Death

A gift of Silence, sweet!
Who may not ever hear:
To lay down at your unobservant feet,
Is all the gift I bear.

I have no songs to sing,
That you should heed or know:
I have no lilies, in full hands, to fling
Across the path you go.

I cast my flowers away,
Blossoms unmeet for you!
The garland I have gathered in my day:
My rosemary and rue.

I watch you pass and pass,
Serene and cold: I lay
My lips upon your trodden, daisied grass,
And turn my life away.

Yea, for I cast you, sweet!
This one gift, you shall take:
Like ointment, on your unobservant feet,
My silence, for your sake.

I.

Ye winds, ye unseen currents of the air,
Softly ye played a few brief hours ago;
Ye bore the murmuring bee; ye tossed the hair
O'er maiden cheeks, that took a fresher glow;
Ye rolled the round white cloud through depths of blue;
Ye shook from shaded flowers the lingering dew;
Before you the catalpa's blossoms flew,
Light blossoms, dropping on the grass like snow.


II.

How are ye changed! Ye take the cataract's sound;
Ye take the whirlpool's fury and its might;
The mountain shudders as ye sweep the ground;
The valley woods lie prone beneath your flight.
The clouds before you shoot like eagles past;
The homes of men are rocking in your blast;
Ye lift the roofs like autumn leaves, and cast,
Skyward, the whirling fragments out of sig...

Welcome, my old friend,
Welcome to a foreign fireside,
While the sullen gales of autumn
Shake the windows.

The ungrateful world
Has, it seems, dealt harshly with thee,
Since, beneath the skies of Denmark,
First I met thee.

There are marks of age,
There are thumb-marks on thy margin,
Made by hands that clasped thee rudely,
At the alehouse.

Soiled and dull thou art;
Yellow are thy time-worn pages,
As the russet, rain-molested
Leaves of autumn.

Thou art stained with wine
Scattered from hilarious goblets,
As the leaves with the libations
Of Olympus.

Yet dost thou recall
Days departed, half-forgotten,
When in dreamy youth I wandered
By the Baltic,--

When I paused to hear
The old ballad...

My father took me by the hand
And led me home again;
(He brought me in from sorrow
As you'd bring a child from rain).
The child's place at the hearth-stone,
The child's place at the board,
And the picture at the bed's head
Of wee ones wi' the Lord.

It's just a child come home he sees
To nestle at his arm;
(He brought me in from sorrow
As you'd bring a child from harm).
And of the two of us who sit
By hearth and candle-light,
There's just one hears a woman's heart
Break--breaking in the night.

The day is closing dark and cold,
With roaring blast and sleety showers;
And through the dusk the lilacs wear
The bloom of snow, instead of flowers.

I turn me from the gloom without,
To ponder o'er a tale of old;
A legend of the age of Faith,
By dreaming monk or abbess told.

On Tintoretto's canvas lives
That fancy of a loving heart,
In graceful lines and shapes of power,
And hues immortal as his art.

In Provence (so the story runs)
There lived a lord, to whom, as slave,
A peasant-boy of tender years
The chance of trade or conquest gave.

Forth-looking from the castle tower,
Beyond the hills with almonds dark,
The straining eye could scarce discern
The chapel of the good St. Mark.

And there, when bitter word or f...

The blackened walnut in its spicy hull
        Rots where it fell;
And, in the orchard, where the trees stand full,
        The pear's ripe bell
Drops; and the log-house in the bramble lane,
        From whose low door
Stretch yellowing acres of the corn and cane,
        He sees once more.

The cat-bird sings upon its porch of pine;
        And o'er its gate,
All slender-podded, twists the trumpet-vine,
        A leafy weight;
And in the woodland, by the spring, mayhap,
        With eyes of joy
Again he bends to set a rabbit-trap,
        A brown-faced boy.

Then, whistling, through the underbrush he goes,
        Out of the wood,
Where, with young cheeks, red as an Autumn rose,
        Beneath her hood,
His sweetheart wai...

