Betrayal

Brown foundling of the Western wood,
Babe of primeval wildernesses!
Long on my table thou hast stood
Encounters strange and rude caresses;
Perchance contented with thy lot,
Surroundings new, and curious faces,
As though ten centuries were not
Imprisoned in thy shining cases.

Thou bring’st me back the halcyon days
Of grateful rest, the week of leisure,
The journey lapped in autumn haze,
The sweet fatigue that seemed a pleasure,
The morning ride, the noonday halt,
The blazing slopes, the red dust rising,
And then the dim, brown, columned vault,
With its cool, damp, sepulchral spicing.

Once more I see the rocking masts
That scrape the sky, their only tenant
The jay-bird, that in frolic casts
From some high yard his broad blue pennant.

Not that I love thy children, whose dull eyes
See nothing save their own unlovely woe,
Whose minds know nothing, nothing care to know,
But that the roar of thy Democracies,
Thy reigns of Terror, thy great Anarchies,
Mirror my wildest passions like the sea
And give my rage a brother ! Liberty!
For this sake only do thy dissonant cries
Delight my discreet soul, else might all kings
By bloody knout or treacherous cannonades
Rob nations of their rights inviolate
And I remain unmoved and yet, and yet,
These Christs that die upon the barricades,
God knows it I am with them, in some things.

I have dreamed sweet dreams of a summer night,
When the moon was walking in cloudless light,
And my soul to the regions of Fancy sprung,
While the spirits of air their soft anthems sung,
Strains wafted down from those heavenly spheres
Which may not be warbled in waking ears;
More sweet than the voice of waters flowing,
Than the breeze over beds of violets blowing,
When it stirs the pines, and sultry day
Fans himself cool with their tremulous play.
On the sleeper's ear those rich notes stealing,
Speak of purer and holier feeling
Than man in his pilgrimage here below,
In the bondage of sin, can ever know.

    I heard in my slumbers the ceaseless roar
Of the sparkling waves, as they met the shore,
Till lulled by the surge of the moon-lit deep,
By the h...

Nay, not to-night; - the slow, sad rain is falling
Sorrowful tears, beneath a grieving sky,
Far off a famished jackal, faintly calling,
Renders the dusk more lonely with its cry.

The mighty river rushes, sobbing, seawards,
The shadows shelter faint mysterious fears,
I turn mine eyes for consolation theewards,
And find thy lashes tremulous with tears.

If some new soul, asearch for incarnation,
Should, through our kisses, enter Life again,
It would inherit all our desolation,
All the soft sorrow of the slanting rain.

When thou desirest Love's supreme surrender,
Come while the morning revels in the light,
Bulbuls around us, passionately tender,
Singing among the roses red and white.

Thus, if it be my sweet and sacred duty,
Subservient...

You thought I was that type:
That you could forget me,
And that I'd plead and weep
And throw myself under the hooves of a bay mare,

Or that I'd ask the sorcerers
For some magic potion made from roots and send you a terrible gift:
My precious perfumed handkerchief.

Damn you! I will not grant your cursed soul
Vicarious tears or a single glance.

And I swear to you by the garden of the angels,
I swear by the miracle-working icon,
And by the fire and smoke of our nights:
I will never come back to you.

Did then the bold Slave rear at last the Sword
    Of Vengeance? drench'd he deep its thirsty blade
In the cold bosom of his tyrant lord?
    Oh! who shall blame him? thro' the midnight shade
Still o'er his tortur'd memory rush'd the thought
    Of every past delight; his native grove,
    Friendship's best joys, and Liberty and Love,
All lost for ever! then Remembrance wrought
His soul to madness; round his restless bed
    Freedom's pale spectre stalk'd, with a stern smile
    Pointing the wounds of slavery, the while
She shook her chains and hung her sullen head:
No more on Heaven he calls with fruitless breath,
But sweetens with revenge, the draught of death.

