That breathe all their lives the warm air of our love,
And never shall know a love other than ours
Till once more some phœnix-star flowers above.
The silver cloud passing is friend of our loving;
The sea, never knowing this year from last year,
Is thick with fair words, between roaring and soughing,
For her and me only to gather and hear.
Yea, the life that we lead now is better and sweeter,
I think, than shall be in the world by and bye;
For those days, be they longer or fewer or fleeter,
I will not exchange on the day that I die.
I shall die when the rose-tree about and above me
Her red kissing mouth seems hath kissed summer through:
I shall die on the day that she ceases to love me--
But that will not be till the day she dies too.
Then, fall on us, dead leaves of our dear roses,
And ruins of summer fall on us erelong,
And hide us away where our dead year reposes;
Let all that we leave in the world be--a song.
And, O song that I sing now while we are together,
Go, sing to some new year of women and men,
How I and she loved in the long loving weather,
And ask if they love on as we two loved then.
ARTHUR O’SHAUGHNESSY.
AS ONE WOULD STAND WHO SAW A SUDDEN LIGHT.
As one would stand who saw a sudden light
Flood down the world, and so encompass him,
And in that world illumined Seraphim
Brooded above and gladdened to his sight;
So stand I in the flame of one great thought,
That broadens to my soul from where she waits,
Who, yesterday, drew wide the inner gates
Of all my being to the hopes I sought.
Her words come to me like a summer-song,
Blown from the throat of some sweet nightingale;
I stand within her light the whole day long,
And think upon her till the white stars fail:
I lift my head towards all that makes life wise,
And see no farther than my lady’s eyes.
GILBERT PARKER.
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
To turn your talk on daily things, my Dear,
Lifting the luminous, 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 passed:
’Twas all unlike your great and gracious ways.
COVENTRY PATMORE.
CADENCES.
MINOR.
I.
The ancient memories buried lie,
And the olden fancies pass;
The old sweet flower-thoughts wither and fly,
And die as the April cowslips die
That scatter the bloomy grass.
II.
All dead, my dear! And the flowers are dead,
And the happy blossoming spring;
The winter comes with its iron tread,
The fields with the dying sun are red,
And the birds have ceased to sing.
III.
I trace the steps on the wasted strand
Of the vanished springtime’s feet:
Withered and dead is our Fairyland,
For Love and Death go hand in hand--
Go hand in hand, my sweet!
MAJOR.
I.
Oh, what shall be the burden of our rhyme,
And what shall be our ditty when the blossom’s on the lime?
Our lips have fed on winter and on weariness too long:
We will hail the royal summer with a golden-footed song.
II.
O lady of my summer and my spring,
We shall hear the blackbird whistle and the brown sweet throstle sing,
And the low clear noise of waters running softly by our feet,
When the sights and sounds of summer in the green clear fields are sweet.
III.
We shall see the roses blowing in the green,
The pink-lipped roses kissing in the golden summer sheen;
We shall see the fields flower thick with stars and bells of summer gold,
And the poppies burn out red and sweet across the corn-crowned wold.
IV.
The time shall be for pleasure, not for pain;
There shall come no ghost of grieving for the past betwixt us twain;
But in the time of roses our lives shall grow together,
And our love be as the love of gods in the blue Olympian weather.
JOHN PAYNE.
CHANT ROYAL OF THE GOD OF LOVE.
I.
O most fair God, O Love both new and old,
That wast before the flowers of morning blew,
Before the glad sun in his mail of gold
Leapt into light across the first day’s dew;
That art the first and last of our delight,
That in the blue day and the purple night
Holdest the hearts of servant and of king,
Lord of liesse, sovran of sorrowing,
That in thy hand hast heaven’s golden key
And hell beneath the shadow of thy wing,
Thou art my Lord to whom I bend the knee!
II.
What thing rejects thy mastery? Who so bold
But at thine altars in the dusk they sue?
Even the straight pale goddess, silver-stoled,
That kissed Endymion when the spring was new,
To thee did homage in her own despite,
When in the shadow of her wings of white
She slid down trembling from her moonèd ring
To where the Latmian boy lay slumbering,
And in that kiss put off cold chastity.
Who but acclaim with voice and pipe and string,
“Thou art my Lord to whom I bend the knee!”
III.
Master of men and gods, in every fold
Of thy wide vans the sorceries that renew
The labouring earth, tranced with the winter’s cold,
Lie hid--the quintessential charms that woo
The souls of flowers, slain with the sullen might
Of the dead year, and draw them to the light.