It was the pleasant season yet,
When the stones at cottage doors
Dry quickly, while the roads are wet,
After the silver showers.

The green leaves they looked greener still,
And the thrush, renewing his tune,
Shook a loud note from his gladsome bill
Into the bright blue noon.

Robin Hood's mother looked out, and said
"It were a shame and a sin
For fear of getting a wet head
To keep such a day within,
Nor welcome up from his sick bed
Your uncle Gamelyn."

And Robin leaped, and thought so too;
And so he has grasped her gown,
And now looking back, they have lost the view
Of merry sweet Locksley town.

Robin was a gentle boy,
And therewithal as bold;
To say he was his mother's joy,
It were a phrase too cold.

...

"Lose and love" is love's first art;
So it was with thee and me,
For I first beheld thy heart
On the night I last saw thee.
Pine-woods and mysteries!
Sea-sands and sorrows!
Hearts fluttered by a breeze
That bodes dark morrows, morrows,--
Bodes dark morrows!

Moonlight in sweet overflow
Poured upon the earth and sea!
Lovelight with intenser glow
In the deeps of thee and me!
Clasped hands and silences!
Hearts faint and throbbing!
The weak wind sighing in the trees!
The strong surf sobbing, sobbing,--
The strong surf sobbing!

She was a Phantom of delight
When first she gleamed upon my sight;
A lovely Apparition, sent
To be a moment's ornament;
Her eyes as stars of Twilight fair;
Like Twilight's, too, her dusky hair;
But all things else about her drawn
From May-time and the cheerful Dawn;
A dancing Shape, an Image gay,
To haunt, to startle, and way-lay.
I saw her upon nearer view,
A Spirit, yet a Woman too!
Her household motions light and free,
And steps of virgin-liberty;
A countenance in which did meet
Sweet records, promises as sweet;
A Creature not too bright or good
For human nature's daily food;
For transient sorrows, simple wiles,
Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles.
And now I see with eye serene
The very pulse of the machine;
A Being ...

FROM ALCIPHRON AT ALEXANDRIA TO CLEON AT ATHENS.


Well may you wonder at my flight
    From those fair Gardens in whose bowers
Lingers whate'er of wise and bright,
Of Beauty's smile or Wisdom's light,
    Is left to grace this world of ours.
Well may my comrades as they roam
    On such sweet eyes as this inquire
Why I have left that happy home
    Where all is found that all desire,
    And Time hath wings that never tire:
Where bliss in all the countless shapes
    That Fancy's self to bliss hath given
Comes clustering round like roadside grapes
    That woo the traveller's lip at even;
Where Wisdom flings not joy away--
As Pallas in the stream they say
Once flung her flute--but smiling owns
That woman's lip can send forth tones
Wor...

I think we are too ready with complaint
In this fair world of God's. Had we no hope
Indeed beyond the zenith and the slope
Of yon gray blank of sky, we might grow faint
To muse upon eternity's constraint
Round our aspirant souls; but since the scope
Must widen early, is it well to droop,    
For a few days consumed in loss and taint?
O pusillanimous Heart, be comforted        
And, like a cheerful traveller, take the road
Singing beside the hedge. What if the bread
Be bitter in thine inn, and thou unshod
To meet the flints? At least it may be said
'Because the way is short, I thank thee, God.'

    O many-gulfed, unalterable one,
    Whose deep sustains
    Far-drifting world and sun,
    Thou wast ere ever star put out on thee;
    And thou shalt be
    When never world remains;
    When all the suns' triumphant strength and pride
    Is sunk in voidness absolute,
    And their majestic music wide
    In vaster silence rendered mute.
    And though God's will were night to dusk the blue,
    And law to cancel and disperse
    The tangled tissues of the universe,
    And mould the suns anew,
    His might were impotent to conquer thee,
    O invisible infinity!
    Thy darks subdue
    All light that treads thee down a space,
    Exulting o'er thy deeps.
    The cycles die, and lo! thy darkness reaps
    The flame of mightiest sta...

