Death

Only half an hour or so
    Before nurse calls them to bed,
And the ruddy light of a cheerful fire
    Shines over each curly head.

No trouble have they, no sorrow -
    Their hearts are lighter than air,
No fear that a dark to-morrow
    May bring with it want or care.

God send them each on their pathway
    Many a wayside flower;
And grant, in the evening of lifetime,
    The joy of the evening hour.

Stiff scholars and the hody amorous
Will in their ripeness equally admire
Powerful, gende cats, pride of the house,
Who, like them, love to sit around the fire.

Friends both of sciences and of l'amour,
They seek the silent horror of the night;
Erebus wants them for his funeral corps,
But in their pride they'd never choose that fate.

They take in sleeping noble attitudes
Great sphinxes in the desert solitudes,
Who seem to be entranced by endless dreams;

Within their potent loins are magic sparks,
And flakes of gold, fine sand, are vaguely seen
Behind their mystic eyes, gleaming like stars.

Come hither, lads, and hearken, for a tale there is to tell,
Of the wonderful days a-coming, when all shall be better than well.

And the tale shall be told of a country, a land in the midst of the sea,
And folk shall call it England in the days that are going to be.

There more than one in a thousand in the days that are yet to come
Shall have some hope of the morrow, some joy of the ancient home.

For then--laugh not, but listen to this strange tale of mine -
All folk that are in England shall be better lodged than swine.

Then a man shall work and bethink him, and rejoice in the deeds of his hand,
Nor yet come home in the even too faint and weary to stand.

Men in that time a-coming shall work and have no fear
For to-morrow's lack of earning and the hunger-...

From other men he stands apart,
    Wrapped in sublimity of thought
    Where futile fancies enter not;
    With starlike purpose pressing on
    Where Agassiz and Audubon
Labored, and sped that noble art
    Yet in its pristine dawn.

Something to conquer, to achieve,
    Makes life well worth the struggle hard;
    Its petty ills to disregard,
    In high endeavor day by day
    With this incentive - that he may
Somehow mankind the richer leave
    When he has passed away.

Forest and field he treads alone,
    Finding companionship in birds,
    In reptiles, rodents, yea, in herds
    Of drowsy cattle fat and sleek;
    For these to him a language speak
To common multitudes unknown
    As tones of classic Greek.

Unth...

Say, Delia, why, in muslin shade,
Ah! say, dost thou conceal those eyes?
Such little stars were never made,
I'm sure, to shine thro' misty skies.

Say, are they wrapt in so much shade,
That they may more successful rise,
Starting from such soft ambuscade,
To catch and kill us by surprise?

Or, of their various pow'rs afraid,
Is it in mercy to our sighs,
Lest love, o'er many a heart betray'd,
Should sob "a faithful vot'ry dies"?

Then, oh! remove the envious shade;
Let others wear, who want, disguise:
We all had sooner die, sweet maid,
To see, than live without, those eyes.

My familiar ghost again
Comes to see what he can see,
Critic, son of Conscious Brain,
Spying on our privacy.

Slam the window, bolt the door,
Yet he'll enter in and stay;
In tomorrow's book he'll score
Indiscretions of today.

Whispered love and muttered fears,
How their echoes fly about!
None escape his watchful ears,
Every sigh might be a shout.

No kind words nor angry cries
Turn away this grim spoilsport;
No fine lady's pleading eyes,
Neither love, nor hate, nor ... port.

Critics wears no smile of fun,
Speaks no word of blame nor praise,
Counts our kisses one by one,
Notes each gesture, every phrase.

My familiar ghost again
Stands or squats where suits him best;
Critic, son of Conscious Brain,
L...

By his evening fire the artist
    Pondered o'er his secret shame;
Baffled, weary, and disheartened,
    Still he mused, and dreamed of fame.

'T was an image of the Virgin
    That had tasked his utmost skill;
But, alas! his fair ideal
    Vanished and escaped him still.

From a distant Eastern island
    Had the precious wood been brought
Day and night the anxious master
    At his toil untiring wrought;

Till, discouraged and desponding,
    Sat he now in shadows deep,
And the day's humiliation
    Found oblivion in sleep.

