Betrayal

My wife is dead and I am free!
And I can guzzle all I want.
When I came home without a cent
Her crying knifed the heart in me.

I am as happy as a king;
The air is pure, the sky divine...
We had such sky another time
When first our love was blossoming!

The awful thirst I feel today
Would need, to get it rightly slaked,
All of the wine that it would take
To fill her tomb; - a lot to say:

I threw her in a well, and then
I even pitched some heavy stones
Out of the well-curb on her bones.
0, I'll forget her, if I can!

Naming those vows of tenderness
From which no power can set us free,
To reconcile us, as when we
Loved with a drunken happiness,

One night, along a road I named,
I begged her for a rendezvous.

How like a hooded friar, bent and grey,
Whose pensive lips speak only when they pray
Doth sad November pass upon his way.

Through forest aisles while the wind chanteth low -
In God's cathedral where the great trees grow,
Now all day long he paceth to and fro.

When shadows gather and the night-mists rise,
Up to the hills he lifts his sombre eyes
To where the last red rose of sunset lies.

A little smile he weareth, wise and cold,
The smile of one to whom all things are old,
And life is weary, as a tale twice told.

"Come see," he seems to say - "where joy has fled -
The leaves that burned but yesterday so red
Have turned to ashes - and the flowers are dead.

"The summer's green and gold hath taken flight,
October days have gone. Now b...

Tune - "Deil tak the wars."



I.

    Mark yonder pomp of costly fashion
        Round the wealthy, titled bride:
    But when compar'd with real passion,
        Poor is all that princely pride.
            What are the showy treasures?
            What are the noisy pleasures?
    The gay gaudy glare of vanity and art:
            The polish'd jewel's blaze
            May draw the wond'ring gaze,
            And courtly grandeur bright
            The fancy may delight,
    But never, never can come near the heart.

II.

    But did you see my dearest Chloris
        In simplicity's array;
    Lovely as yonder sweet opening flower is,
        Shrinking from the gaze of day;
            O then the heart al...

Past life, past tears, far past the grave,
    The tryst is set for me,
Since, for our all, your all you gave
    On the slopes of Picardy.

On Angus, in the autumn nights,
    The ice-green light shall lie,
Beyond the trees the Northern Lights
    Slant on the belts of sky.

But miles on miles from Scottish soil
    You sleep, past war and scaith,
Your country's freedman, loosed from toil,
    In honour and in faith.

For Angus held you in her spell,
    Her Grampians, faint and blue,
Her ways, the speech you knew so well,
    Were half the world to you.

Yet rest, my son; our souls are those
    Nor time nor death can part,
And lie you proudly, folded close
    To France's deathless heart.

To-night the west o'er-brims with warmest dyes;
Its chalice overflows
With pools of purple colouring the skies,
Aflood with gold and rose;
And some hot soul seems throbbing close to mine,
As sinks the sun within that world of wine.

I seem to hear a bar of music float
And swoon into the west;
My ear can scarcely catch the whispered note,
But something in my breast
Blends with that strain, till both accord in one,
As cloud and colour blend at set of sun.

And twilight comes with grey and restful eyes,
As ashes follow flame.
But O! I heard a voice from those rich skies
Call tenderly my name;
It was as if some priestly fingers stole
In benedictions o'er my lonely soul.

I know not why, but all my being longed
And leapt at that sweet ...

O weep not, love! each tear that springs
In those dear eyes of thine,
To me a keener suffering brings
Than if they flowed from mine.

And do not droop! however drear
The fate awaiting thee.
For my sake, combat pain and care,
And cherish life for me!

I do not fear thy love will fail,
Thy faith is true I know;
But O! my love! thy strength is frail
For such a life of woe.

Were't not for this, I well could trace
(Though banished long from thee)
Life's rugged path, and boldly face
The storms that threaten me.

Fear not for me, I've steeled my mind
Sorrow and strife to greet,
Joy with my love I leave behind,
Care with my friends I meet.

A mother's sad reproachful eye,
A father's scowling brow,
But he may frow...

