Betrayal

The willows stand by Fringford brook,
    From Fringford up to Hethe,
Sun on their cloudy silver heads,
    And shadow underneath.

They ripple to the silent airs
    That stir the lazy day,
Now whitened by their passing hands,
    Now turned again to grey.

The slim marsh-thistle's purple plume
    Droops tasselled on the stem,
The golden hawkweeds pierce like flame
    The grass that harbours them;

Long drowning tresses of the weeds
    Trail where the stream is slow,
The vapoured mauves of water-mint
    Melt in the pools below;

Serenely soft September sheds
    On earth her slumberous look,
The heartbreak of an anguished world
    Throbs not by Fringford brook.

All peace is here. Beyond our range,
    Ye...

I

The happiest day the happiest hour
My seared and blighted heart hath known,
The highest hope of pride and power,
I feel hath flown.


II

Of power! said I? Yes! such I ween
But they have vanished long, alas!
The visions of my youth have been
But let them pass.


III

And pride, what have I now with thee?
Another brow may ev'n inherit
The venom thou hast poured on me
Be still my spirit!


IV

The happiest day the happiest hour
Mine eyes shall see have ever seen
The brightest glance of pride and power
I feel have been:


V

But were that hope of pride and power
Now offered with the pain
Ev'n then I felt that brightest hour
I would not live again:

First in these fields I try the sylvan strains,
Nor blush to sport on Windsor's blissful plains:
Fair Thames, flow gently from thy sacred spring,
While on thy banks Sicilian Muses sing;
Let vernal airs tho' trembling osiers play,
And Albion's cliffs resound the rural lay.
You, that too wise for pride, too good for pow'r,
Enjoy the glory to be great no more,
And carrying with you all the world can boast,
To all the world illustriously are lost!
O let my Muse her slender reed inspire,
Till in your native shades you tune the lyre:
So when the Nightingale to rest removes,
The Thrush may chant to the forsaken groves,
But, charm'd to silence, listens while she sings,
And all th' aerial audience clap their wings.
Soon as the flocks shook off the nightly dews,
Tw...

I have come to bury Love
Beneath a tree,
In the forest tall and black
Where none can see.

I shall put no flowers at his head,
Nor stone at his feet,
For the mouth I loved so much
Was bittersweet.

I shall go no more to his grave,
For the woods are cold.
I shall gather as much of joy
As my hands can hold.

I shall stay all day in the sun
Where the wide winds blow,
But oh, I shall cry at night
When none will know.

    The Cry of the Little Peoples went up to God in vain;
    The Czech and the Pole, and the Finn, and the Schleswig Dane:

    We ask but a little portion of the green, ambitious earth;
    Only to sow and sing and reap in the land of our birth.

    We ask not coaling stations, nor ports in the China seas,
    We leave to the big child-nations such rivalries as these.

    We have learned the lesson of Time, and we know three things of worth;
    Only to sow and sing and reap in the land of our birth.

    O leave us little margins, waste ends of land and sea,
    A little grass, and a hill or two, and a shadowing tree;

    O leave us our little rivers that sweetly catch the sky,
    To drive our mills, and to carry our wood, and to ripple by.

 ...

I dreamed that I stood in a valley, and amid sighs,
For happy lovers passed two by two where I stood;
And I dreamed my lost love came stealthily out of the wood
With her cloud-pale eyelids falling on dream-dimmed eyes:
I cried in my dream ‘O women bid the young men lay
‘Their heads on your knees, and drown their eyes with your hair,
‘Or remembering hers they will find no other face fair
‘Till all the valleys of the world have been withered away.’

Heart, my heart, thou hast found thy home!
From gloom and sorrow thou hast come forth,
Thou who wast foolish, and sought to roam
'Neath the cruel stars of the frozen North.

Thou hast returned to thy dear delights;
The golden glow of the quivering days,
The silver silence of tropical nights,
No more to wander in alien ways.

