Death

Good Muse, rock me asleep
    With some sweet harmony:
The weary eye is not to keep
    Thy wary company.

Sweet Love, begone awhile,
    Thou knowest my heaviness:
Beauty is born but to beguile
    My heart of happiness.

See how my little flock,
    That loved to feed on high,
Do headlong tumble down the rock,
    And in the valley die.

The bushes and the trees
    That were so fresh and green,
Do all their dainty colour leese,
    And not a leaf is seen.

The blackbird and the thrush,
    That made the woods to ring,
With all the rest, are now at hush,
    And not a note they sing.

Sweet Philomel, the bird
    That hath the heavenly throat,
Doth now alas! not once afford
    Recording of a note.<...

A stranger, schooled to gentle arts,
He stept before the curious throng;
His path into our waiting hearts
Already paved by song.

Full well we knew his choristers,
Whose plaintive voices haunt our rest,
Those sable-vested harbingers
Of melancholy guest.

We smiled on him for love of these,
With eyes that swift grew dim to scan
Beneath the veil of courteous ease
The faith-forsaken man.

To his wan gaze the weary shows
And fashions of our vain estate,
Our shallow pain and false repose,
Our barren love and hate,

Are shadows in a land of graves,
Where creeds, the bubbles of a dream,
Flash each and fade, like melting waves
Upon a moonlight stream.

Yet loyal to his own despair,
Erect beneath a darkened sky,
He...

I am pale with sick desire,
For my heart is far away
From this world's fitful fire
And this world's waning day;
In a dream it overleaps
A world of tedious ills
To where the sunshine sleeps
On the everlasting hills. -
Say the Saints: There Angels ease us
Glorified and white.
They say: We rest in Jesus,
Where is not day or night.

My soul saith: I have sought
For a home that is not gained,
I have spent yet nothing bought,
Have laboured but not attained;
My pride strove to mount and grow,
And hath but dwindled down;
My love sought love, and lo!
Hath not attained its crown. -
Say the Saints: Fresh souls increase us,
None languish or recede.
They say: We love our Jesus,
And He loves us indeed.

I cannot rise above,<...

All over the earth like a mantle,
    Golden, and green, and grey,
Crimson, and scarlet, and yellow,
    The Autumn foliage lay; -
The sun of the Indian Summer
    Laughed at the bare old trees
As they shook their leafless branches
    In the soft October breeze.

Gorgeous was every hill-side,
    And gorgeous every nook,
And the dry, old log was gorgeous,
    Spanning the little brook;
Its holiday robes, the forest
    Had suddenly cast to earth,
And, as yet, seemed scarce to miss, them,
    In its plenitude of mirth.

I walked where the leaves the softest,
    The brightest, and goldenest lay,
And I thought of a forest hill-side,
    And an Indian Summer day, -
Of an eager, little child-face
    O'er the fallen leaves that ...

What hast thou not withstood,
    Tempest-despising tree,
Whose bloat and riven wood
    Gapes now so hollowly,
What rains have beaten thee through many years,
What snows from off thy branches dripped like tears?

Calmly thou standest now
    Upon thy sunny mound;
The first spring breezes flow
    Past with sweet dizzy sound;
Yet on thy pollard top the branches few
Stand stiffly out, disdain to murmur too.

The children at thy foot
    Open new-lighted eyes,
Where, on gnarled bark and root,
    The soft warm sunshine lies -
Dost thou, upon thine ancient sides, resent
The touch of youth, quick and impermanent?

These at the beck of spring
    Live in the moment still:
Thy boughs unquivering,
    Remembering winter's chill...

From a Picture


The sun has gone down, spreading wide on
The sky-line one ray of red fire;
Prepare the soft cushions of Sidon,
Make ready the rich loom of Tyre.
The day, with its toil and its sorrow,
Its shade, and its sunshine, at length
Has ended; dost fear for the morrow,
Strong man, in the pride of thy strength?

Like fire-flies, heavenward clinging,
They multiply, star upon star;
And the breeze a low murmur is bringing
From the tents of my people afar.
Nay, frown not, I am but a Pagan,
Yet little for these things I care;
’Tis the hymn to our deity Dagon
That comes with the pleasant night air.

