Heartbreak

Since there is no escape, since at the end
My body will be utterly destroyed,
This hand I love as I have loved a friend,
This body I tended, wept with and enjoyed;
Since there is no escape even for me
Who love life with a love too sharp to bear:
The scent of orchards in the rain, the sea
And hours alone too still and sure for prayer,
Since darkness waits for me, then all the more
Let me go down as waves sweep to the shore
In pride; and let me sing with my last breath;
In these few hours of light I lift my head;
Life is my lover, I shall leave the dead
If there is any way to baffle death.

"We had a dream which was not all a dream." - Byron.


        I laid me down one day in June,
        It was late long afternoon,
        A very sultry summer's eve,
        Such times the senses oft deceive,
        The place was 'neath a maple tree,
        Soon from all cares and troubles free,
        By a gentle, kindly slumber,
        No more our sorrows we could number,
        But we heard a plaintive wail
        Such as we find in fairy tale,
        It was the genius of the tree
        Who in sad guise appeared to me,
        And then she sadly did give vent
        Unto this awful grave lament:
        Though I am gay in month of June,
        All decked in green, yet very soon,
        Alas my beauty will be faded
        An...

    I am growing old: I have kept youth too long,
    But I dare not let them know it now.
    I have done the heart of youth a grievous wrong,
    Danced it to dust and drugged it with the rose,
    Forced its reluctant lips to one more vow.
    I have denied the lawful grey,
    So kind, so wise, to settle in my hair;
    I belong no more to April, but September has not taught me her repose.
    I wish I had let myself grow old in the quiet way
    That is so gracious....    I wish I did not care.
    My faded mouth will never flower again,
    Under the paint the wrinkles fret my eyes,
    My hair is dull beneath its henna stain,
    I have come to the last ramparts of disguise.
    And now the day draws on of my defeat.
    I shall not meet
    The swift, ...

The shade for me, but over thee
The lingering sunshine still;
As, smiling, to the silent stream
Comes down the singing rill.

So come to me, my little one,
My years with thee I share,
And mingle with a sister's love
A mother's tender care.

But keep the smile upon thy lip,
The trust upon thy brow;
Since for the dear one God hath called
We have an angel now.

Our mother from the fields of heaven
Shall still her ear incline;
Nor need we fear her human love
Is less for love divine.

The songs are sweet they sing beneath
The trees of life so fair,
But sweetest of the songs of heaven
Shall be her children's prayer.

Then, darling, rest upon my breast,
And teach my heart to lean
With thy sweet trust upon the arm...

I.

Wailing, wailing, wailing, the wind over land and sea–
And Willy’s voice in the wind, ‘O mother, come out to me.’
Why should he call me to-night, when he knows that I cannot go?
For the downs are as bright as day, and the full moon stares at the snow.

II.

We should be seen, my dear; they would spy us out of the town.
The loud black nights for us, and the storm rushing over the down,
When I cannot see my own hand, but am led by the creak of the chain,
And grovel and grope for my son till I find myself drenched with the rain.

III.

Anything fallen again? nay–what was there left to fall?
I have taken them home, I have number’d the bones, I have hidden them all.
What am I saying? and what are you? do you come as a spy?
Falls? what falls? who ...

Love in fantastic triumph sat,
Whilst bleeding hearts around him flow'd,
For whom fresh pains he did create,
And strange tyrannic power he shew'd;
From thy bright eyes he took his fire,
Which round about in sport he hurl'd;
But 'twas from mine he took desire
Enough to undo the amorous world.

From me he took his sighs and tears,
From thee his pride and cruelty;
From me his languishments and fears,
And every killing dart from thee;
Thus thou and I the God have arm'd,
And set him up a Deity;
But my poor heart alone is harm'd,
Whilst thine the victor is, and free.

