Heartbreak

        Once more into my arid days like dew,
        Like wind from an oasis, or the sound
        Of cold sweet water bubbling underground,
        A treacherous messenger, the thought of you
        Comes to destroy me; once more I renew
        Firm faith in your abundance, whom I found
        Long since to be but just one other mound
        Of sand, whereon no green thing ever grew.
        And once again, and wiser in no wise,
        I chase your colored phantom on the air,
        And sob and curse and fall and weep and rise
        And stumble pitifully on to where,
        Miserable and lost, with stinging eyes,
        Once more I clasp,--and there is nothing there.

        I.

The slanted storm tossed at their feet
The frost-nipped Autumn leaves;
The park's high pines were caked with sleet
And ice-spears armed the eaves.
They strolled adown the pillared pines
To part where wet and twisted vines
About the gate-posts flapped and beat.
She watched him dimming in the rain
Along the river's misty shore,
And laughed with lips that sneered disdain
"To meet no more!"


        II.

'Mong heavy roses weighed with dew
The chirping crickets hid;
Down the honeysuckle avenue
Creaked the green katydid.
The scattered stars smiled thro' the pines;
Thro' stately windows draped with vines
The rising moonlight's silver blew.
He stared at lips proud, white, and dead,
A chiseled calm that wore;

i.

Dearest and best of maidens, whom the Fates
    have dower'd with beauty, whom the glory-gates
Have shown so splendid in my waking sight,
Is't well, thou syren! thus to haunt the night
And grant no mercy, none from week to week
All through the year? Is't well my soul to seek
    And shun my body? Is't throughout ordain'd
That thou shouldst spurn a love so tender-meek?


ii.

It is my joy to serve thee, 'tis my pride
    To own my follies, though anew denied
The chance of wisdom, and for this, who knows?
I shall be counted, ere the season's close,
A time-perverter. Yes! I shall be shamed,
And frown'd upon, and day by day proclaim'd
    A foe to virtue, though, in seeking thee
I seek the goal that Virtue's self hath named.

As late I rambled in the happy fields,
What time the skylark shakes the tremulous dew
From his lush clover covert; when anew
Adventurous knights take up their dinted shields;
I saw the sweetest flower wild nature yields,
A fresh-blown musk-rose; 'twas the first that threw
Its sweets upon the summer: graceful it grew
As is the wand that Queen Titania wields.
And, as I feasted on its fragrancy,
I thought the garden-rose it far excelled;
But when, O Wells! thy roses came to me,
My sense with their deliciousness was spelled:
Soft voices had they, that with tender plea
Whispered of peace, and truth, and friendliness unquelled.

A modern Poet addresses his Muse, to whom he has devoted the best Years of his Life

I.

Not here, O belovéd! not here let us part, in the city, but there!
Out there where the storm can enfold us, on the hills, where its breast is made bare:
Its breast, that is rainy and cool as the fern that drips by the fall
In the luminous night of' the woodland where winds to the waters call.
Not here, O belovéd! not here! but there! out there in the storm!

The rush and the reel of the heavens, the tem pest, whose rapturous arm
Shall seize us and sweep us together, resistless as passions seize men,
Through the rocking world of the woodland, with its multitude music, and then,
With the rain on our lips, belovéd! in the heart of the night's wild hell,
One last, long kiss forever, and...

How breaks my heart to hear you say
You feel the shadows fall about you!
The gods forefend
That fate, O friend!
I would not, I could not live without you!
You gone, what would become of me,
Your shadow, O beloved Maecenas?
We've shared the mirth--
And sweets of earth--
Let's share the pangs of death between us!

I should not dread Chinaera's breath
Nor any threat of ghost infernal;
Nor fear nor pain
Should part us twain--
For so have willed the powers eternal.
No false allegiance have I sworn,
And, whatsoever fate betide you,
Mine be the part
To cheer your heart--
With loving song to fare beside you!

Love snatched you from the claws of death
And gave you to the grateful city;
The falling tree
That threatened me

S' una fede amorosa, un cor non finto.

THE MISERY OF HIS LOVE.


