Identity

Ant-like city, city full of dreams,
where the passer-by, at dawn, meets the spectre!
Mysteries everywhere are the sap that streams
through the narrow veins of this great ogre.


One morning, when, on the dreary street,
the buildings all seemed heightened, cold
a swollen river’s banks carved out to greet,
(their stage-set mirroring an actor’s soul),


the dirty yellow fog that flooded space,
arguing with my already weary soul,
steeling my nerves like a hero, I paced
suburbs shaken by the carts’ drum-roll.


Suddenly, an old man in rags, their yellow
mirroring the colour of the rain-filled sky,
whose looks alone prompted alms to flow,
except for the evil glittering of his eye,


appeared. You’d have thought his eyeballs

("O Charles, je te sens près de moi.")

[July, 1871.]


I feel thy presence, Charles. Sweet martyr! down
    In earth, where men decay,
I search, and see from cracks which rend thy tomb,
    Burst out pale morning's ray.

Close linked are bier and cradle: here the dead,
    To charm us, live again:
Kneeling, I mourn, when on my threshold sounds
    Two little children's strain.

George, Jeanne, sing on! George, Jeanne, unconscious play!
    Your father's form recall,
Now darkened by his sombre shade, now gilt
    By beams that wandering fall.

Oh, knowledge! what thy use? did we not know
    Death holds no more the dead;
But Heaven, where, hand in hand, angel and star
    Smile at the grave we dread?

A Heave...

Intense young soul, that takest hearts by storm,
And chills them into sorrow with a look!
Some minds are open as a well-read book;
But here the leaves are still uncut - unscanned,
The volume clasped and sealed, and all the warm
And passionate exuberance of love
Held in submission to these threadbare flaws
And creeds of weaknesses, poor human laws.
Stand up erect - nay kneel - for from above
God's light is streaming on thee. Fashion's daws
May fawn and natter like a cringing pack
Of servile hounds beneath the keeper's hand,
But these are not thy peers; they drive thee back:
Urge on the car of Thought, and take a higher stand!

    Beauty beloved, who hast my heart inspired,
    Seen from afar, or with thy face concealed,
    Save, when in visions of the night revealed,
    Or seen in daydreams bright,
    When all the fields are filled with light,
    And Nature's smile is sweet,
    Say, hast thou blessed
    Some golden age of innocence,
    And floatest, now, a shadow, o'er the earth?
    Or hath Fate's envious doom
    Reserved thee for some happier day to come?

    To see thee e'er alive,
    No hope remains to me;
    Unless perchance, when from this body free,
    My wandering spirit, lone,
    O'er some new path, to some new world hath flown.
    E'en here, at first, I, at the dawn
    Of this, my day, so dreary and forlorn,
    Sought thee, to guide me on my...

Ah! might I range each hallow'd bower and glade
    Musæus cultur'd, many a raptur'd sigh
    Wou'd that dear, local consciousness supply
    Beneath his willow, in the grotto's shade,
Whose roof his hand with ores and shells inlaid.
    How sweet to watch, with reverential eye,
    Thro' the sparr'd arch, the streams he oft survey'd,
    Thine, blue Thamésis, gently wandering by!
This is the POET's triumph, and it towers
    O'er Life's pale ills, his consciousness of powers
    That lift his memory from Oblivion's gloom,
Secure a train of these heart-thrilling hours
    By his idea deck'd in rapture's bloom,
    For Spirits rightly touch'd, thro' ages yet to come.

Brown foundling of the Western wood,
Babe of primeval wildernesses!
Long on my table thou hast stood
Encounters strange and rude caresses;
Perchance contented with thy lot,
Surroundings new, and curious faces,
As though ten centuries were not
Imprisoned in thy shining cases.

Thou bring’st me back the halcyon days
Of grateful rest, the week of leisure,
The journey lapped in autumn haze,
The sweet fatigue that seemed a pleasure,
The morning ride, the noonday halt,
The blazing slopes, the red dust rising,
And then the dim, brown, columned vault,
With its cool, damp, sepulchral spicing.

Once more I see the rocking masts
That scrape the sky, their only tenant
The jay-bird, that in frolic casts
From some high yard his broad blue pennant.

The work is done: young men and maidens, set
Upon my curls the myrtle coronet
Washed with sweet ointments: thus at last I come
To suffer in the Muses' martyrdom;
But with this comfort, if my blood be shed,
The Muses will wear blacks when I am dead.

    Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring,
        And all the flowers that in the springtime grow,
        And dusty roads, and thistles, and the slow
    Rising of the round moon, all throats that sing
    The summer through, and each departing wing,
        And all the nests that the bared branches show,
        And all winds that in any weather blow,
    And all the storms that the four seasons bring.

    You go no more on your exultant feet
        Up paths that only mist and morning knew,
    Or watch the wind, or listen to the beat
        Of a bird's wings too high in air to view,--
    But you were something more than young and sweet
        And fair,--and the long year remembers you.

Of equality, As if it harm’d me, giving others the same chances and rights as myself, As if it were not indispensable to my own rights that others possess the same.

I have heard that hysterical women say
They are sick of the palette and fiddle-bow.
Of poets that are always gay,
For everybody knows or else should know
That if nothing drastic is done
Aeroplane and Zeppelin will come out.
Pitch like King Billy bomb-balls in
Until the town lie beaten flat.

All perform their tragic play,
There struts Hamlet, there is Lear,
That's Ophelia, that Cordelia;
Yet they, should the last scene be there,
The great stage curtain about to drop,
If worthy their prominent part in the play,
Do not break up their lines to weep.
They know that Hamlet and Lear are gay;
Gaiety transfiguring all that dread.
All men have aimed at, found and lost;
Black out; Heaven blazing into the head:
Tragedy wrought to its uttermost.
T...

