Courage

DEATH:
For my dagger is bathed in the blood of the brave,
I come, care-worn tenant of life, from the grave,
Where Innocence sleeps 'neath the peace-giving sod,
And the good cease to tremble at Tyranny's nod;
I offer a calm habitation to thee, -
Say, victim of grief, wilt thou slumber with me?
My mansion is damp, cold silence is there,
But it lulls in oblivion the fiends of despair;
Not a groan of regret, not a sigh, not a breath,
Dares dispute with grim Silence the empire of Death.
I offer a calm habitation to thee, -
Say, victim of grief, wilt thou slumber with me?

MORTAL:
Mine eyelids are heavy; my soul seeks repose,
It longs in thy cells to embosom its woes,
It longs in thy cells to deposit its load,
Where no longer the scorpions of Perfidy goad,...

I would I could weave in
    The colour, the wonder,
The song I conceive in
    My heart while I ponder,

And show how it came like
    The magi of old
Whose chant was a flame like
    The dawn's voice of gold;

Who dreams followed near them
    A murmur of birds,
And ear still could hear them
    Unchanted in words.

In words I can only
    Reveal thee my heart,
Oh, Light of the Lonely,
    The shining impart.

Between the twilight and the dark
The lights danced up before my eyes:
I found no sleep or peace or rest,
But dreams of stars and burning skies.

I knew the faces of the day--
Dream faces, pale, with cloudy hair,
I know you not nor yet your home,
The Fount of Shadowy Beauty, where?

...

Yes, 'tis the pulse of life! my fears were vain!
I wake, I breathe, and am myself again.
Still in this nether world; no seraph yet!
Nor walks my spirit, when the sun is set,
With troubled step to haunt the fatal board,
Where I died last--by poison or the sword;
Blanching each honest cheek with deeds of night,
Done here so oft by dim and doubtful light.
    --To drop all metaphor, that little bell
Call'd back reality, and broke the spell.
No heroine claims your tears with tragic tone;
A very woman--scarce restrains her own!
Can she, with fiction, charm the cheated mind,
When to be grateful is the part assign'd?
Ah, No! she scorns the trappings of her Art;
No theme but truth, no prompter but the heart!
    But, Ladies, say, must I alone unmask?
Is here no o...

The Lawns were dry in Euston Park;
(Here Truth    [1] inspires my Tale)
The lonely footpath, still and dark,
Led over Hill and Dale.

[Footnote 1: This Ballad is founded on a fact. The circumstance occurred perhaps long before I was born: but is still related by my Mother, and some of the oldest inhabitants in that part of the country. R.B.]

Benighted was an ancient Dame,
And fearful haste she made
To gain the vale of Fakenham,
And hail its Willow shade.

Her footsteps knew no idle stops,
But follow'd faster still;
And echo'd to the darksome Copse
That whisper'd on the Hill;

Where clam'rous Rooks, yet scarcely hush'd,
Bespoke a peopled shade;
And many a wing the foliage brush'd,
And hov'ring circuits made.

The dappled herd of g...

Dearest, best and brightest,
Come away,
To the woods and to the fields!
Dearer than this fairest day
Which, like thee to those in sorrow,
Comes to bid a sweet good-morrow
To the rough Year just awake
In its cradle in the brake.
The eldest of the Hours of Spring,
Into the Winter wandering,
Looks upon the leafless wood,
And the banks all bare and rude;
Found, it seems, this halcyon Morn
In February's bosom born,
Bending from Heaven, in azure mirth,
Kissed the cold forehead of the Earth,
And smiled upon the silent sea,
And bade the frozen streams be free;
And waked to music all the fountains,
And breathed upon the rigid mountains,
And made the wintry world appear
Like one on whom thou smilest, Dear.

Radiant Sister of the Day,

        Oh, you who read some song that I have sung,
        What know you of the soul from whence it sprung?

        Dost dream the poet ever speaks aloud
        His secret thought unto the listening crowd?

        Go take the murmuring sea-shell from the shore:
        You have its shape, its color and no more.