Here, each star is a well-loved friend;
To me and my heart at the journey's end.

These are my people, and this my land,
I hear the pulse of her secret soul.
This is the life that I understand,
Savage and simple and sane and whole.

Washed in the light of a clear fierce sun, -
Heart, my heart, the journey is done.

See! the painted piece of the skies,
Where the rose-hued opal of sunset lies.
Hear the pass...

(For A Drawing By E. A. Abbey.)


How weary 'twas to wait! The year
Went dragging slowly on;
The red leaf to the running brook
Dropped sadly, and was gone;
December came, and locked in ice
The plashing of the mill;
The white snow filled the orchard up;
But she was waiting still.

Spring stirred and broke. The rooks once more
'Gan cawing in the loft;
The young lambs' new awakened cries
Came trembling from the croft;
The clumps of primrose filled again
The hollows by the way;
The pale wind-flowers blew; but she
Grew paler still than they.

How weary 'twas to wait! With June,
Through all the drowsy street,
Came distant murmurs of the war,
And rumours of the fleet;
The gossips, from the market-stalls,
Cried news of...

Quel che 'n Tessaglia ebbe le man sì pronte.

SOME HAVE WEPT FOR THEIR WORST ENEMIES, BUT LAURA DEIGNS HIM NOT A SINGLE TEAR.


    He who for empire at Pharsalia threw,
Reddening its beauteous plain with civil gore,
As Pompey's corse his conquering soldiers bore,
Wept when the well-known features met his view:
The shepherd youth, who fierce Goliath slew,
Had long rebellious children to deplore,
And bent, in generous grief, the brave Saul o'er
His shame and fall when proud Gilboa knew:
But you, whose cheek with pity never paled,
Who still have shields at hand to guard you well
Against Love's bow, which shoots its darts in vain,
Behold me by a thousand deaths assail'd,
And yet no tears of thine compassion tell,
But in those bright eyes anger an...

    "I would not have," he said,
"Tears, nor the black pall, nor the wormy grave,
Grief's hideous panoply I would not have
    Round me when I am dead.


    "Music and flowers and light,
And choric dances to guitar and flute,
Be these around me when my lips are mute,
    Mine eyes are sealed from sight.


    "So let me lie one day,
One long, eternal day, in sunshine bathed,
In cerements of silken tissue swathed,
    Smothered 'neath flowers of May.

    "One perfect day of peace,
Or ere clean flame consume my fleshly veil,
My life - a gilded vapor - shall exhale,
    Brief as a sigh - and cease.


    "But ere the torch be laid
To my unshrinking limbs by some true hand,
Athwart the orange-fragrant laughing land,

Love lit a beacon in thine eyes,
        And I out in the storm,
And lo! the night had taken wings;
        I dream me safe and warm.

Love lit a beacon in thine eyes,
        A wreckers’ light for me;
My heart is broken on the rocks;
        I perish in the sea.

Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.
-Solomon

What are life's joys and gains?
What pleasures crowd its ways,
That man should take such pains
To seek them all his days?
Sift this untoward strife
On which thy mind is bent:
See if this chaff of life
Is worth the trouble spent.

Is pride thy heart's desire?
Is power thy climbing aim?
Is love thy folly's fire?
Is wealth thy restless game?
Pride, power, love, wealth, and all
Time's touchstone shall destroy,
And, like base coin, prove all
Vain substitutes for joy.

Dost think that pride exalts
Thyself in other's eyes,
And hides thy folly's faults,
Which reason will despise?
Dost strut, and turn, and stride,
Like walking weathercocks?
The shadow by thy side
Be...

I have been across the bridges of the years.
    Wet with tears
Were the ties on which I trod, going back
    Down the track
To the valley where I left, 'neath skies of Truth,
    My lost youth.

As I went, I dropped my burdens, one and all -
    Let them fall;
All my sorrows, all my wrinkles, all my care,
    My white hair,
I laid down, like some lone pilgrim's heavy pack,
    By the track.