Balsam and blessing to thy garments cling;
Skyward and seaward, when thy white hands fling
Their spells of healing over land and sea,
One shout of homage makes the welkin ring,
“Thou art my Lord to whom I bend the knee!”
IV.
I see thee throned aloft; thy fair hands hold
Myrtles for joy, and euphrasy and rue:
Laurels and roses round thy white brows rolled,
And in thine eyes the royal heaven’s hue:
But in thy lips’ clear colour, ruddy bright,
The heart’s blood shines of many a hapless wight.
Thou art not only fair and sweet as spring;
Terror and beauty, fear and wondering
Meet on thy brow, amazing all that see:
All men do praise thee, ay, and everything;
Thou art my Lord to whom I bend the knee!
V.
I fear thee, though I love. Who can behold
The sheer sun burning in the orbèd blue,
What while the noontide over hill and wold
Flames like a fire, except his mazèd view
Wither and tremble? So thy splendid sight
Fills me with mingled gladness and affright.
Thy visage haunts me in the wavering
Of dreams, and in the dawn awakening,
I feel thy radiance streaming full on me.
Both fear and joy unto thy feet I bring;
Thou art my Lord to whom I bend the knee!
ENVOY.
God above Gods, High and Eternal King,
To whom the spheral symphonies do sing,
I find no whither from thy power to flee,
Save in thy pinions vast o’ershadowing.
Thou art my Lord to whom I bend the knee!
JOHN PAYNE.
FALSE SPRING.
O birds, ’twas not well done of you!
O flowers and breeze, right well ye knew
The weary glamour that the spring
Had laid for me on every thing.
’Twas but to bring me back again
The memory of the olden pain,
You lured me out with songs of birds,
With violet breath and fair false words!
For lo! my feet had hardly passed
The woven band of flowerage, cast
Betwixt the meadows and the trees,
When, in the bird-songs and the breeze,
Another strain was taken up;
And out of every blue-bell’s cup
The mocking voices sang again
The olden songs of love and pain.
The flowers did mimic the old grace;
The wan white windflowers wore her face;
And in the stream I heard her words;
Her voice came rippling from the birds.
Dead love, I saw thy form anew
Bend down among the violets blue,
And, like a mist, the memory
Of all the past came back to me.
JOHN PAYNE.
IN JUNE.
So sweet, so sweet the roses in their blowing,
So sweet the daffodils, so fair to see;
So blithe and gay the humming-bird a-going
From flower to flower, a-hunting with the bee.
So sweet, so sweet the calling of the thrushes,
The calling, cooing, wooing, everywhere;
So sweet the water’s song through reeds and rushes,
The plover’s piping note, now here, now there.
So sweet, so sweet from off the fields of clover
The west wind blowing, blowing up the hill;
So sweet, so sweet with news of some one’s lover,
Fleet footsteps, singing nearer, nearer still.
So near, so near, now listen, listen, thrushes;
Now, plover, blackbird, cease, and let me hear;
And, water, hush your song through reeds and rushes,
That I may know whose lover cometh near.
So loud, so loud the thrushes kept their calling,
Plover or blackbird never heeding me;
So loud the millstream too kept fretting, falling,
O’er bar and bank in brawling, boisterous glee.
So loud, so loud; yet blackbird, thrush nor plover,
Nor noisy millstream, in its fret and fall,
Could drown the voice, the low voice of my lover,
My lover calling through the thrushes’ call.
“Come down, come down!” he called, and straight the thrushes
From mate to mate sang all at once, “Come down!”
And while the water laughed through reeds and rushes,
The blackbird chirped, the plover piped, “Come down!”
Then down and off, and through the fields of clover,
I followed, followed at my lover’s call;
Listening no more to blackbird, thrush or plover,
The water’s laugh, the millstream’s fret and fall.
NORA PERRY.
A SONG OF WINTER.
Barb’d blossom of the guarded gorse,
I love thee where I see thee shine:
Thou sweetener of our common ways,
And brightener of our wintry days.
Flower of the gorse, the rose is dead,
Thou art undying, oh, be mine!
Be mine with all thy thorns, and prest
Close on a heart that asks not rest.
I pluck thee, and thy stigma set
Upon my breast and on my brow;
Blow, buds, and ’plenish so my wreath
That none may know the wounds beneath.
O crown of thorn that seem’st of gold,
No festal coronal art thou;
Thy honey’d blossoms are but hives
That guard the growth of wingèd lives.
I saw thee in the time of flowers
As sunshine spill’d upon the land,
Or burning bushes all ablaze
With sacred fire; but went my ways.
I went my ways, and as I went
Pluck’d kindlier blooms on either hand;
Now of those blooms so passing sweet
None lives to stay my passing feet.
