Betrayal

Eternal Spirit of the chainless Mind![1]
Brightest in dungeons, Liberty! thou art:
For there thy habitation is the heart -
The heart which love of thee alone can bind;
And when thy sons to fetters are consigned -
To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom,
Their country conquers with their martyrdom,
And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind.
Chillon! thy prison is a holy place,
And thy sad floor an altar - for 'twas trod,
Until his very steps have left a trace
Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod,
By Bonnivard! - May none those marks efface!
For they appeal from tyranny to God.[2]

    I reached the highest place in Spoon River,
    But through what bitterness of spirit!
    The face of my father, sitting speechless,
    Child-like, watching his canaries,
    And looking at the court-house window
    Of the county judge's room,
    And his admonitions to me to seek
    My own in life, and punish Spoon River
    To avenge the wrong the people did him,
    Filled me with furious energy
    To seek for wealth and seek for power.
    But what did he do but send me along
    The path that leads to the grove of the Furies?
    I followed the path and I tell you this:
    On the way to the grove you'll pass the Fates,
    Shadow-eyed, bent over their weaving.
    Stop for a moment, and if you see
    The thread of revenge leap out of the s...

Love, indeed thy strength is mighty
Thus, alone, such strife to bear,
Three 'gainst one, and never ceasing,
Death, and Madness, and Despair!

'Tis not my own strength has saved me;
Health, and hope, and fortitude,
But for love, had long since failed me;
Heart and soul had sunk subdued.

Often, in my wild impatience,
I have lost my trust in Heaven,
And my soul has tossed and struggled,
Like a vessel tempest-driven;

But the voice of my beloved
In my ear has seemed to say,
'O, be patient if thou lov'st me!'
And the storm has passed away.

When outworn with weary thinking,
Sight and thought were waxing dim,
And my mind began to wander,
And my brain began to swim,

Then those hands outstretched to save me
Seemed to...

The Clock! a sinister, impassive god
Whose threatening finger says to us: 'Remember!
Soon in your anguished heart, as in a target,
Quivering shafts of Grief will plant themselves;

Vaporous Joy glides over the horizon
The way a sylphid flits into the wings;
Each instant eats a piece of the delight
A man is granted for his earthly season.

Three thousand and six hundred times an hour
The Second sighs, Remember! Suddenly
That droning insect Now says: I am Past
And I have sucked your life into my nostril!

Esto memor! Remember! Souviens-toi!
(My metal throat speaks out in a every language)
Don't let the minutes, prodigal, be wasted
They are the ore you must refine for gold!

Remember, Time is greedy at the game
And wins on every roll! per...

The Text is that obtained in 1800 by Alexander Fraser Tytler from Mrs. Brown of Falkland, and by him committed to writing. The first ten and the last two stanzas show corruption, but the rest of the ballad is in the best style.

The Story emphasises the necessity of asking the consent of a brother to the marriage of his sister, and therefore the title The Cruel Brother is a misnomer. In ballad-times, the brother would have been well within his rights; it was rather a fatal oversight of the bridegroom that caused the tragedy.

Danish and German ballads echo the story, though in the commonest German ballad, Graf Friedrich, the bride receives an accidental wound, and that from the bridegroom's own hand.

The testament of the bride, by which she benefits her friends and leaves curses on her e...

Dishevelled leaves creep down
Upon that bank to-day,
Some green, some yellow, and some pale brown;
The wet bents bob and sway;
The once warm slippery turf is sodden
Where we laughingly sat or lay.

The summerhouse is gone,
Leaving a weedy space;
The bushes that veiled it once have grown
Gaunt trees that interlace,
Through whose lank limbs I see too clearly
The nakedness of the place.

And where were hills of blue,
Blind drifts of vapour blow,
And the names of former dwellers few,
If any, people know,
And instead of a voice that called, "Come in, Dears,"
Time calls, "Pass below!"

By the trim taper, and the blazing hearth,
(While loud without the blast of winter sung),
Now thrill'd with awe, and now relax'd with mirth,
Paris, I've roam'd thy varied haunts among,
Loitering where Fashion's insect myriads spread
Their painted wings, and sport their little day;
Anon, by beckoning recollection led
To the dark shadow of the stern ABBAYE,
Pale Fancy heard the petrifying shriek
Of midnight Murder from its turrets bleak,
And to her horrent eye came passing on
Phantoms of those dark times, elapsed and gone,
When Rapine yell'd o'er his defenceless prey,
As unchain'd Anarchy her tocsin rung,
And France! in dust and blood thy throne and altars lay!

Oh! thou, thus skill'd with absolute controul,
Where'er thou wilt to lead th' admiring soul,

Sometimes, to solace my sad heart, I say,
Though late it be, though lily-time be past,
Though all the summer skies be overcast,
Haply I will go down to her, some day,
And cast my rests of life before her feet,
That she may have her will of me, being so sweet
And none gainsay!

So might she look on me with pitying eyes,
And lay calm hands of healing on my head:
"Because of thy long pains be comforted;
For I, even I, am Love: sad soul, arise!"
So, for her graciousness, I might at last
Gaze on the very face of Love, and hold Him fast
In no disguise.

Haply, I said, she will take pity on me,
Though late I come, long after lily-time,
With burden of waste days and drifted rhyme:
Her kind, calm eyes, down drooping maidenly,
Shall change, gr...

If thou survive my well-contented day,
When that churl Death my bones with dust shall cover
And shalt by fortune once more re-survey
These poor rude lines of thy deceased lover,
Compare them with the bett’ring of the time,
And though they be outstripp’d by every pen,
Reserve them for my love, not for their rhyme,
Exceeded by the height of happier men.
O! then vouchsafe me but this loving thought:
‘Had my friend’s Muse grown with this growing age,
A dearer birth than this his love had brought,
To march in ranks of better equipage:
But since he died and poets better prove,
Theirs for their style I’ll read, his for his love’.