        It tells not one of those vast mysteries
        That lie beneath the surface of the seas.

        Our songs are shells, cast out by-waves of thought;
        Here, take them at your pleasure; but think not

        You've seen beneath the surface of the waves,
        Where lie our shipwrecks and our coral caves.

With lyre Orphean, see a Bard explore
    The central caverns of the mornless Night,
    Where never Muse perform'd harmonious rite
    Till now! - and lo! upon the sparry floor,
Advance, to welcome him, each Sister Power,
    Petra, stern Queen, Fossilia, cold and bright,
    And call their Gnomes, to marshal in his sight
    The gelid incrust, and the veined ore,
And flashing gem. - Then, while his songs pourtray
    The mystic virtues gold and gems acquire,
    With every charm that mineral scenes display,
Th' imperial Sisters praise the daring Lyre,
    And grateful hail its new and powerful lay,
    That seats them high amid the Muses' Choir.

1: Petra, and Fossilia, are Personifications of the first and last division of the Fossil Kingdom. The Author of this ...

When in the even ways of life
    The old world jogs along,
Our little coloured flags we flaunt:
Our little separate selves we vaunt:
    Each pipes his native song.
And jealousy and greed and pride
    Join their ungodly hands,
And this round lovely world divide
    Into opposing lands.

But let some crucial hour of pain
    Sound from the tower of time,
Then consciousness of brotherhood
Wakes in each heart the latent good,
    And men become sublime.
As swarming insects of the night,
    Fly when the sun bursts in,
Self fades, before love's radiant light,
    And all the world is kin.

God, what a place this earth would be
    If that uplifting thought,
Born of some vast world accident,
Into our daily lives were blent,

Beautiful Mother, I have toiled all day;
        And I am wearied. And the day is done.
        Now, while the wild brooks run
Soft by the furrows--fading, gold to gray,
    Their laughters turned to musing--ah, let me
    Hide here my face at thine unheeding knee,
        Beautiful Mother; if I be thy son.

The birds fly low. Gulls, starlings, hoverers,
        Along the meadows and the paling foam,
        All wings of thine that roam
Fly down, fly down. One reedy murmur blurs
    The silence of the earth; and from the warm
    Face of the field the upward savors swarm
        Into the darkness. And the herds are home.

All they are stalled and folded for their rest,
        The creatures: cloud-fleece young that leap and veer;
        Mad-mane and...

Stay, bold Adventurer; rest awhile thy limbs
On this commodious Seat! for much remains
Of hard ascent before thou reach the top
Of this huge Eminence, from blackness named,
And, to far-travelled storms of sea and land,
A favourite spot of tournament and war!
But thee may no such boisterous visitants
Molest; may gentle breezes fan thy brow;
And neither cloud conceal, nor misty air
Bedim, the grand terraqueous spectacle,
From centre to circumference, unveiled!
Know, if thou grudge not to prolong thy rest,
That on the summit whither thou art bound,
A geographic Labourer pitched his tent,
With books supplied and instruments of art,
To measure height and distance; lonely task,
Week after week pursued! To him was given
Full many a glimpse (but sparingly bestowe...

The Fear Of Death.


Thou! whose superior, and aspiring mind
Can leave the weakness of thy sex behind;
Above its follies, and its fears can rise,
Quit the low earth, and gain the distant skies:
Whom strength of soul and innocence have taught
To think of death, nor shudder at the thought;
Say! whence the dread, that can alike engage
Vain thoughtless youth, and deep-reflecting age;
Can shake the feeble, and appal the strong;
Say! whence the terrors, that to death belong?
Guilt must be fearful: but the guiltless too
Start from the grave, and tremble at the view.
The blood-stained pirate, who in neighbouring climes,
Might fear, lest justice should o'ertake his crimes,
Wisely may bear the sea's tempestuous roar,
And rather wait the storm, than make the sh...

(Ode to Lycoris. May 1817)

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 an...