    If faith most true, a heart that cannot feign,
If Love's sweet languishment and chasten'd thought,
And wishes pure by nobler feelings taught,
If in a labyrinth wanderings long and vain,
If on the brow each pang pourtray'd to bear,
Or from the heart low broken sounds to draw,
Withheld by shame, or check'd by pious awe,
If on the faded cheek Love's hue to wear,
If than myself to hold one far more dear,
If sighs that cease not, tears that ever flow,
Wrung from the heart by all Love's various woe,
In absence if consumed, and chill'd when near,--
If these be ills in which I waste my prime,
Though I the sufferer be, yours, lady, is the crime.

DACRE.


   ...

    Have I slept and failed to hear you calling?
    Cry again, belov'd; for sleep is heavy,
    Curtaining away the golden sunlight,
    Shutting out the blue sky and the breezes,
    Sealing up my ears to all you tell me.
    Cry again! your voice shall pierce the clumsy
    Leaden folds that sleep has wrapt about me,
    Cry again! accomplish what the singing,
    Hours old now on all the trees and bushes,
    And the wind and sun could not accomplish.
    Lo!    I waste good hours of love and kisses
    While the sun and you have spilt your glory
    Freely on me lying unregarding.
    In the happy islands, where no sunset
    Stains the waters with a morbid splendour,
    Where the open skies are blue for ever,
    I might stay for years and years unsleep...

Oh, the day has set me dreaming
In a strange, half solemn way
Of the feelings I experienced
On another long past day,--
Of the way my heart made music
When the buds began to blow,
And o' little Lucy Landman
Whom I loved long years ago.

It 's in spring, the poet tells us,
That we turn to thoughts of love,
And our hearts go out a-wooing
With the lapwing and the dove.
But whene'er the soul goes seeking
Its twin-soul, upon the wing,
I 've a notion, backed by mem'ry,
That it's love that makes the spring.

I have heard a robin singing
When the boughs were brown and bare,
And the chilling hand of winter
Scattered jewels through the air.
And in spite of dates and seasons,
It was always spring, I know,
When I loved Lucy Landman<...

I found in dreams a place of wind and flowers,
Full of sweet trees and colour of glad grass,
In midst whereof there was
A lady clothed like summer with sweet hours.
Her beauty, fervent as a fiery moon,
Made my blood burn and swoon
Like a flame rained upon.
Sorrow had filled her shaken eyelids’ blue,
And her mouth’s sad red heavy rose all through
Seemed sad with glad things gone.

She held a little cithern by the strings,
Shaped heartwise, strung with subtle-coloured hair
Of some dead lute-player
That in dead years had done delicious things.
The seven strings were named accordingly;
The first string charity,
The second tenderness,
The rest were pleasure, sorrow, sleep, and sin,
And loving-kindness, that is pity’s kin
And is most pitiless.

With saddest music all day long
She soothed her secret sorrow:
At night she sighed "I fear 'twas wrong
Such cheerful words to borrow.
Dearest, a sweeter, sadder song
I'll sing to thee to-morrow."

I thanked her, but I could not say
That I was glad to hear it:
I left the house at break of day,
And did not venture near it
Till time, I hoped, had worn away
Her grief, for nought could cheer it!

My dismal sister! Couldst thou know
The wretched home thou keepest!
Thy brother, drowned in daily woe,
Is thankful when thou sleepest;
For if I laugh, however low,
When thou'rt awake, thou weepest!

I took my sister t'other day
(Excuse the slang expression)
To Sadler's Wells to see the play
In hopes the new impression
Might in h...

    If your thoughts were as clear as your eyes,
    And the whole of your heart were true,
    You were fitter by far for winning,
    But then that would not be you.

    If your pulse beat time to love
    As fast as you think and plan,
    You could kindle a lasting passion
    In the breast of the strongest man.

    If you felt as much as you thought,
    And dreamed what you seem to dream,
    A world of elysian beauty
    Your ruined heart would redeem.

    If you thought in the light of the sun,
    Or the blood in your veins flowed free,
    If you gave your kisses but gladly,
    We two could better agree.

    If you were strong where I counted,
    And weak where yourself were at stake,
    You would have my strength...

Awm havin a smook bi misel,
Net a soul here to spaik a word to,
Awve noa gossip to hear nor to tell,
An ther's nowt aw feel anxious to do.