Here, where precipitate Spring with one light bound
Into hot Summer's lusty arms expires;
And where go forth at morn, at eve, at night,
Soft airs, that want the lute to play with them,
And softer sighs, that know not what they want;
Under a wall, beneath an orange-tree
Whose tallest flowers could tell the lowlier ones
Of sights in Fiesole right up above,
While I was gazing a few paces off
At what they seemed to show me with their nods,
Their frequent whispers and their pointing shoots,
A gentle maid came down the garden-steps
And gathered the pure treasure in her lap.
I heard the branches rustle, and stept forth
To drive the ox away, or mule, or goat,
(Such I believed it must be); for sweet scents
Are the swift vehicles of still sweeter thoughts,
And nurs...

Thine eyes I love, and they, as pitying me,
Knowing thy heart torment me with disdain,
Have put on black and loving mourners be,
Looking with pretty ruth upon my pain.
And truly not the morning sun of heaven
Better becomes the grey cheeks of the east,
Nor that full star that ushers in the even,
Doth half that glory to the sober west,
As those two mourning eyes become thy face:
O! let it then as well beseem thy heart
To mourn for me since mourning doth thee grace,
And suit thy pity like in every part.
Then will I swear beauty herself is black,
And all they foul that thy complexion lack.

[Written to the Most Beautiful Woman in the World]


    My Sweetheart is the TRUTH BEYOND THE MOON,
    And never have I been in love with Woman,
    Always aspiring to be set in tune
    With one who is invisible, inhuman.

    O laughing girl, cold TRUTH has stepped between,
    Spoiling the fevers of your virgin face:
    Making your shining eyes but lead and clay,
    Mocking your brilliant brain and lady's grace.

    TRUTH haunted me the day I wooed and lost,
    The day I wooed and won, or wooed in play:
    Tho' you were Juliet or Rosalind,
    Thus shall it be, forever and a day.

    I doubt my vows, tho' sworn on my own blood,
    Tho' I draw toward you weeping, soul to soul,
    I have a lonely goal beyond the moon;
    Ay...

Bonny lassie, come thi ways,
An let us goa together!
Tho' we've met wi stormy days,
Ther'll be some sunny weather.
An if joy should spring for me,
Tha shall freely share it;
An if trouble comes to thee,
Aw can help to bear it.

Tho' thi mammy says us nay,
An thi dad's unwillin';
Wod ta have me pine away
Wi this love at's killin'?
Come thi ways, an let me twine
Mi arms once moor abaght thee;
Weel tha knows mi heart is thine,
Aw couldn't live withaat thee.

Ivvery day an haar at slips,
Some pleasure we are missin',
For those bonny rooasy lips
Awm nivver stall'd o' kissin'.
If men wor wise to walk life's track
Withaat sith joys to glad 'em,
He must ha made a sad mistak
At gave a Eve to Adam.

When but a little toddlin thing,
I'th' heather sweet shoo'd play,
An like a fay on truant wing,
Shoo'd rammel far away;
An even butterflees wod come
Her lovely face to scan,
An th' burds wod sing ther sweetest song,
For bonny Mary Ann.

Shoo didn't fade as years flew by,
But added day bi day,
Some little touch ov witchery, -
Some little winnin way.
Her lovely limbs an angel face,
To paint noa mortal can;
Shoo seemed possessed ov ivvery grace,
Did bonny Mary Ann.

To win her wod be heaven indeed,
Soa off aw went to woo;
Mi tale o' love shoo didn't heed,
Altho' mi heart spake too.
Aw axt, "what wants ta, onnyway?"
Shoo sed, "aw want a man,"
Then laffin gay, shoo tript away, -
Mi bonny Mary Ann.

Thinks aw, w...

Rain on Rahoon falls softly, softly falling,
Where my dark lover lies.
Sad is his voice that calls me, sadly calling,
At grey moonrise.

Love, hear thou
How soft, how sad his voice is ever calling,
Ever unanswered, and the dark rain falling,
Then as now.

Dark too our hearts, O love, shall lie and cold
As his sad heart has lain
Under the moongrey nettles, the black mould
And muttering rain.