Ha! snow
Upon the crags!
How slow
The winter lags
Ha, little lamb upon the crags,
How fearlessly you go!
Take care
Up there,
You little woolly atom! On and on
He goes . . . ‘tis steep . . . Hillo!
My friend is gone,
Friend orthodoxo-logical,
He could not argue with a waterfall!
And here it is, my Aber . . . Stay!
I’ll cross
This way:
The moss
Upon these stones is dripping with the spray,
And now one turn, left hand,
And I shall stand
Before the very rock: not yet . . . not yet!
O let me think ! No, no ! I don’t forget
(Forget!) but this is sacred . . . peace, then, peace!
Release
From all dead things, that serve not to present
At my soul’s grate the lovely innocent.
He had heard some idle talk
Of how his f...

PETER RONSARD loquitur.


“Heigho!” yawned one day King Francis,
“Distance all value enhances!
“When a man’s busy, why, leisure
“Strikes him as wonderful pleasure,
“’Faith, and at leisure once is he?
“Straightway he wants to be busy.
“Here we’ve got peace; and aghast I’m
“Caught thinking war the true pastime!
“Is there a reason in metre?
“Give us your speech, master Peter!”
I who, if mortal dare say so,
Ne’er am at loss with my Naso,
“Sire,” I replied, “joys prove cloudlets:
“Men are the merest Ixions”,
Here the King whistled aloud, “Let’s
“ . . Heigho . . go look at our lions!”
Such are the sorrowful chances
If you talk fine to King Francis.

And so, to the courtyard proceeding,
Our company, Francis was leading,
...

I


Morn's mystic rose is reddening on the hills,
Dawn's irised nautilus makes glad the sea;
There is a lyre of flame that throbs and fills
Far heaven and earth with hope's wild ecstasy.--
With lilied field and grove,
Haunts of the turtle-dove,
Here is the land of Love.


II


The chariot of the noon makes blind the blue
As towards the goal his burning axle glares;
There is a fiery trumpet thrilling through
Wide heaven and earth with deeds of one who dares.--
With peaks of splendid name,
Wrapped round with astral flame,
Here is the land of Fame.


III


The purple priesthood of the evening waits
With golden pomp within the templed skies;
There is a harp of worship at the gates
Of heaven and ...

Your own fair youth, you care so little for it,
    Smiling towards Heaven, you would not stay the advances
    Of time and change upon your happiest fancies.
I keep your golden hour, and will restore it.

If ever, in time to come, you would explore it--
    Your old self whose thoughts went like last year's pansies,
    Look unto me; no mirror keeps its glances;
In my unfailing praises now I store it.

To keep all joys of yours from Time's estranging,
    I shall be then a treasury where your gay,
            Happy, and pensive past for ever is.

I shall be then a garden charmed from changing,
    In which your June has never passed away.
            Walk there awhile among my memories.

I've watched too late; the morn is near;
One look at God's broad silent sky!
Oh, hopes and wishes vainly dear,
How in your very strength ye die!

Even while your glow is on the cheek,
And scarce the high pursuit begun,
The heart grows faint, the hand grows weak,
The task of life is left undone.

See where upon the horizon's brim,
Lies the still cloud in gloomy bars;
The waning moon, all pale and dim,
Goes up amid the eternal stars.

Late, in a flood of tender light,
She floated through the ethereal blue,
A softer sun, that shone all night
Upon the gathering beads of dew.

And still thou wanest, pallid moon!
The encroaching shadow grows apace;
Heaven's everlasting watchers soon
Shall see thee blotted from thy place.

I

Between two sister moorland rills
There is a spot that seems to lie
Sacred to flowerets of the hills,
And sacred to the sky.
And in this smooth and open dell
There is a tempest-stricken tree;
A corner-stone by lightning cut,
The last stone of a lonely hut;
And in this dell you see
A thing no storm can e'er destroy,
The shadow of a Danish Boy.

II

In clouds above, the lark is heard,
But drops not here to earth for rest;
Within this lonesome nook the bird
Did never build her nest.
No beast, no bird hath here his home;
Bees, wafted on the breezy air,
Pass high above those fragrant bells
To other flowers:to other dells
Their burthens do they bear;
The Danish Boy walks here alone:
The lovely dell is all his own....