It shall not disturb thee, nor can it;
See, closed are the curtains, the lights
Gleam down on the cloven pomegranate,

Running water has a charm all its own; it proffers companionship of which one never tires; it adapts itself to moods; it is the guardian of secrets. It has cool draughts for the thirsty soul as well as for drooping flowers; and they who wander in the garden of God with listening ears learn of its many voices.

When the strain of a working day has left me weary, perhaps troubled and perplexed, I find my way to the river. I step into a boat and pull up stream until the exertion has refreshed me; and then I make fast to the old alder-stump where last year the reed- piper nested, and lie back in the stern and think.

The water laps against the keel as the boat rocks gently in the current; the river flows past, strong and quiet. There are side eddies, of course, and little disturbing whirlpools near the big stones, but they...

I. M. - Margaret Emma Henley (1888-1894)



When you wake in your crib,
You, an inch of experience -
Vaulted about
With the wonder of darkness;
Wailing and striving
To reach from your feebleness
Something you feel
Will be good to and cherish you,
Something you know
And can rest upon blindly:
O, then a hand
(Your mother's, your mother's!)
By the fall of its fingers
All knowledge, all power to you,
Out of the dreary,
Discouraging strangenesses
Comes to and masters you,
Takes you, and lovingly
Woos you and soothes you
Back, as you cling to it,
Back to some comforting
Corner of sleep.

So you wake in your bed,
Having lived, having loved;
But the shadows are there,
And the world and its kingdoms<...

To Jenny came a gentle youth
From inland leazes lone,
His love was fresh as apple-blooth
By Parrett, Yeo, or Tone.
And duly he entreated her
To be his tender minister,
And call him aye her own.

Fair Jenny's life had hardly been
A life of modesty;
At Casterbridge experience keen
Of many loves had she
From scarcely sixteen years above;
Among them sundry troopers of
The King's-Own Cavalry.

But each with charger, sword, and gun,
Had bluffed the Biscay wave;
And Jenny prized her gentle one
For all the love he gave.
She vowed to be, if they were wed,
His honest wife in heart and head
From bride-ale hour to grave.

Wedded they were. Her husband's trust
In Jenny knew no bound,
And Jenny kept her pure and just,
T...

About the time of Michael's feast
And all his angels,
There comes a word to man and beast
By dark evangels.

Then hearing what the wild things say
To one another,
Those creatures first born of our gray
Mysterious Mother,

The greatness of the world's unrest
Steals through our pulses;
Our own life takes a meaning guessed
From the torn dulse's.

The draft and set of deep sea-tides
Swirling and flowing,
Bears every filmy flake that rides,
Grandly unknowing.

The sunlight listens; thin and fine
The crickets whistle;
And floating midges fill the shine
Like a seeding thistle.

The hawkbit flies his golden flag
From rocky pasture,
Bidding his legions never lag
Through morning's vasture.

Soon we sh...

The great roads are all grown over
    That seemed so firm and white.
The deep black forests have covered them.
    How should I walk aright?
How should I thread these tangled mazes,
    Or grope to that far off light?
I stumble round the thickets, and they turn me
    Back to the thickets and the night.

Yet, sometimes, at a word, an elfin pass-word,
    (O, thin, deep, sweet with beaded rain!)
There shines, through a mist of ragged-robins,
    The old lost April-coloured lane,
That leads me from myself; for, at a whisper,
    Where the strong limbs thrust in vain,
At a breath, if my heart help another heart,
    The path shines out for me again.

A thin thread, a rambling lane for lovers
    To the light of the world's one May,
Where the ...

The leafless trees, the untidy stack
    Last rainy summer raised in haste,
Watch the sky turn from fair to black
    And watch the river fill and waste;

But never a footstep comes to trouble
    The sea-gulls in the new-sown corn,
Or pigeons rising from late stubble
    And flashing lighter as they turn.

Or if a footstep comes, 'tis mine
    Sharp on the road or soft on grass:
Silence divides along my line
    And shuts behind me as I pass.

No other comes, no labourer
    To cut his shaggy truss of hay,
Along the road no traveller,
    Day after day, day after day.