But one short night between my Love and me!
    I watch the soft-shod dusk creep wistfully
    Through the slow-moving curtains, pausing by
And shrouding with its spirit-fingers free
    Each well-known chair. There is a growing grace
    Of tender magic in this little place.

Comes through half-opened windows, soft and cool
    As Spring's young breath, the vagrant evening air,
    My day-worn soul is hushed. I fain would bear
No burdens on my brain to-night, no rule
    Of anxious thought; the world has had my tears,
    My thoughts, my hopes, my aims these many years;

This is Thy hour, and I shall sink to sleep
    With a glad weariness, to know that when
    The new day dawns I shall lay by my pen
Needed no more. If I, perchance, should weep
   ...

Why is there in the least touch of her hands
More grace than other women's lips bestow,
If love is but a slave in fleshly bands
Of flesh to flesh, wherever love may go?

Why choose vain grief and heavy-hearted hours
For her lost voice, and dear remembered hair,
If love may cull his honey from all flowers,
And girls grow thick as violets, everywhere?

Nay! She is gone, and all things fall apart;
Or she is cold, and vainly have we prayed;
And broken is the summer's splendid heart,
And hope within a deep, dark grave is laid.

As man aspires and falls, yet a soul springs
Out of his agony of flesh at last,
So love that flesh enthralls, shall rise on wings
Soul-centred, when the rule of flesh is past.

Then, most High Love, or wreathed with myrtl...

'While I sit at the door
Sick to gaze within
Mine eye weepeth sore
For sorrow and sin:
As a tree my sin stands
To darken all lands;
Death is the fruit it bore.

'How have Eden bowers grown
Without Adam to bend them!
How have Eden flowers blown
Squandering their sweet breath
Without me to tend them!
The Tree of Life was ours,
Tree twelvefold-fruited,
Most lofty tree that flowers,
Most deeply rooted:
I chose the tree of death.

'Hadst thou but said me nay,
Adam, my brother,
I might have pined away;
I, but none other:
God might have let thee stay
Safe in our garden,
By putting me away
Beyond all pardon.

'I, Eve, sad mother
Of all who must live,
I, not another
Plucked bitterest fruit to gi...

And only where the forest fires have sped,
    Scorching relentlessly the cool north lands,
A sweet wild flower lifts its purple head,
And, like some gentle spirit sorrow-fed,
    It hides the scars with almost human hands.

And only to the heart that knows of grief,
    Of desolating fire, of human pain,
There comes some purifying sweet belief,
Some fellow-feeling beautiful, if brief.
    And life revives, and blossoms once again.

(Ode to Lycoris. May 1817)

Enough of climbing toil! Ambition treads
Here, as 'mid busier scenes, ground steep and rough,
Or slippery even to peril! and each step,
As we for most uncertain recompence
Mount toward the empire of the fickle clouds,
Each weary step, dwarfing the world below,
Induces, for its old familiar sights,
Unacceptable feelings of contempt,
With wonder mixed, that Man could e'er be tied,
In anxious bondage, to such nice array
And formal fellowship of petty things!
Oh! 'tis the 'heart' that magnifies this life,
Making a truth and beauty of her own;
And moss-grown alleys, circumscribing shades,
And gurgling rills, assist her in the work
More efficaciously than realms outspread,
As in a map, before the adventurer's gaze,
Ocean an...

[Greek: Mesonuktiois poth hopais, k.t.l.] [1]


Ode 3.


'Twas now the hour when Night had driven
Her car half round yon sable heaven;
Boötes, only, seem'd to roll
His Arctic charge around the Pole;
While mortals, lost in gentle sleep,
Forgot to smile, or ceas'd to weep:
At this lone hour the Paphian boy,
Descending from the realms of joy,
Quick to my gate directs his course,
And knocks with all his little force;
My visions fled, alarm'd I rose, -
"What stranger breaks my blest repose?"
"Alas!" replies the wily child
In faltering accents sweetly mild;
"A hapless Infant here I roam,
Far from my dear maternal home.
Oh! shield me from the wintry blast!
The nightly storm is pouring fast.
No prowling robber lingers...