Then a voice cried, "Rise, O master!
    From the burning brand of oak
Shape the thought that stirs within thee!"
    And the startled artist woke,--

Woke, and from the smoking embers
  ...

AS I walk these broad, majestic days of peace,
(For the war, the struggle of blood finish'd, wherein, O terrific Ideal!
Against vast odds, having gloriously won,
Now thou stridest on--yet perhaps in time toward denser wars,
Perhaps to engage in time in still more dreadful contests, dangers,
Longer campaigns and crises, labors beyond all others;
--As I walk solitary, unattended,
Around me I hear that eclat of the world--politics, produce,
The announcements of recognized things--science,
The approved growth of cities, and the spread of inventions.

I see the ships, (they will last a few years,)
The vast factories, with their foremen and workmen,
And here the indorsement of all, and do not object to it.

But I too announce solid things;
Science, ships, politics, ...

I have heard the pigeons of the Seven Woods
Make their faint thunder, and the garden bees
Hum in the lime-tree flowers; and put away
The unavailing outcries and the old bitterness
That empty the heart. I have forgot awhile
Tara uprooted, and new commonness
Upon the throne and crying about the streets
And hanging its paper flowers from post to post,
Because it is alone of all things happy.
I am contented, for I know that quiet
Wanders laughing and eating her wild heart
Among pigeons and bees, while that Great Archer,
Who but awaits His hour to shoot, still hangs
A cloudy quiver over Pairc-na-lee.

To the willows of the brookside
The mill wheel sings to-day--
Sings and weeps,
As the brooklet creeps
Wondering on its way;
And here is the ring she gave me
With love's sweet promise then--
It hath burst apart
Like the trusting heart
That may never be soothed again!

Oh, I would be a minstrel
To wander far and wide,
Weaving in song the merciless wrong
Done by a perjured bride!
Or I would be a soldier,
To seek in the bloody fray
What gifts of fate can compensate
For the pangs I suffer to-day!

Yet may this aching bosom,
By bitter sorrow crushed,
Be still and cold
In the churchyard mould
Ere thy sweet voice be hushed;
So sing, sing on forever,
O wheel of the brookside mill,
For you mind me agai...

Heaped in raven loops and masses
Over temples smooth and fair,
Have you marked it, as she passes,
Gleam and shadow mingled there,
Braided strands of midnight air,
Helen's hair?

Deep with dreams and starry mazes
Of the thought that in them lies,
Have you seen them, as she raises
Them in gladness or surprise,
Two gray gleams of daybreak skies,
Helen's eyes?

Moist with dew and honied wafters
Of a music sweet that slips,
Have you marked them, brimmed with laughter's
Song and sunshine to their tips,
Rose-buds whence the fragrance drips,
Helen's lips?

He who sees her needs must love her:
But, beware! avoid love's dart!
He who loves her must discover
Nature overlooked one part,
In this masterpiece of art
Helen's he...

I go through wet spring woods alone,
Through sweet green woods with heart of stone,
My weary foot upon the grass
Falls heavy as I pass.
The cuckoo from the distance cries,
The lark a pilgrim in the skies;
But all the pleasant spring is drear.
I want you, dear!

I pass the summer meadows by,
The autumn poppies bloom and die;
I speak alone so bitterly
For no voice answers me.
“O lovers parting by the gate,
O robin singing to your mate,
Plead you well, for she will hear
‘I love you, dear!’”

I crouch alone, unsatisfied,
Mourning by winter’s fireside.
O Fate, what evil wind you blow.
Must this be so?
No southern breezes come to bless,
So conscious of their emptiness
My lonely arms I spread in woe,
I want you so.

BROTHER BILL.


