Identity

[In an interview with Lawrence Barrett, he said:    "The literature of the New World must look to the West for its poetry."]

Not to the crowded East,
    Where, in a well-worn groove,
Like the harnessed wheel of a great machine,
    The trammelled mind must move -
Where Thought must follow the fashion of Thought,
Or be counted vulgar and set at naught.

Not to the languid South,
    Where the mariners of the brain
Are lured by the Sirens of the Sense,
    And wrecked upon its main -
Where Thought is rocked, on the sweet wind's breath
To a torpid sleep that ends in death.

But to the mighty West,
    That chosen realm of God,
Where Nature reaches her hands to men,
    And Freedom walks abroad -
Where mind is King, and fashion is naught,

From the cool and dark-lipped furrow breathes a dim delight
Through the woodland's purple plumage to the diamond night.
Aureoles of joy encircle every blade of grass
Where the dew-fed creatures silent and enraptured pass.
And the restless ploughman pauses, turns, and wondering,
Deep beneath his rustic habit finds himself a king;
For a fiery moment looking with the eyes of God
Over fields a slave at morning bowed him to the sod.
Blind and dense with revelation every moment flies.
And unto the mighty mother, gay, eternal, rise
All the hopes we hold, the gladness, dreams of things to be.
One of all thy generations, mother, hails to thee.
Hail, and hail, and hail for ever, though I turn again
From thy joy unto the human vestiture of pain.
I, thy child who went forth radiant...

See the chariot at hand here of Love,
Wherein my lady rideth!
Each that draws is a swan or a dove,
And well the car Love guideth.
As she goes, all hearts do duty
Unto her beauty;
And enamour'd, do wish, so they might
But enjoy such a sight,
That they still were to run by her side,
Through swords, through seas, whither she would ride.

Do but look on her eyes, they do light
All that Love's world compriseth!
Do but look on her hair, it is bright
As Love's star when it riseth!
Do but mark, her forehead's smoother
Than words that soothe her;
And from her arched brows, such a grace
Sheds itself through the face
As alone there triumphs to the life
All the gain, all the good, of the elements' strife.

Have you seen but a bright lily grow...

One of the solid margins bears us now
Envelop'd in the mist, that from the stream
Arising, hovers o'er, and saves from fire
Both piers and water. As the Flemings rear
Their mound, 'twixt Ghent and Bruges, to chase back
The ocean, fearing his tumultuous tide
That drives toward them, or the Paduans theirs
Along the Brenta, to defend their towns
And castles, ere the genial warmth be felt
On Chiarentana's top; such were the mounds,
So fram'd, though not in height or bulk to these
Made equal, by the master, whosoe'er
He was, that rais'd them here. We from the wood
Were not so far remov'd, that turning round
I might not have discern'd it, when we met
A troop of spirits, who came beside the pier.

They each one ey'd us, as at eventide
One eyes another under...

Believe me, together
The bright gods come ever,
    Still as of old;
Scarce see I Bacchus, the giver of joy,
Than comes up fair Eros, the laugh-loving boy,
    And Phoebus, the stately, behold!

They come near and nearer,
    The heavenly ones all
The gods with their presence
    Fill earth as their hall!

Say, how shall I welcome,
Human and earthborn,
    Sons of the sky?
Pour out to me pour the full life that ye live!
What to ye, O ye gods! can the mortal one give?

The joys can dwell only
    In Jupiter's palace
Brimmed bright with your nectar,
    Oh, reach me the chalice!

"Hebe, the chalice
Fill full to the brim!
Steep his eyes steep his eyes in the bath of the dew,
Let him dream, while the Styx is concea...

And he had mused on lands each bird,
That winged from realms of Falerina,
O'er seas of the Enchanted Sword,
In romance sang him, till he heard
Vague foam on Islands of Alcina.

For rich Levant and old Castile
Let other seamen freight their galleys;
With Polo he and Mandeville
Through stranger seas a dreamy keel
Sailed into wonder-peopled valleys.

Far continents of flow'r and fruit,
Of everlasting spring; where fountains
'Mid flow'rs, with human faces, shoot;
Where races dwell, both man and brute,
In cities under golden mountains.

Where cataracts their thunders hurl
From heights the tempest has at mercy;
Vast peaks that touch the moon, and whirl
Their torrents down of gold and pearl;
And forests strange as those of Circe.