And still thy lamp upon the hill
Feeds on the autumn’s dying sigh,
And from thy midst comes murmuring
A music sweeter than in spring.
Barb’d blossoms of the guarded gorse,
Be mine to wear until I die,
And mine the wounds of love which still
Bear witness to his human will.
EMILY PFEIFFER.
TO A LOST LOVE.
I cannot look upon thy grave,
Though there the rose is sweet:
Better to hear the long wave wash
These wastes about my feet!
Shall I take comfort? Dost thou live
A spirit, though afar,
With a deep hush about thee, like
The stillness round a star?
Oh, thou art cold! In that high sphere
Thou art a thing apart,
Losing in saner happiness
This madness of the heart.
And yet, at times, thou still shalt feel
A passing breath, a pain;
Disturb’d, as though a door in heaven
Had sped and closed again.
And thou shalt shiver, while the hymns
The solemn hymns, shall cease;
A moment half remember me:
Then turn away in peace.
But oh! forevermore thy look,
Thy laugh, thy charm, thy tone,
Thy sweet and wayward loveliness,
Dear trivial things are gone!
Therefore I look not on thy grave,
Though there the rose is sweet;
But rather hear the loud wave wash
These wastes about my feet.
STEPHEN PHILLIPS.
PRINCE OF PAINTERS, COME, I PRAY.
Prince of painters, come, I pray,
Paint my love, for, though away,
King of craftsmen, you can well
Paint what I to thee can tell.
First her hair you must indite
Dark, but soft as summer night;
Hast thou no contrivance whence
To make it breathe its frankincense?
Rising from her rounded cheek
Let thy pencil duly speak,
How below that purpling night
Glows her forehead ivory-white.
Mind you neither part nor join
Those sweet eyebrows’ easy line;
They must merge, you know, to be
In separated unity.
Painter draw, as lover bids,
Now the dark line of the lids;
Painter, now ’tis my desire,
Make her glance from very fire,
Make it as Athene’s blue,
Like Cythera’s liquid too;
Now to give her cheeks and nose,
Milk must mingle with the rose;
Her lips be like persuasion’s made,
To call for kisses they persuade;
And for her delicious chin,
O’er and under and within,
And round her soft neck’s Parian wall,
Bid fly the graces, one and all.
For the rest, enrobe my pet
In her faint clear violet;
But a little truth must show
There is more that lies below,
Hold! thou hast her--that is she.
Hush! she ’s going to speak to me.
WILLIAM PHILPOT.
A LAGOON MESSAGE.
Not now, but later, when the road
We tread together breaks apart,
When thou, my dearest, distant art,
And tedious days have swelled the load
Upon my heart.
Or haply after that, when I
Am sealed within an earthy bed,
Resting and unrememberèd,
This scene will speak and easily
The whole be said.
Some eve, when from his burning chair
The sun below Fusina slips,
And all the sable poplar tips
Wave in the warm vermilion air,
The wind, the lips
Of the soft breeze with wayward touch
Shall tell thee all I longed to own;
And thou, on lurid lakes alone,
Wilt say: “Poor soul, he loved me much;
And he is gone.”
PERCY C. PINKERTON.
A CONQUEST.
I found him openly wearing her token;
I knew that her troth could never be broken;
I laid my hand on the hilt of my sword,
He did the same, and he spoke no word;
He faced me with his villainy;
He laughed and said, “She gave it me.”
We searched for seconds, they soon were found;
They measured our swords; they measured the ground:
They held to the deadly work too fast;
They thought to gain our place at last.
We fought in the sheen of a wintry wood,
The fair white snow was red with his blood;
But his was the victory, for, as he died,
He swore by the rood that he had not lied.
WALTER HERRIES POLLOCK.
THE DEVOUT LOVER.
It is not mine to sing the stately grace,
The great soul beaming in my lady’s face;
To write no sounding odes to me is given
Wherein her eyes outshine the stars in heaven.
Not mine in flowing melodies to tell
The thousand beauties that I know so well;
Not mine to serenade her ev’ry tress,
And sit and sigh my love in idleness.
But mine it is to follow in her train,
Do her behests in pleasure or in pain,
Burn at her altar love’s sweet frankincense,
And worship her in distant reverence.
WALTER HERRIES POLLOCK.
BALLADE OF LOVERS.
For the man was she made by the Eden tree,
To be decked in soft raiment and worn on his sleeve,
To be fondled so long as they both agree,--
A thing to take, or a thing to leave.
But for her, let her live through one long summer eve--
Just the stars, and the moon, and the man, and she--
And her soul will escape her beyond reprieve,
And, alas! the whole of her world is he.