Is it so, that the sword is broken,
Our sword, that was halfway drawn?
Is it so, that the light was a spark,
That the bird we hailed as the lark
Sang in her sleep in the dark,
And the song we took for a token
Bore false witness of dawn?

Spread in the sight of the lion,
Surely, we said, is the net
Spread but in vain, and the snare
Vain; for the light is aware,
And the common, the chainless air,
Of his coming whom all we cry on;
Surely in vain is it set.

Surely the day is on our side,
And heaven, and the sacred sun;
Surely the stars, and the bright
Immemorial inscrutable night:
Yea, the darkness, because of our light,
Is no darkness, but blooms as a bower-side
When the winter is over and done;

Blooms underfoot with youn...

In the wet dusk silver-sweet,
Down the violet scented ways,
As I moved with quiet feet
I was met by mighty days.

On the hedge the hanging dew
Glassed the eve and stars and skies;
While I gazed a madness grew
Into thundered battle cries.

Where the hawthorn glimmered white,
Flashed the spear and fell the stroke--
Ah, what faces pale and bright
Where the dazzling battle broke!

There a hero-hearted queen
With young beauty lit the van.
Gone! the darkness flowed between
All the ancient wars of man.

While I paced the valley's gloom
Where the rabbits pattered near,
Shone a temple and a tomb
With the legend carven clear:

'Time put by a myriad fates
That her day might dawn in glory.
Death made wide a million ga...

She bewitched me in my childhood,
And the witch's charm is hidden -
Far beyond the wicked wildwood
I shall find it, I am bidden.

She commands me, she who bound me
With soft sorcery to follow;
In a golden snare who wound me
To her bosom's snowy hollow....

Comes a night-dark stallion sired
Of the wind; a mare his mother
Whom Thessalian madness fired,
And the hurricane his brother.

Then my soul delays no longer:
Though the night around is scowling,
Keenly mount him blacker, stronger
Than the tempest that is howling.

At our ears wild shadows whistle;
Brazen forks the lightning o'er us
Flames; and huge the thunder's missile
Bursts behind us, drags before us.

Over fire-scorched fields of stubble;
Iron forests da...

I.

One is a slow and melancholy maid;
I know riot if she cometh from the skies
Or from the sleepy gulfs, but she will rise
Often before me in the twilight shade,
Holding a bunch of poppies and a blade
Of springing wheat: prostrate my body lies
Before her on the turf, the while she ties
A fillet of the weed about my head;
And in the gaps of sleep I seem to hear
A gentle rustle like the stir of corn,
And words like odours thronging to my ear:
"Lie still, beloved--still until the morn;
Lie still with me upon this rolling sphere--
Still till the judgment; thou art faint and worn."

II.

The other meets me in the public throng;
Her hair streams backward from her loose attire;
She hath a trumpet and an eye of fire;
She points me downwa...

It fell upon a summer night
The village folk were soundly sleeping,
Unconscious of the glamour white
In which the moon all things was steeping;
One window only showed a light;
Behind it, silent vigil keeping,
Sat Margaret, as one in trance,
The dark-eyed daughter of the Manse.

A flood of strange, sweet thoughts was surging
Her passionate heart and brain within.
At last, some secret impulse urging,
She laid aside her garment thin,
And from its snowy folds emerging,
Like Lamia from the serpent-skin,
She stood before her mirror bright
Naked, and lovely as the night.

Her dark hair o’er her shoulders flowing
Might well have been a silken pall
O’er Galatea’s image glowing
To life and love: she was withal
The lamplight o’er her radianc...

Is not Loue here, as 'tis in other Clymes,
And diff'reth it, as doe the seu'rall Nations?
Or hath it lost the Vertue, with the Times,
Or in this land alt'reth with the Fashions?
Or haue our Passions lesser pow'r then theirs,
Who had lesse Art them liuely to expresse?
Is Nature growne lesse pow'rfull in their Heires,
Or in our Fathers did the more transgresse?
I am sure my Sighes come from a Heart as true,
As any Mans, that Memory can boast,
And my Respects and Seruices to you
Equall with his, that loues his Mistris most:
    Or Nature must be partiall in my Cause,
    Or onely you doe violate her Lawes.

