Family

Speak low, speak little; who may sing
    While yonder cannon-thunders boom?
Watch, shuddering, what each day may bring:
    Nor 'pipe amid the crack of doom.'

And yet - the pines sing overhead,
    The robins by the alder-pool,
The bees about the garden-bed,
    The children dancing home from school.

And ever at the loom of Birth
    The mighty Mother weaves and sings:
She weaves - fresh robes for mangled earth;
    She sings - fresh hopes for desperate things.

And thou, too:    if through Nature's calm
    Some strain of music touch thine ears,
Accept and share that soothing balm,
    And sing, though choked with pitying tears.

Eversley, 1870.

Mother 's gone a-visitin' to spend a month er two,
An', oh, the house is lonesome ez a nest whose birds has flew
To other trees to build ag'in; the rooms seem jest so bare
That the echoes run like sperrits from the kitchen to the stair.
The shetters flap more lazy-like 'n what they used to do,
Sence mother 's gone a-visitin' to spend a month er two.

We 've killed the fattest chicken an' we've cooked her to a turn;
We 've made the richest gravy, but I jest don't give a durn
Fur nothin' 'at I drink er eat, er nothin' 'at I see.
The food ain't got the pleasant taste it used to have to me.
They 's somep'n' stickin' in my throat ez tight ez hardened glue,
Sence mother's gone a-visitin' to spend a month er two.

The hollyhocks air jest ez pink, they 're double ones at that,<...

Over there, above the jetty, stands the mansion of the Vardens,
With a tennis ground and terrace, and a flagstaff in the gardens:
They are gentlemen and ladies, they’ve been ‘toffs’ for generations,
But old Varden’s been unlucky, lost a lot in speculations.

Troubles gathered fast upon him when the mining bubble ‘busted,’
Then the bank suspended payment, where his little all he trusted;
And the butcher and the baker sent their bills in when they read it,
Even John, the Chow that served him, has refused to give him ‘cledit.’

And the daughters of the Vardens, they are beautiful as Graces,
But the balcony’s deserted, and they rarely show their faces;
And the swells of their acquaintance never seem to venture near them,
And the bailiff says they seldom have a cup of tea to chee...

Pardon, old fathers, if you still remain
Somewhere in ear-shot for the story's end,
Old Dublin merchant "free of the ten and four"
Or trading out of Galway into Spain;
Old country scholar, Robert Emmet's friend,
A hundred-year-old memory to the poor;
Merchant and scholar who have left me blood
That has not passed through any huckster's loin,
Soldiers that gave, whatever die was cast:
A Butler or an Armstrong that withstood
Beside the brackish waters of the Boyne
James and his Irish when the Dutchman crossed;
Old merchant skipper that leaped overboard
After a ragged hat in Biscay Bay;
You most of all, silent and fierce old man,
Because the daily spectacle that stirred
My fancy, and set my boyish lips to say,
"Only the wasteful virtues earn the sun";
P...

If they missed my face in Farmers’ Arms
When the landlord lit the lamp,
They would grin and say in their country way,
‘Oh! he’s down at the Gipsy camp!’
But they’d read of things in the Daily Mail
That the wild Australians do,
And I cared no day what the world might say,
For I came of the Gipsies too.
‘Oh! the Gipsy crowd are a mongrel lot,
‘And a thieving lot and sly!’
But I’d dined on fowls in the far-off south,
And a mongrel lot was I.
‘Oh! the Gipsy crowd are a roving gang,
‘And a sulky, silent crew!’
But they managed a smile and a word for me,
For I came of the Gipsies too.

And the old queen looked in my palm one day,
And a shrewd old dame was she:
‘My pretty young gent, you may say your say,
‘You may laugh your laugh at me;
‘But...

        Dear Love, where the red lilies blossomed and grew
    The white snows are falling;
        And all through the woods where I wandered with you
    The loud winds are calling;
        And the robin that piped to us tune upon tune,
    Neath the oak, you remember,
        O'er hill-top and forest has followed the June
    And left us December.

        He has left like a friend who is true in the sun
    And false in the shadows;
        He has found new delights in the land where he's gone,
    Greener woodlands and meadows.
        Let him go! what care we? let the snow shroud the lea,
    Let it drift on the heather;
        We can sing through it all: I have you, you have me.
    And we'll laugh at the weather.

        The old year may di...

Gone hath the Spring, with all its flowers,
And gone the Summer’s pomp and show,
And Autumn, in his leafless bowers,
Is waiting for the Winter’s snow.

I said to Earth, so cold and gray,
“An emblem of myself thou art.”
“Not so,” the Earth did seem to say,
“For Spring shall warm my frozen heart.”
I soothe my wintry sleep with dreams
Of warmer sun and softer rain,
And wait to hear the sound of streams
And songs of merry birds again.