Happy the man, whose wish and care
A few paternal acres bound,
Content to breathe his native air,
In his own ground.

Whose heards with milk, whose fields with bread,
Whose flocks supply him with attire,
Whose trees in summer yield him shade,
In winter fire.

Blest! who can unconcern'dly find
Hours, days, and years slide soft away,
In health of body, peace of mind,
Quiet by day,

Sound sleep by night; study and ease
Together mix'd; sweet recreation,
And innocence, which most does please,
With meditation.

Thus let me live, unseen, unknown;
Thus unlamented let me dye;
Steal from the world, and not a stone
Tell where I lye.

Cease, daubers! profane not the theme, I implore ye!
But leave him, O leave him alone with his glory!

    *        *        *        *        *

Man's owl-eyed reason Popish Priests assert
Can't safely bear the gospel's heavenly light;
Therefore, with kindest zeal, they do their best
To keep their flocks in unillumined night.

    *        *        *        *        *

'The brokers of the Stock-Exchange
Are nicknamed bears and bulls; how strange!
What reason, Sir, to call them so?'
Ma'am, see their manners, you will know.

While the summer day is hot
You and I will loaf awhile,
Lolling in a leafy spot,
Lali of the cunning smile.

You and I have little care
How the “precious moments” pass
While we snuff the drowsy air
Rich in fragrance of the grass.

Stupid people boom or squeal
Lessons drawn from daily strife;
“Time,” they cry, “is on the wheel;
Death puts out the gas of life.

Imitate the prudent ant,
Labour like the busy bee.”
O the everlasting cant!
Loafing’s good for you and me.

Here we watch the ants that haul
Loads by weary jungle ways!
If they like it, let them crawl
Laden through the heavy blaze.

We’ve no time for moral tags;
We can hear a sleepy sound
With his yellow tucker-bags
Brother Bee is bumming round.<...

Hours continuing long, sore and heavy-hearted,
Hours of the dusk, when I withdraw to a lonesome and unfrequented spot, seating myself, leaning my face in my hands;
Hours sleepless, deep in the night, when I go forth, speeding swiftly the country roads, or through the city streets, or pacing miles and miles, stifling plaintive cries;
Hours discouraged, distracted--for the one I cannot content myself without, soon I saw him content himself without me;
Hours when I am forgotten, (O weeks and months are passing, but I believe I am never to forget!)
Sullen and suffering hours! (I am ashamed--but it is useless--I am what I am;)
Hours of my torment--I wonder if other men ever have the like, out of the like feelings?
Is there even one other like me--distracted--his friend, his lover, lost to him?
Is he too ...

(CLARISSA HARLOW)


Seek not to calm my grief,
    To stay the falling tear;
Have pity on me, ye my friends,
    The hand of God is here.

She was my only one,
    Oh, then my love how great!
Now she is gone, my heart and home
    Are empty desolate

I thought not, in my love
    That we were doomed to part,
Now I am childless, and my fate
    Falls heavy on my heart

O Thou who gave the gift,
    Who took the gift away,
Who only can heal up the wound,
    Give answer while I pray!

Do Thou send comfort down,
    All goodness as Thou art,
Even in Thy last passion, Thou
    Didst soothe a mother's heart.

I would not take her back,
    From Thee, from Heaven and bliss,
Though yearning for her...

Why was it that the thunder voice of Fate
Should call thee, studious, from the classic groves,
Where calm-eyed Pallas with still footstep roves,
And charge thee seek the turmoil of the state?
What bade thee hear the voice and rise elate,
Leave home and kindred and thy spicy loaves,
To lead th' unlettered and despised droves
To manhood's home and thunder at the gate?

Far better the slow blaze of Learning's light,
The cool and quiet of her dearer fane,
Than this hot terror of a hopeless fight,
This cold endurance of the final pain,--
Since thou and those who with thee died for right
Have died, the Present teaches, but in vain!