To-morrow brings plenty as lovesome, maybe;
If she break when he handles her, why should he grieve?
She is only one pearl in a pearl-crowded sea,--
A thing to take, or a thing to leave.
But she, though she knows he has kissed to deceive,
And forsakes her, still only clings on at his knee--
When life has gone, what further loss can bereave?
And, alas! the whole of her world is he.
For the man was she made upon Eden lea,
To be helpmeet what time there is burden to heave,
White-footed, to follow where he walks free,--
A thing to take, or a thing to leave;
White-fingered, to weave and to interweave
Her woof with his warp, and a tear two or three,
Till clear his way out through her web he cleave,
And, alas! the whole of her world is he.
ENVOI.
Did he own her no more when he called her Eve,
Than a thing to take, or a thing to leave?
A flower-filled plot that unlocks to his key--
But, alas! the whole of her world is he.
MAY PROBYN.
IN A GARDEN.
The cowslip glowed, the tulip burned,
The grass was green as green could be;
There, as in sweet content we turned,
Beneath the budding linden-tree,
We saw the westering sunbeams shake
Large glory o’er the mountain lake.
The cushat cooed, the blackbird’s cry
About the terrace garden rang;
Still as we wooed, my love and I,
The throstle still enraptured sang,
And still the waters danced with glee,
Beneath the budding linden-tree.
The tulips trembled still with flame,
The cowslips gleamed along the walk,
Yet, dear one, when the last word came,
And silence only seemed to talk,
We looked and found the lake was gone,
Flowers dim, birds hushed, and one star shone.
Beloved! by many an up and down,
O’er level lawns, unlevel ways,
Through weeds and flowers, when birds had flown
And when birds sang, have passed the days
Since our new dawn forbade the night;
But lo! o’erhead Love’s star is bright.
HARDWICK DRUMMOND RAWNSLEY.
A SONG FOR CANDLEMAS.
There’s never a rose upon the bush,
And never a bud on any tree;
In wood and field nor hint nor sign
Of one green thing for you of me.
Come in, come in, sweet love of mine,
And let the bitter weather be.
Coated with ice the garden wall,
The river reeds are stark and still;
The wind goes plunging to the sea,
And last week’s flakes the hollows fill.
Come in, come in, sweet love, to me,
And let the year blow as it will.
LIZETTE WOODWORTH REESE.
A DREAM OF DIANA.
In dream I saw Diana pass, Diana as of old,
Across the green wood radiantly, attired in green and gold;
With spear alert, with eyes afire, as they had seen the sun,
And gave its glances back again, with brightness of their own.
No human maid is she, I thought, who there so lightly fares
Upon her sylvan empery, afar from our pale cares.
She passed, and left me to that thought, who felt the sadder then
That only once, and not again, she might be seen of men;
Though constantly, by lawn and wood, and hanging mountain-side,
My restless eye might dare to hunt the huntress in her pride.
Without her all was lonely grown; I had no liking left
For fern or foxglove bloom, of her bright grace bereft.
And in that taking, in a bed of softest fern I lay,
And found no joy of woodcraft left, the livelong summer day;
When lo! at eve, a silvery horn, a questing hound, a cry,
And swift, Diana came again, and sat her down thereby;
And then I saw those radiant eyes were full of perfect rest,
And found beneath the goddess there the woman’s softer breast.
ERNEST RHYS.
WHEN SHE COMES HOME.
When she comes home again! A thousand ways
I fashion, to myself, the tenderness
Of my glad welcome. I shall tremble--yes;
And touch her, as when first in the old days
I touched her girlish hand, nor dared upraise
Mine eyes, such was my faint heart’s sweet distress.
Then silence, and the perfume of her dress:
The room will sway a little, and a haze
Cloy eyesight--soul-sight, even--for a space:
And tears--yes; and the ache here in the throat,
To know that I so ill deserve the place
Her arms make for me; and the sobbing note
I stay with kisses, ere the tearful face
Again is hidden in the old embrace.
JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY.
POPLAR LEAVES.
The wind blows down the dusty street;
And through my soul that grieves
It brings a sudden odour sweet,
A smell of poplar leaves.
O leaves that herald in the spring,
O freshness young and pure,
Into my weary soul you bring
The vigour to endure.
The wood is near but out of sight,
Where all the poplars grow;
Straight up and tall and silver white,
They quiver in a row.
My love is out of sight, but near;
And through my soul that grieves
A sudden memory wafts her here
As fresh as poplar leaves.
A. MARY F. ROBINSON.
AFTER DEATH.