Lo, I the man that whilom lov'd and lost,
Not dreading loss, do sing again of love;
And like a man but lately tempest-toss'd,
Try if my stars still inauspicious prove:
Not to make good that poets never can
Long time without a chosen mistress be,
Do I sing thus; or my affections ran
Within the maze of mutability;
What last I lov'd was beauty of the mind,
And that lodg'd in a temple truly fair,
Which ruin'd now by death, if I can find
The saint that liv'd therein some otherwhere,
I may adore it there, and love the cell
For entertaining what I lov'd so well.

        The ordered intermingling
            of the real and the dream,--
        The mill above the river,
            and the mist above the stream;
        The life of ceaseless labor,
            brave with song and cheery call--
        The radiant skies of evening,
            with its rainbow o'er us all.


        AN OLD SWEETHEART OF MINE!--Is this
            her presence here with me,
        Or but a vain creation of
            a lover's memory?

        A fair, illusive vision
            that would vanish into air
        Dared I even touch the silence
            with the whisper of a prayer?

        Nay, let me then believe in all
            the blended false a...

        I.

With bloodshot eyes the morning rose
Upon a world of gloom and tears;
A kindred glance queen Isoud shows -
Come night, come morn, cease not her fears.
The fog-clouds whiten all the vale,
The sunlight draws them to its love;
The diamond dews wash ev'ry dale,
Where bays the hunt within the grove.
Her lute - the one her touch he taught
To wake beneath the stars a song
Of swan-caught music - is as naught
And on yon damask lounge is flung.
Down o'er her cheeks her hair she draws
In golden rays 'twixt lily tips,
And gazes sad on gloomy shaws
'Neath which had often touched their lips.


        II.

With irised eyes, from morn to noon.
And noon to middle night she stoops
From her high lattice 'neath the moon,
H...

Stay yet awhile, oh flowers!--oh wandering grasses,
    And creeping ferns, and climbing, clinging vines;--
Bend down and cover with lush odorous masses
        My darling's couch, where he in sleep reclines.

Stay yet awhile;--let not the chill October
    Plant spires of glinting frost about his bed;
Nor shower her faded leaves, so brown and sober,
    Among the tuberoses above his head.

I would have all things fair, and sweet, and tender,--
    The daisy's pearl, the cowslip's shield of snow,
And fragrant hyacinths in purple splendour,
    About my darling's grassy couch to grow.

Oh birds!--small pilgrims of the summer weather,
    Come hither, for my darling loved ye well;--
Here floats the thistle down for you to gather,
    And bearded grasse...

To die be given us, or attain!
Fierce work it were, to do again.
So pilgrims, bound for Mecca, pray’d
At burning noon: so warriors said,
Scarf’d with the cross, who watch’d the miles
Of dust that wreath’d their struggling files
Down Lydian mountains: so, when snows
Round Alpine summits eddying rose,
The Goth, bound Rome-wards: so the Hun,
Crouch’d on his saddle, when the sun
Went lurid down o’er flooded plains
Through which the groaning Danube strains
To the drear Euxine: so pray all,
Whom labours, self-ordain’d, enthrall;
Because they to themselves propose
On this side the all-common close
A goal which, gain’d, may give repose.
So pray they: and to stand again
Where they stood once, to them were pain;
Pain to thread back and to renew
Past ...

I thought that silence would be best,
But I a call have heard,
And, Victor, after all the rest,
I well might say a word:
The day and work is nearly done,
And ours the victory,
And we are resting, one by one,
In graveyards by the sea.

But then you talked of other nights,
When, gay from dusk to dawn,
You wasted hours with other lights
That went where you have gone.
You spoke not of the fair and “fast”,
But of the pure and true,
“Sweet ugly women of the past”
Who stood so well by you.

You made a jest on that last night,
I met it with a laugh:
You wondered which of us should write
The other’s epitaph.
We filled the glasses to the brim,
“The land’s own wine” you know,
And solemnly we drank to him
Who should be first to...

Perch' io t' abbia guardato di menzogna.

IN HER PRESENCE HE CAN NEITHER SPEAK, WEEP, NOR SIGH.