Towards the hills of Jamberoo
Some few fantastic shadows haste,
Uplit with fires
Like castle spires
Outshining through a mirage waste.
Behold, a mournful glory sits
On feathered ferns and woven brakes,
Where sobbing wild like restless child
The gusty breeze of evening wakes!
Methinks I hear on every breath
A lofty tone go passing by,
That whispers “Weave,
Though wood winds grieve,
The fadeless blooms of Poesy!”

A spirit hand has been abroad
An evil hand to pluck the flowers
A world of wealth,
And blooming health
Has gone from fragrant seaside bowers.
The twilight waxeth dim and dark,
The sad waves mutter sounds of woe,
But the evergreen retains its sheen,
And happy hearts exist below;
But pleasure sparkles on the sward,...

Where Hudson's wave o'er silvery sands
Winds through the hills afar,
Old Cronest like a monarch stands,
Crowned with a single star!
And there, amid the billowy swells
Of rock-ribbed, cloud-capped earth,
My fair and gentle Ida dwells,
A nymph of mountain-birth.

The snow-flake that the cliff receives,
The diamonds of the showers,
Spring's tender blossoms, buds, and leaves,
The sisterhood of flowers,
Morn's early beam, eve's balmy breeze,
Her purity define;
Yet Ida's dearer far than these
To this fond breast of mine.

My heart is on the hills.    The shades
Of night are on my brow;
Ye pleasant haunts and quiet glades,
My soul is with you now!
I bless the star-crowned highlands where
My Ida's footsteps roam:
O for a falcon'...

THE POET SINGS TO HER POET

O poet of the time to be,
    My conqueror, I began for thee.
Enter into thy poet's pain,
    And take the riches of the rain,
And make the perfect year for me.

Thou unto whom my lyre shall fall,
Whene'er thou comest, hear my call.
    O, keep the promise of my lays,
    Take the sweet parable of my days;
I trust thee with the aim of all.

And if thy thoughts unfold from me,
Know that I too have hints of thee,
    Dim hopes that come across my mind
    In the rare days of warmer wind,
And tones of summer in the sea.

And I have set thy paths, I guide
Thy blossoms on the wild hillside.
    And I, thy bygone poet, share
    The flowers that throng thy feet where
I led thy feet before I died.

Out of the noise of tired people working,
Harried with thoughts of war and lists of dead,
His beauty met me like a fresh wind blowing,
Clean boyish beauty and high-held head.
Eyes that told secrets, lips that would not tell them,
Fearless and shy the young unwearied eyes,
Men die by millions now, because God blunders,
Yet to have made this boy he must be wise.

I.

The last rose falls, wrecked of the wind and rain;
Where once it bloomed the thorns alone remain:
Dead in the wet the slow rain strews the rose.
The day was dim; now eve comes on again,
Grave as a life weighed down by many woes, -
So is the joy dead, and alive the pain.

The brown leaf flutters where the green leaf died;
Bare are the boughs, and bleak the forest side:
The wind is whirling with the last wild leaf.
The eve was strange; now dusk comes weird and wide,
Gaunt as a life that lives alone with grief, -
So doth the hope go and despair abide.

An empty nest hangs where the wood-bird pled;
Along the west the dusk dies, stormy red:
The frost is subtle as a serpent's breath.
The dusk was sad; now night is overhead,
Grim as a soul bro...

Through shattered galleries, 'mid roofless halls,
Wandering with timid footsteps oft betrayed,
The Stranger sighs, nor scruples to upbraid
Old Time, though he, gentlest among the Thralls
Of Destiny, upon these wounds hath laid
His lenient touches, soft as light that falls,
From the wan Moon, upon the towers and walls,
Light deepening the profoundest sleep of shade.
Relic of Kings! Wreck of forgotten wars,
To winds abandoned and the prying stars,
Time 'loves' Thee! at his call the Seasons twine
Luxuriant wreaths around thy forehead hoar;
And, though past pomp no changes can restore,
A soothing recompense, his gift, is thine!

Upon Hearing That His Name Would Be Transmitted To Posterity In Dr. Swift's Works.
By William Dunkin


Well! now, since the heat of my passion's abated,
That the Dean hath lampoon'd me, my mind is elated: -
Lampoon'd did I call it? - No - what was it then?
What was it? - 'Twas fame to be lash'd by his pen:
For had he not pointed me out, I had slept till
E'en doomsday, a poor insignificant reptile;
Half lawyer, half actor, pert, dull, and inglorious,
Obscure, and unheard of - but now I'm notorious:
Fame has but two gates, a white and a black one;
The worst they can say is, I got in at the back one:
If the end be obtain'd 'tis equal what portal
I enter, since I'm to be render'd immortal:
So clysters applied to the anus, 'tis said,
By skilful physicians, giv...

Under an arch of glorious leaves I passed
Out of the wood and saw the sickle moon
Floating in daylight o'er the pale green sea.

It was the quiet hour before the sun
Gathers the clouds to prayer and silently
Utters his benediction on the waves
That whisper round the death-bed of the day.
The labourers were returning from the farms
And children danced to meet them. From the doors
Of cottages there came a pleasant clink
Where busy hands laid out the evening meal.
From smouldering elms around the village spire
There soared and sank the caw of gathering rooks.
The faint-flushed clouds were listening to the tale
The sea tells to the sunset with one sigh.
The last white wistful sea-bird sought for peace,
And the last fishing-boat stole o'er the bar,
And fr...