As I neared the happy valley with light feet,
    My heart beat
To the rhythm of a song I used to know
    Long ago,
And my spirits gushed and bubbled like a fountain
    Down a mountain.

On the border of that valley I found you,
    Tried and true;
And we wandered through the golden Summer-Land
    Hand in hand.
And my pulses...

("Sur une barricade.")

[June, 1871.]


Like Casabianca on the devastated deck,
In years yet younger, but the selfsame core.
Beside the battered barricado's restless wreck,
A lad stood splashed with gouts of guilty gore,
But gemmed with purest blood of patriot more.

Upon his fragile form the troopers' bloody grip
Was deeply dug, while sharply challenged they:
"Were you one of this currish crew?" - pride pursed his lip,
As firm as bandog's, brought the bull to bay -
While answered he: "I fought with others. Yea!"

"Prepare then to be shot! Go join that death-doomed row."
As paced he pertly past, a volley rang -
And as he fell in line, mock mercies once more flow
Of man's lead-lightning's sudden scathing pang,
But to his home-tur...

While fauour fed my hope, delight with hope was brought,
Thought waited on delight, and speech did follow thought;
Then grew my tongue and pen records vnto thy glory,
I thought all words were lost that were not spent of thee,
I thought each place was darke but where thy lights would be,
And all eares worse than deaf that heard not out thy storie.

I said thou wert most faire, and so indeed thou art;
I said thou wert most sweet, sweet poison to my heart;
I said my soule was thine, O that I then had lyed;
I said thine eyes were starres, thy breast the milken way,
Thy fingers Cupids shafts, thy voyce the angels lay:
And all I said so well, as no man it denied.

But now that hope is lost, vnkindnesse kils delight;
Yet thought and speech do liue, though metamorphos'd qu...

        You will forget me. The years are so tender,
    They bind up the wounds which we think are so deep;
        This dream of our youth will fade out as the splendor
    Fades from the skies when the sun sinks to sleep;
        The cloud of forgetfulness, over and over
    Will banish the last rosy colors away,
        And the fingers of time will weave garlands to cover
    The scar which you think is a life-mark to-day.

        You will forget me. The one boon you covet
    Now above all things will soon seem no prize;
        And the heart, which you hold not in keeping to prove it
    True or untrue, will lose worth in your eyes.
        The one drop to-day, that you deem only wanting
    To fill your life-cup to the brim, soon will seem
        But a val...

Nature, thou accept the song,
To thee the simple lines belong,
Inspir'd as brushing hill and dell
I stroll'd the way to Holywell.
Though 'neath young April's watery sky,
The sun gleam'd warm, and roads were dry;
And though the valleys, bush, and tree
Still naked stood, yet on the lea
A flush of green, and fresh'ning glow
In melting patches 'gan to show
That swelling buds would soon again
In summer's livery bless the plain.
The thrushes too 'gan clear their throats,
And got by heart some two 'r three notes
Of their intended summer-song,
To cheer me as I stroll'd along.
The wild heath triumph'd in its scenes
Of goss and ling's perpetual greens;
And just to say that spring was come,
The violet left its woodland home,
And, hermit-like, from sto...

I' vo pensando, e nel pensier m' assale.

SELF-CONFLICT.


    Ceaseless I think, and in each wasting thought
So strong a pity for myself appears,
That often it has brought
My harass'd heart to new yet natural tears;
Seeing each day my end of life draw nigh,
Instant in prayer, I ask of God the wings
With which the spirit springs,
Freed from its mortal coil, to bliss on high;
But nothing, to this hour, prayer, tear, or sigh,
Whatever man could do, my hopes sustain:
And so indeed in justice should it be;
Able to stay, who went and fell, that he
Should prostrate, in his own despite, remain.
But, lo! the tender arms
In which I trust are open to me still,
Though fears my bosom fill
Of others' fate, and my own heart alarms,
Which...