Now while so many turn with love and longing
To wan lands lying in the grey North Sea,
To thee we turn, hearts, mem’ries, all belonging,
Dear land of ours, to thee.

West, ever west, with the strong sunshine marching
Beyond the mountains, far from this soft coast,
Until we almost see the great plains arching,
In endless mirage lost.

A land of camps where seldom is sojourning,
Where men like the dim fathers of our race
Halt for a time, and next day, unreturning,
Fare ever on apace.

Last night how many a leaping blaze affrighted
The wailing birds of passage in their file:
And dawn sees ashes dead and embers whited
Where men had dwelt awhile.

The sun may burn, the mirage shift and vanish
And fade and glare by turns along the sky;
...

Here's never a bough to be tossed in the breeze,
For it’s long since the forest was green;
And round all the trunks of the naked white trees
The marks of the death-ring are seen.
The solemn-faced bear, who had looked on the blacks
From his home with the ’possum and cat,
Blinked anxiously down when the death-dealing axe
Was ring-barking Skeleton Flat.

And, strange to be seen in the evergreen south,
The gums for ten summers have stood,
And dried in the terrible furnace of drouth,
Till harder than flint is the wood.
Now tall grows the grass at the roots of the trees,
But a beautiful forest it cost;
And the heart of the splitter is sad when he sees
And thinks of the timber that’s lost.

Here flies, through a sky that is glazed, the black crow,
And ...

O Love Divine, that stooped to share
Our sharpest pang, our bitterest tear,
On Thee we cast each earth-born care,
We smile at pain while Thou art near!

Though long the weary way we tread,
And sorrow crown each lingering year,
No path we shun, no darkness dread,
Our hearts still whispering, Thou art near!

When drooping pleasure turns to grief,
And trembling faith is changed to fear,
The murmuring wind, the quivering leaf,
Shall softly tell us, Thou art near!

On Thee we fling our burdening woe,
O Love Divine, forever dear,
Content to suffer while we know,
Living and dying, Thou art near!

Bowed as an elm under the weight of its beauty,
So earth is bowed, under her weight of splendor,
Molten sea, richness of leaves and the burnished
Bronze of sea-grasses.
Clefts in the cliff shelter the purple sand-peas
And chicory flowers bluer than the ocean
Flinging its foam high, white fire in sunshine,
Jewels of water.
Joyous thunder of blown waves on the ledges,
Make me forget war and the dark war-sorrow
Against the sky a sentry paces the sea-cliff
Slim in his khaki.

In samite sark yclad was she;
And that fair glimmerish band of gold
Which crowned long, savage locks of hair
    In the moon brent cold.

She with big eyeballs gloomed and glowered,
And lightly hummed some Elfin's song,
And one could naught save on her stare
    And fare along.

Yea; sad and lute-like was that song
And softly said its mystery;
Which quaintly sang in elden verse
    "Thy love I'll be."

And oft it said: "I love thee true,
Sir Ewain, champion of the fair."
And never wist he what a witch
    Was that one there.

And never wist he that a witch
Had bound him with her wily hair,
Eke with dark art had ta'en his heart
    To slay him there.

And all his soul did wax amort
To stars, to hills, to slades,...

What is a poet's love? -
To write a girl a sonnet,
To get a ring, or some such thing,
And fustianize upon it.

What is a poet's fame? -
Sad hints about his reason,
And sadder praise from garreteers,
To be returned in season.

Where go the poet's lines? -
Answer, ye evening tapers!
Ye auburn locks, ye golden curls,
Speak from your folded papers!

Child of the ploughshare, smile;
Boy of the counter, grieve not,
Though muses round thy trundle-bed
Their broidered tissue weave not.

The poet's future holds
No civic wreath above him;
Nor slated roof, nor varnished chaise,
Nor wife nor child to love him.

Maid of the village inn,
Who workest woe on satin,
(The grass in black, the graves in green,
The epitaph...

O absent presence! Stella is not here;
False-flatt'ring hope, that with so faire a face
Bare me in hand, that in this orphane place,
Stella, I say my Stella, should appeare:
What saist thou now? where is that dainty cheere
Thou toldst mine eyes should helpe their famisht case?
But thou art gone, now that selfe-felt disgrace
Doth make me most to wish thy comfort neer.
But heere I do store of faire ladies meet,
Who may with charme of conuersation sweete,
Make in my heauy mould new thoughts to grow.
Sure they preuaile as much with me, as he
That bad his friend, but then new maim'd to be
Mery with him, and so forget his woe.

Not all thy flushing suns are set,
Herrick, as yet;
Nor doth this far-drawn hemisphere
Frown and look sullen ev'rywhere.
Days may conclude in nights, and suns may rest
As dead within the west;
Yet, the next morn, regild the fragrant east.

Alas ! for me, that I have lost
E'en all almost;
Sunk is my sight, set is my sun,
And all the loom of life undone:
The staff, the elm, the prop, the shelt'ring wall
Whereon my vine did crawl,
Now, now blown down; needs must the old stock fall.

Yet, Porter, while thou keep'st alive,
In death I thrive:
And like a phoenix re-aspire
From out my nard and fun'ral fire;
And as I prune my feathered youth, so I
Do mar'l how I could die
When I had thee, my chief preserver, by.

I'm up, I'm up, ...

I thought of your beauty, and this arrow,
Made out of a wild thought, is in my marrow.
There's no man may look upon her, no man,
As when newly grown to be a woman,
Tall and noble but with face and bosom
Delicate in colour as apple blossom.
This beauty's kinder, yet for a reason
I could weep that the old is out of season.