    Although from falsehood I did thee restrain
With all my power, and paid thee honour due,
Ungrateful tongue; yet never did accrue
Honour from thee, but shame, and fierce disdain:
Most art thou cold, when most I want the strain
Thy aid should lend while I for pity sue;
And all thy utterance is imperfect too,
When thou dost speak, and as the dreamer's vain.
Ye too, sad tears, throughout each lingering night
Upon me wait, when I alone would stay;
But, needed by my peace, you take your flight:
And, all so prompt anguish and grief t' impart,
Ye sighs, then slow, and broken breathe your way:
My looks alone truly reveal my heart.

NOTT.

The Princess sings:

I am the princess up in the tower
And I dream the whole day thro'
Of a knight who shall come with a silver spear
And a waving plume of blue.

I am the princess up in the tower,
And I dream my dreams by day,
But sometimes I wake, and my eyes are wet,
When the dusk is deep and gray.

For the peasant lovers go by beneath,
I hear them laugh and kiss,
And I forget my day-dream knight,
And long for a love like this.

II

The Minstrel sings:

I lie beside the princess' tower,
So close she cannot see my face,
And watch her dreaming all day long,
And bending with a lily's grace.

Her cheeks are paler than the moon
That sails along a sunny sky,
And yet her silent mouth is red
Where ten...

Though the winds be dank,
And the sky be sober,
And the grieving Day
In a mantle gray
Hath let her waiting maiden robe her,--
All the fields along
I can hear the song
Of the meadow lark,
As she flits and flutters,
And laughs at the thunder when it mutters.
O happy bird, of heart most gay
To sing when skies are gray!

When the clouds are full,
And the tempest master
Lets the loud winds sweep
From his bosom deep
Like heralds of some dire disaster,
Then the heart alone
To itself makes moan;
And the songs come slow,
While the tears fall fleeter,
And silence than song by far seems sweeter.
Oh, few are they along the way
Who sing when skies are gray!

In golden youth when seems the earth
A Summer-land of singing mirth,
When souls are glad and hearts are light,
And not a shadow lurks in sight,
We do not know it, but there lieu
Somewhere veiled under evening skies
A garden which we all must see -
The garden of Gethsemane.

With joyous steps we go our ways,
Love lends a halo to our days;
Light sorrows sail like clouds afar,
We laugh, and say how strong we are.
We hurry on; and hurrying, go
Close to the borderland of woe
That waits for you, and waits for me -
Forever waits Gethsemane.

Down shadowy lanes, across strange streams,
Bridged over by our broken dreams;
Behind the misty caps of years,
Beyond the great salt fount of tears,
The garden lies.    Strive as you may,
You ca...

The curtain rose, the play began,
The limelight on the gay garbs shone;
Yet carelessly I gazed upon
The painted players, maid and man,
As one with idle eyes who sees
The marble figures on a frieze.

Long lark-notes clear the first act close,
So the soprano: then a hush,
The tenor, tender as a thrush;
Then loud and high the chorus rose,
Till, with a sudden rush and strong,
It ended in a storm of song.

The curtain fell, the music died,
The lights grew bright, revealing there
The flash of jewelled fingers fair,
And wreaths of pearls on brows of pride;
Then, with a quick-flushed cheek, I turned,
And into mine her dark eyes burned.

Such eyes but once a man may see,
And, seeing once, his fancy dies
To thought of any other eyes:

    When in the Thracian dust uprooted lay,
    In ruin vast, the strength of Italy,
    And Fate had doomed Hesperia's valleys green,
    And Tiber's shores,
    The trampling of barbarian steeds to feel,
    And from the leafless groves,
    On which the Northern Bear looks down,
    Had called the Gothic hordes,
    That Rome's proud walls might fall before their swords;
    Exhausted, wet with brothers' blood,
    Alone sat Brutus, in the dismal night;
    Resolved on death, the gods implacable
    Of heaven and hell he chides,
    And smites the listless, drowsy air
    With his fierce cries of anger and despair.

    "O foolish virtue, empty mists,
    The realms of shadows, are thy schools,
    And at thy heels repentance follows fast.
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