The curtains were half drawn, the floor was swept
And strewn with rushes, rosemary and may
Lay thick upon the bed on which I lay,
Where through the lattice ivy-shadows crept.
He leaned above me, thinking that I slept
And could not hear him; but I heard him say,
“Poor child, poor child!” and as he turned away
Came a deep silence, and I knew he wept.
He did not touch the shroud, or raise the fold
That hid my face, or take my hand in his,
Or ruffle the smooth pillows for my head:
He did not love me living; but once dead
He pitied me; and very sweet it is
To know he still is warm, though I am cold.
CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI.
SOMEWHERE OR OTHER.
Somewhere or other there must surely be
The face not seen, the voice not heard,
The heart that not yet--never yet--ah me!
Made answer to my word.
Somewhere or other, may be near or far;
Past land and sea, clean out of sight;
Beyond the wandering moon, beyond the star
That tracks her night by night.
Somewhere or other, may be far or near;
With just a wall, a hedge between;
With just the last leaves of the dying year
Fallen on a turf grown green.
CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI.
FIRST LOVE REMEMBERED.
Peace in her chamber, wheresoe’er
It be, a holy place:
The thought still brings my soul such grace
As morning meadows wear.
Whether it still be small and light,
A maid’s who dreams alone,
As from her orchard-gate the moon
Its ceiling showed at night:
Or whether, in a shadow dense
As nuptial hymns invoke,
Innocent maidenhood awoke
To married innocence:
Then still the thanks unheard await
The unconscious gift bequeathed;
For there my soul this hour has breathed
An air inviolate.
DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI.
LOVE ENTHRONED.
I marked all kindred Powers the heart finds fair:--
Truth, with awed lips; and Hope, with eyes upcast;
And Fame, whose loud wings fan the ashen Past
To signal-fires, Oblivion’s flight to scare;
And Youth, with still some single golden hair
Unto his shoulder clinging, since the last
Embrace wherein two sweet arms held him fast;
And Life, still wreathing flowers for Death to wear.
Love’s throne was not with these; but far above
All passionate wind of welcome and farewell
He sat in breathless bowers they dream not of;
Though Truth foreknow Love’s heart, and Hope foretell,
And Fame be for Love’s sake desirable,
And Youth be dear, and Life be sweet to Love.
DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI.
SUDDEN LIGHT.
I have been here before,
But when or how I cannot tell:
I know the grass beyond the door,
The sweet keen smell,
The sighing sound, the lights around the shore.
You have been mine before,--
How long ago I may not know:
But just when at that swallow’s soar
Your neck turned so,
Some veil did fall,--I knew it all of yore.
Has this been thus before?
And shall not thus time’s eddying flight
Still with our lives our loves restore
In death’s despite,
And day and night yield one delight once more?
DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI.
A PERFECT DAY.
Bland air and leagues of immemorial blue;
No subtlest hint of whitening rime or cold;
A revel of rich colours, hue on hue,
From radiant crimson to soft shades of gold.
A vagueness in the undulant hill line,
The flutter of a bird’s south-soaring wing;
Æolian harmonies in groves of pine,
And glad brook laughter like the mirth of spring.
A sense of gracious calm afar and near,
And yet a something wanting,--one fine ray
For consummation. Love, were you but here,
Then were the day indeed a perfect day.
CLINTON SCOLLARD.
RUS IN URBE.
Poets are singing, the whole world over,
Of May in melody, joys for June;
Dusting their feet in the careless clover,
And filling their hearts with the blackbird’s tune.
The “brown bright nightingale” strikes with pity
The sensitive heart of a count or clown;
But where is the song for our leafy city,
And where the rhymes for our lovely town?
“Oh for the Thames and its rippling reaches,
Where almond rushes and breezes sport!
Take me a walk under Burnham Beeches;
Give me a dinner at Hampton Court!”
Poets, be still, though your hearts I harden;
We’ve flowers by day, and have scents at dark;
The limes are in leaf in the cockney garden,
And lilacs blossom in Regent’s Park.
“Come for a blow,” says a reckless fellow,
Burn’d red and brown by passionate sun;
“Come to the downs, where the gorse is yellow
The season of kisses has just begun!
Come to the fields where bluebells shiver,
Hear cuckoo’s carol, or plaint of dove:
Come for a row on the silent river;
Come to the meadows and learn to love!”
Yes, I will come when this wealth is over
Of softened colour and perfect tone:
The lilac’s better than fields of clover;
I’ll come when blossoming May has flown.
When dust and dirt of a trampled city
Have dragged the yellow laburnum down,
I’ll take my holiday,--more’s the pity,--
And turn my back upon London town.