But thou, from whom the Spring hath gone,
For whom the flowers no longer blow,
Who standest blighted and forlorn,
Like Autumn waiting for the snow;

No hope is thine of sunnier hours,
Thy Winter shall no more depart;
No Spring revive thy wasted flowers,
Nor Summer warm thy frozen heart.

    Given, not lent,
    And not withdrawn--once sent--
This Infant of mankind, this One,
Is still the little welcome Son.

    New every year,
    New-born and newly dear,
He comes with tidings and a song,
The ages long, the ages long.

    Even as the cold
    Keen winter grows not old;
As childhood is so fresh, foreseen,
And spring in the familiar green;

    Sudden as sweet
    Come the expected feet.
All joy is young, and new all art,
And He, too, Whom we have by heart.

I.


The corn has turned from grey to red,
Since first my spirit wandered forth
From the drear cities of the north,
And to Italia's mountains fled.

And here I set my face towards home,
For all my pilgrimage is done,
Although, methinks, yon blood-red sun
Marshals the way to Holy Rome.

O Blessed Lady, who dost hold
Upon the seven hills thy reign!
O Mother without blot or stain,
Crowned with bright crowns of triple gold!

O Roma, Roma, at thy feet
I lay this barren gift of song!
For, ah! the way is steep and long
That leads unto thy sacred street.


II.


And yet what joy it were for me
To turn my feet unto the south,
And journeying towards the Tiber mouth
To kneel again at Fiesole!

Why comes not Francis? From the doleful City
He fled, and, in his flight, could hear
The death-sounds of the Minster-bell:
That sullen stroke pronounced farewell
To Marmaduke, cut off from pity!
To Ambrose that! and then a knell
For him, the sweet half-opened Flower!
For all all dying in one hour!
Why comes not Francis? Thoughts of love
Should bear him to his Sister dear
With the fleet motion of a dove;
Yea, like a heavenly messenger
Of speediest wing, should he appear.
Why comes he not? for westward fast
Along the plain of York he past;
Reckless of what impels or leads,
Unchecked he hurries on; nor heeds
The sorrow, through the Villages,
Spread by triumphant cruelties
Of vengeful military force,
And punishment without remorse.
He mark...

Once, for a palace, Painting left her grove,
And taught her royal fav'rite's hand to trace
A beauteous maiden's tale of little Love,
His silken wings, soft limbs, and laughing face!

Then Nature wept o'er each expressive line,
To think the sweet creation so confin'd,
That such a boy, so fair, and so divine,
Was but the playful prattler of her mind;

And had he near the royal easel flown,
And seen the features of this mimic brother,
He would have known the portrait for his own,
And claim'd the beauteous painter for his mother.

Say, lovely youth, that dost my heart command,
Can Phaon's eyes forget his Sappho's hand?
Must then her name the wretched writer prove,
To thy remembrance lost, as to thy love?
Ask not the cause that I new numbers choose,
The lute neglected and the lyric Muse;
Love taught my tears in sadder notes to flow,
And tuned my heart to elegies of woe,
I burn, I burn, as when through ripen'd corn
By driving winds the spreading flames are borne!
Phaon to Ætna's scorching fields retires,
While I consume with more than Ætna's fires!
No more my soul a charm in music finds;
Music has charms alone for peaceful minds.
Soft scenes of solitude no more can please;
Love enters there, and I'm my own disease.
No more the Lesbian dames my passion move,
Once the dear objects of m...

Expression, child of soul! I fondly trace
    Thy strong enchantments, when the poet's lyre,
    The painter's pencil catch thy sacred fire,
And beauty wakes for thee her touching grace -
But from this frighted glance thy form avert
    When horrors check thy tear, thy struggling sigh,
    When frenzy rolls in thy impassion'd eye,
Or guilt sits heavy on thy lab'ring heart -
Nor ever let my shudd'ring fancy bear
    The wasting groan, or view the pallid look
    Of him[A] the Muses lov'd - when hope forsook
His spirit, vainly to the Muses dear!
For charm'd with heav'nly song, this bleeding breast,
Mourns the blest power of verse could give despair no rest. -

[A]    Chatterton.

Love is fellow-service.


A youth and maid upon a summer night
Upon the lawn, while yet the skies were light,
Edmund and Emma, let their names be these,
Among the shrubs within the circling trees,
Joined in a game with boys and girls at play:
For games perhaps too old a little they;
In April she her eighteenth year begun,
And twenty he, and near to twenty-one.
A game it was of running and of noise;
He as a boy, with other girls and boys
(Her sisters and her brothers), took the fun;
And when her turn, she marked not, came to run,
‘Emma,’ he called, then knew that he was wrong,
Knew that her name to him did not belong.
Her look and manner proved his feeling true,
A child no more, her womanhood she knew;
Half was the colour mounted on her fa...