love were heedless of our prayer
Than that his glory he should bare
And show himself to our despair.
Better to wander till we die
And never come the door anigh,
Than weeping sore without to lie
And get no answer to our cry.
O child! the night is cold and blind,
The way is rough with rain and wind,
Narrow and steep and hard to find;
But I have found thee--love, be kind.
J. B. B. NICHOLS.
THE HORIZON.
Oh, would, oh, would that thou and I,
Now this brief day of love is past,
Could toward the sunset straightway fly,
And fold our wearied wings at last
There, where the sea-line meets the sky.
A sweet thing and a strange ’twould be
Thus, thus to break our prison bars,
And know that we at last were free
As voiceful waves and silent stars,--
There, where the sky-line meets the sea.
But vain the longing! thou and I,
As we have been must ever be,
Yet thither, wind, oh, waft my sigh,
There where the sky-line meets the sea,--
There where the sea-line meets the sky.
JAMES ASHCROFT NOBLE.
SHADOWS.
Azure of sky and silver of cloud
In the deep dark water show,
Amber of field and emerald of wood
That were pictured long ago.
Here, as of old, the beauty above,
And its shadow there below;
Why was their message jubilant then,
And their meaning now but woe?
Nay, not the same, O fool, as of yore!
These be other leaves that grow,
Other the harvests, other the waves;
Other the breezes that blow.
Sameness in sooth, but difference too;
And a simple change I know,
Within beholder, without in scene,
It may alter meaning so!
Shadow of her who looked down with me,
In the depths so long ago--
Were all your archness glimmering there,
Would the picture breathe but woe?
JOSEPH O’CONNOR.
A FAREWELL.
Hath any loved you well down there,
Summer or winter through?
Down there, have you found any fair
Laid in the grave with you?
Is death’s long kiss a richer kiss
Than mine was wont to be?
Or have you gone to some far bliss,
And quite forgotten me?
What soft enamouring of sleep
Hath you in some soft way?
What charmed death holdeth you with deep
Strange lure by night and day?
A little space below the grass,
Out of the sun and shade;
But worlds away from me, alas!
Down there where you are laid!
My bright hair’s waved and wasted gold,
What is it now to thee
Whether the rose-red life I hold
Or white death holdeth me?
Down there you love the grave’s own green,
And evermore you rave
Of some sweet seraph you have seen
Or dreamed of in the grave.
There you shall lie as you have lain,
Though in the world above
Another live your life again,
Loving again your love;
Is it not sweet beneath the palm?
Is not the warm day rife
With some long mystic golden calm
Better than love and life?
The broad quaint odorous leaves, like hands
Weaving the fair day through,
Weave sleep no burnished bird withstands,
While death weaves sleep for you;
And many a strange rich breathing sound
Ravishes morn and noon;
And in that place you must have found
Death a delicious swoon.
Hold me no longer for a word
I used to say or sing;
Ah! long ago you must have heard
So many a sweeter thing:
For rich earth must have reached your heart,
And turned the faith to flowers;
And warm wind stolen, part by part,
Your soul through faithless hours.
And many a soft seed must have won
Soil of some yielding thought,
To bring a bloom up to the sun
That else had ne’er been brought;
And doubtless many a passionate hue
Hath made that place more fair,
Making some passionate part of you
Faithless to me down there.
ARTHUR O’SHAUGHNESSY.
SONG.
Has summer come without the rose,
Or left the bird behind?
Is the blue changed above thee,
O world! or am I blind?
Will you change every flower that grows,
Or only change this spot,
Where she who said, I love thee,
Now says, I love thee not?
The skies seemed true above thee,
The rose true on the tree;
The bird seemed true the summer through,
But all proved false to me.
World, is there one good thing in you,
Life, love, or death--or what?
Since lips that sang, I love thee,
Have said, I love thee not?
I think the sun’s kiss will scarce fall
Into one flower’s gold cup;
I think the bird will miss me,
And give the summer up.
O sweet place! desolate in tall
Wild grass, have you forgot
How her lips loved to kiss me
Now that they kiss me not?
Be false or fair above me,
Come back with any face,
Summer! do I care what you do?
You cannot change one place--
The grass, the leaves, the earth, the dew,
The grave I make this spot--
Here, where she used to love me,
Here, where she loves me not.
ARTHUR O’SHAUGHNESSY.
SUPREME SUMMER.
O heart full of song in the sweet song-weather,
A voice fills each bower, a wing shakes each tree,
Come forth, O winged singer, on song’s fairest feather,
And make a sweet fame of my love and of me.
The blithe world shall ever have fair loving leisure,
And long is the summer for bird and for bee;
But too short the summer and too keen the pleasure
Of me kissing her and of her kissing me.
Songs shall not cease of the hills and the heather;
Songs shall not fail of the land and the sea:
But, O heart, if you sing not while we are together,
What man shall remember my love or me?
Some million of summers hath been and not known her,
Hath known and forgotten loves less fair than she;
But one summer knew her, and grew glad to own her,
And made her its flower, and gave her to me.
And she and I loving, on earth seem to sever
Some part of the great blue from heaven each day:
I know that the heaven and the earth are for ever,
But that which we take shall with us pass away.
And that which she gives me shall be for no lover
In any new love-time, the world’s lasting while;
The world, when it looses, shall never recover
The gold of her hair nor the sun of her smile.
A tree grows in heaven, where no season blanches
Or stays the new fruit through the long golden clime;
My love reaches up, takes a fruit from its branches,
And gives it to me to be mine for all time.
What care I for other fruits, fed with new fire,
Plucked down by new lovers in fair future line?
The fruit that I have is the thing I desire,
To live of and die of,--the sweet she makes mine.
And she and I loving, are king of one summer
And queen of one summer to gather and glean:
The world is for us what no fair future comer
Shall find it or dream it could ever have been.
The earth, as we lie on its bosom, seems pressing
A heart up to bear us and mix with our heart;
The blue, as we wonder, drops down a great blessing
That soothes us and fills us and makes the tears start.