Awve noa noashun o' writin a line,
Tho' awve just dipt mi pen into th' ink,
Towards warkin aw dooant mich incline,
An awm ommost too lazy to think.

Awve noa riches to mak me feel vain,
An yet awve as mich as aw need;
Awve noa sickness to cause me a pain,
An noa troubles to mak mi heart bleed.

Awr Dolly's crept off to her bed,
An aw hear shoo's beginnin to snoor;
(That upset me when furst we wor wed,
But nah it disturbs me noa moor.)

Like me, shoo taks things as they come,
Makkin th' best o' what falls to her lot,
Shoo's content wi her own humble hooam,
For her world's i' this snug litt...

Like music heard in mellow chime,
The charm of her transforming time
    Upon my senses steals
As softly as from sunny walls,
In day's decline, their shadow falls
    Across the sleeping fields.

A fair, illumined book
Is nature's page whereon I look
    While "autumn turns the leaves;"
And many a thought of her designs
Between those rare, resplendent lines
    My fancy interweaves.

I dream of aborigines,
Who must have copied from the trees
    The fashions of the day:
Those gorgeous topknots for the head,
Of yellow tufts and feathers red,
    With beads and sinews gay.

I wonder if the saints behold
Such pageantry of colors bold
    Beyond the radiant sky;
And if the tints of Paradise
Are heightened by the strange...

"O Lord, how canst Thou say Thou lovest me?
Me whom thou settest in a barren land,
Hungry and thirsty on the burning sand,
Hungry and thirsty where no waters be
Nor shadows of date-bearing tree: -
O Lord, how canst Thou say Thou lovest me?"

"I came from Edom by as parched a track,
As rough a track beneath My bleeding feet.
I came from Edom seeking thee, and sweet
I counted bitterness; I turned not back
But counted life as death, and trod
The winepress all alone: and I am God."

"Yet, Lord, how canst Thou say Thou lovest me?
For Thou art strong to comfort: and could I
But comfort one I love, who, like to die,
Lifts feeble hands and eyes that fail to see
In one last prayer for comfort - nay,
I could not stand aside or turn away."

"Alas...

Syren of sullen moods and fading hues,
Yet haply not incapable of joy,
Sweet Autumn! I thee hail
With welcome all unfeigned;

And oft as morning from her lattice peeps
To beckon up the sun, I seek with thee
To drink the dewy breath
Of fields left fragrant then,

In solitudes, where no frequented paths
But what thine own foot makes betray thine home,
Stealing obtrusive there
To meditate thy end;

By overshadowed ponds, in woody nooks,
With ramping sallows lined, and crowding sedge,
Which woo the winds to play,
And with them dance for joy;

And meadow pools, torn wide by lawless floods,
Where waterlilies spread their oily leaves,
On which, as wont, the fly
Oft battens in the sun;

Where leans the mossy willow half way...

I.

    I round the threshold wandering here,
    Vainly the tempest and the rain invoke,
    That they may keep my lady prisoner.

    And yet the wind was howling in the woods,
    The roving thunder bellowing in the clouds,
    Before the dawn had risen in the sky.

    O ye dear clouds! O heaven! O earth! O trees!
    My lady goes! Have mercy, if on earth
    Unhappy lovers ever mercy find!

    Awake, ye whirlwinds! storm-charged clouds, awake,
    O'erwhelm me with your floods, until the sun
    To other lands brings back the light of day!

    Heaven opens; the wind falls; the grass, the leaves
    Are motionless, around; the dazzling sun
    In my tear-laden eyes remorseless shines.


II.

    The light of d...

In the endless nights, from my bed, where sleepless in anguish I lie,
I startle the stillness and gloom with a bitter and strong cry:
0 Love! 0 Beloved long lost! come down from thy Heaven above,
For my heart is wasting and dying in uttermost famine for love!

Come down for a moment! oh, come! Come serious and mild
And pale, as thou wert on this earth, thou adorable Child!
Or come as thou art, with thy sanctitude, triumph and bliss,
For a garment of glory about thee; and give me one kiss,
One tender and pitying look of thy tenderest eyes,
One word of solemn assurance and truth that
the soul with its love never dies!

In the endless nights, from my bed, where sleepless in frenzy I lie,
I cleave through the crushing gloom with a bitter and deadly cry:
Oh! where have ...