And even I, when I come here,
    Move softly on, subdued and still,
Lonely as death, though I can hear
    Men shouting on the other hill.

Day aft...

When cold in the earth lies the friend thou hast loved,
    Be his faults and his follies forgot by thee then;
Or, if from their slumber the veil be removed,
    Weep o'er them in silence, and close it again.
And oh! if 'tis pain to remember how far
    From the pathways of light he was tempted to roam,
Be it bliss to remember that thou wert the star
    That arose on his darkness and guided him home.

From thee and thy innocent beauty first came
    The revealings, that taught him true love to adore,
To feel the bright presence, and turn him with shame
    From the idols he blindly had knelt to before.
O'er the waves of a life, long benighted and wild,
    Thou camest, like a soft golden calm o'er the sea;
And if happiness purely and glowingly smiled
    On h...

JULY 28, 1728

Sure never did man see
A wretch like poor Nancy,
So teazed day and night
By a Dean and a Knight.
To punish my sins,
Sir Arthur begins,
And gives me a wipe,
With Skinny and Snipe:[2],
His malice is plain,
Hallooing the Dean.

The Dean never stops,
When he opens his chops;
I'm quite overrun
With rebus and pun.
    Before he came here,
To spunge for good cheer,
I sat with delight,
From morning till night,
With two bony thumbs
Could rub my old gums,
Or scratching my nose
And jogging my toes;
But at present, forsooth,
I must not rub a tooth.
When my elbows he sees
Held up by my knees,
My arms, like two props,
Supporting my chops,
And just as I handle 'em
Moving all like a...

If grief for grief can touch thee,
If answering woe for woe,
If any truth can melt thee
Come to me now!

I cannot be more lonely,
More drear I cannot be!
My worn heart beats so wildly
'Twill break for thee.

And when the world despises,
When Heaven repels my prayer,
Will not mine angel comfort?
Mine idol hear?

Yes, by the tears I'm poured,
By all my hours of pain
O I shall surely win thee,
Beloved, again!

I cannot tell what change hath come to you
To vex your splendid hair. I only know
One grief. The passion left betwixt us two,
Like some forsaken watchfire, burneth low.
’Tis sad to turn and find it dying so,
Without a hope of resurrection! Yet,
O radiant face that found me tired and lone!
I shall not for the dear, dead past forget
The sweetest looks of all the summers gone.
Ah! time hath made familiar wild regret;
For now the leaves are white in last year’s bowers,
And now doth sob along the ruined leas
The homeless storm from saddened southern seas,
While March sits weeping over withered flowers.

Lonely wonder, delight past hoping!
Sky-line broken by stirring trees,
Grey rocks hither and shoreward sloping,
Silent bracken about my knees.

Dusky scrub where the sunlight splashes,
Glimmer of waters barely seen
Here the hope that was dust and ashes
Leaps and flashes in flames of green.

Through the boughs that are still before me,
Misty blue of the harbour hills;
Mighty Spirit of Earth who bore me,
Here the peace of thy love distils.

Fools have harried me; hell has driven,
Bidding me toil for its fading shows:
Back I spring to your arms, forgiven,
Back to the truth that a dreamer knows.

Gold and glory and fleeting pleasure
Pass in dust or as melting cloud:
You can dower with eternal treasure
Heart uplifted and head unbo...

Forbear to ask Me, why I weep;
Vext Cloe to her Shepherd said:
'Tis for my Two poor stragling Sheep
Perhaps, or for my Squirrel dead.
For mind I what You late have writ?
Your subtle Questions, and Replies;
Emblems, to teach a Female Wit
The Ways, where changing Cupid flies.
Your Riddle, purpos'd to rehearse
The general Pow'r that Beauty has:
But why did no peculiar Verse
Describe one Charm of Cloe's Face?
The Glass, which was at Venus' Shrine,
With such Mysterious Sorrow laid:
The Garland (and You call it Mine)
Which show'd how Youth and Beauty fade.
Ten thousand Trifles light as These
Nor can my Rage, nor Anger move:
She shou'd be humble, who wou'd please:
And She must suffer, who can love.
When in My Glass I chanc'd to look;
Of Venus...