Enough of climbing toil! Ambition treads
Here, as 'mid busier scenes, ground steep and rough,
Or slippery even to peril! and each step,
As we for most uncertain recompence
Mount toward the empire of the fickle clouds,
Each weary step, dwarfing the world below,
Induces, for its old familiar sights,
Unacceptable feelings of contempt,
With wonder mixed that Man could e'er be tied,
In anxious bondage, to such nice array
And formal fellowship of petty things!
Oh! 'tis the 'heart' that magnifies this life,
Making a truth and beauty of her own;
And moss-grown alleys, circumscribing shades,
And gurgling rills, assist her in the work
More efficaciously than realms outspread,
As in a map, before the adventurer's gaze
Ocean and Earth contending for regard.
The ...

I saw sweet Poetry turn troubled eyes
On shaggy Science nosing in the grass,
For by that way poor Poetry must pass
On her long pilgrimage to Paradise.
He snuffled, grunted, squealed; perplexed by flies,
Parched, weatherworn, and near of sight, alas,
From peering close where very little was
In dens secluded from the open skies.

But Poetry in bravery went down,
And called his name, soft, clear, and fearlessly;
Stooped low, and stroked his muzzle overgrown;
Refreshed his drought with dew; wiped pure and free
His eyes: and lo! laughed loud for joy to see
In those grey deeps the azure of her own.

Earnest, earthless, equal, attuneable, | vaulty, voluminous, . . stupendous
Evening strains to be tíme's vást, | womb-of-all, home-of-all, hearse-of-all night.
Her fond yellow hornlight wound to the west, | her wild hollow hoarlight hung to the height
Waste; her earliest stars, earl-stars, | stárs principal, overbend us,
Fíre-féaturing heaven. For earth | her being has unbound, her dapple is at an end, as- tray or aswarm, all throughther, in throngs; | self ín self steepèd and pashed - qúite
Disremembering, dísmembering | àll now. Heart, you round me right
With: Óur évening is over us; óur night | whélms, whélms, ánd will end us.
Only the beak-leaved boughs dragonish | damask the tool-smooth bleak light; black,
Ever so black on it. Óur tale, óur oracle! | Lét life, wáned, ah lét life wind
Off h...

Liete e pensose, accompagnate e sole.

NOT FINDING HER WITH HER FRIENDS, HE ASKS THEM WHY SHE IS ABSENT.


P.    Pensive and glad, accompanied, alone,
        Ladies who cheat the time with converse gay,
        Where does my life, where does my death delay?
        Why not with you her form, as usual, shown?
L. Glad are we her rare lustre to have known,
        And sad from her dear company to stay,
        Which jealousy and envy keep away
        O'er other's bliss, as their own ill who moan.
P. Who lovers can restrain, or give them law?
L. No one the soul, harshness and rage the frame;
        As erst in us, this now in her appears.
        As oft the face, betrays the heart, we saw
        Clouds that, obscuring her...

Heart! my heart! what means this feeling?

What oppresseth thee so sore?
What strange life is o'er me stealing!

I acknowledge thee no more.
Fled is all that gave thee gladness,
Fled the cause of all thy sadness,

Fled thy peace, thine industry

Ah, why suffer it to be?

Say, do beauty's graces youthful,

Does this form so fair and bright,
Does this gaze, so kind, so truthful,

Chain thee with unceasing might?
Would I tear me from her boldly,
Courage take, and fly her coldly,

Back to her. I'm forthwith led

By the path I seek to tread.


By a thread I ne'er can sever,

For 'tis 'twined with magic skill,
Doth the cruel maid for ever

Hold me fast against my will.
While those m...

In broad daylight, and at noon,
Yesterday I saw the moon
Sailing high, but faint and white,
As a school-boy's paper kite.

In broad daylight, yesterday,
I read a Poet's mystic lay;
And it seemed to me at most
As a phantom, or a ghost.

But at length the feverish day
Like a passion died away,
And the night, serene and still,
Fell on village, vale, and hill.

Then the moon, in all her pride,
Like a spirit glorified,
Filled and overflowed the night
With revelations of her light.

And the Poet's song again
Passed like music through my brain;
Night interpreted to me
All its grace and mystery.