To have a good birthday for a grown-up person is very difficult indeed;
We don't give it up, for Mother says the harder things are, the harder you must try till you succeed.
Still, our birthdays are different; we want so many things, and choosing your own pudding, and even half-holidays are treats;
But what can you do for people who always order the dinner, and never have lessons, and don't even like sweets?
I know Mother does not. Baby put a big red comfit in her mouth, and I saw her take it out again on the sly;
I don't believe she even enjoys going a-gypseying, for she gets neuralgia if she stands about where it isn't dry.
And how can you boil the kettle if you're not near the brook? But it's the last time she shall go there,
I told her so; I said, "What's the goo...

Ever let the Fancy roam,
Pleasure never is at home:
At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth,
Like to bubbles when rain pelteth;
Then let winged Fancy wander
Through the thought still spread beyond her:
Open wide the mind’s cage-door,
She’ll dart forth, and cloudward soar.
O sweet Fancy! let her loose;
Summer’s joys are spoilt by use,
And the enjoying of the Spring
Fades as does its blossoming;
Autumn’s red-lipp’d fruitage too,
Blushing through the mist and dew,
Cloys with tasting: What do then?
Sit thee by the ingle, when
The sear faggot blazes bright,
Spirit of a winter’s night;
When the soundless earth is muffled,
And the caked snow is shuffled
From the ploughboy’s heavy shoon;
When the Night doth meet the Noon
In a dark conspiracy

“Give” and “It-shall-be-given-unto-you.”


I.
Grand rough old Martin Luther
Bloomed fables, flowers on furze,
The better the uncouther:
Do roses stick like burrs?

II.
A beggar asked an alms
One day at an abbey-door,
Said Luther; but, seized with qualms,
The abbot replied, “We’re poor!

III.
“Poor, who had plenty once,
“When gifts fell thick as rain:
“But they give us nought, for the nonce,
“And how should we give again?”

IV.
Then the beggar, “See your sins!
“Of old, unless I err,
“Ye had brothers for inmates, twins,
“Date and Dabitur.

V.
“While Date was in good case
“Dabitur flourished too:
“For Dabitur’s lenten face
“No wonder if Date rue.

VI.
“Would ye retrie...

Browning wrote this poem in 1842 for Macready’s son, who was ill. He had also written the Pied Piper of Hamelin at the same time.


Crescenzio, the Pope’s Legate at the High Council, Trent,
Year Fifteen hundred twenty-two, March Twenty-five, intent
On writing letters to the Pope till late into the night,
Rose, weary, to refresh himself, and saw a monstrous sight:
(I give mine Author’s very words: he penned, I reindite.)

A black Dog of vast bigness, eyes flaming, ears that hung
Down to the very ground almost, into the chamber sprung
And made directly for him, and laid himself right under
The table where Crescenzio wrote, who called in fear and wonder
His servants in the ante-room, commanded every one
To look for and find out the beast: but, looking, they found no...

God grant a blessing on this tower and cottage
And on my heirs, if all remain unspoiled,
No table or chair or stool not simple enough
For shepherd lads in Galilee; and grant
That I myself for portions of the year
May handle nothing and set eyes on nothing
But what the great and passionate have used
Throughout so many varying centuries
We take it for the norm; yet should I dream
Sinbad the sailor's brought a painted chest,
Or image, from beyond the Loadstone Mountain,
That dream is a norm; and should some limb of the Devil
Destroy the view by cutting down an ash
That shades the road, or setting up a cottage
Planned in a government office, shorten his life,
Manacle his soul upon the Red Sea bottom.

In quella parte dov' Amor mi sprona.

HE FINDS HER IMAGE EVERYWHERE.


    When Love, fond Love, commands the strain,
The coyest muse must sure obey;
Love bids my wounded breast complain,
And whispers the melodious lay:
Yet when such griefs restrain the muse's wing,
How shall she dare to soar, or how attempt to sing?

Oh! could my heart express its woe,
How poor, how wretched should I seem!
But as the plaintive accents flow,
Soft comfort spreads her golden gleam;
And each gay scene, that Nature holds to view,
Bids Laura's absent charms to memory bloom anew.

Though Fate's severe decrees remove
Her gladsome beauties from my sight,
Yet, urged by pity, friendly Love
Bids fond reflection yield delight;
If lavish spring wit...