Rich is the fancy which can double back
All seeming forms, and from cold icicles
Build up high glittering palaces where dwells
Summer perfection, moulding all this wrack
To spirit symmetry, and doth not lack
The power to hear amidst the funeral bells
The eternal heart's wind-melody which swells
In whirlwind flashes all along its track!
So hath the sun made all the winter mine
With gardens springing round me fresh and fair;
On hidden leaves uncounted jewels shine;
I live with forms of beauty everywhere,
Peopling the crumbling waste and icy pool
With sights and sounds of life most beautiful.

"It is the voice of years, that are gone! they roll before me, with all their deeds."

Ossian.



1.

NEWSTEAD! fast-falling, once-resplendent dome!
Religion's shrine! repentant HENRY'S [2] pride!
Of Warriors, Monks, and Dames the cloister'd tomb,
Whose pensive shades around thy ruins glide,


2.

Hail to thy pile! more honour'd in thy fall,
Than modern mansions, in their pillar'd state;
Proudly majestic frowns thy vaulted hall,
Scowling defiance on the blasts of fate.


3.

No mail-clad Serfs, [3] obedient to their Lord,
In grim array, the crimson cross [4] demand;
Or gay assemble round the festive board,
Their chief's retainers, an immortal band.


4.
...

There stands on yonder high mountain

A castle built of yore,
Where once lurked horse and horseman

In rear of gate and of door.

Now door and gate are in ashes,

And all around is so still;
And over the fallen ruins

I clamber just as I will.

Below once lay a cellar,

With costly wines well stor'd;
No more the glad maid with her pitcher

Descends there to draw from the hoard.

No longer the goblet she places

Before the guests at the feast;
The flask at the meal so hallow'd

No longer she fills for the priest.

No more for the eager squire

The draught in the passage is pour'd;
No more for the flying present

Receives she the flying reward.

For all the roof and th...

When we had passed the threshold of the gate
(Which the soul's ill affection doth disuse,
Making the crooked seem the straighter path),
I heard its closing sound. Had mine eyes turn'd,
For that offence what plea might have avail'd?

We mounted up the riven rock, that wound
On either side alternate, as the wave
Flies and advances. "Here some little art
Behooves us," said my leader, "that our steps
Observe the varying flexure of the path."

Thus we so slowly sped, that with cleft orb
The moon once more o'erhangs her wat'ry couch,
Ere we that strait have threaded. But when free
We came and open, where the mount above
One solid mass retires, I spent, with toil,
And both, uncertain of the way, we stood,
Upon a plain more lonesome, than the roads
That...

The leaves are many under my feet,
    And drift one way.
Their scent of death is weary and sweet.
    A flight of them is in the grey
Where sky and forest meet.

The low winds moan for dead sweet years;
    The birds sing all for pain,
Of a common thing, to weary ears,-
    Only a summer's fate of rain,
And a woman's fate of tears.

I walk to love and life alone
    Over these mournful places,
Across the summer overthrown,
    The dead joys of these silent faces,
To claim my own.

I know his heart has beat to bright
    Sweet loves gone by.
I know the leaves that die to-night
    Once budded to the sky,
And I shall die from his delight.

O leaves, so quietly ending now,
    You have heard cuckoos sing.
And I w...

Surprised by joy, impatient as the Wind
I turned to share the transport, Oh! with whom
But Thee, deep buried in the silent tomb,
That spot which no vicissitude can find?
Love, faithful love, recalled thee to my mind,
But how could I forget thee? Through what power,
Even for the least division of an hour,
Have I been so beguiled as to be blind
To my most grievous loss! That thought's return
Was the worst pang that sorrow ever bore,
Save one, one only, when I stood forlorn,
Knowing my heart's best treasure was no more;
That neither present time, nor years unborn
Could to my sight that heavenly face restore.

Whene'er I recollect the happy time
When you and I held converse dear together,
There come a thousand thoughts of sunny weather,
Of early blossoms, and the fresh year's prime;
Your memory lives for ever in my mind
With all the fragrant beauties of the spring,
With od'rous lime and silver hawthorn twined,
And many a noonday woodland wandering.
There's not a thought of you, but brings along
Some sunny dream of river, field, and sky;
'Tis wafted on the blackbird's sunset song,
Or some wild snatch of ancient melody.
And as I date it still, our love arose
'Twixt the last violet and the earliest rose.

I once knew a certain Benedicta whose presence filled the air with the ideal and whose eyes spread abroad the desire of grandeur, of beauty, of glory, and of all that makes man believe in immortality.
But this miraculous maiden was too beautiful for long life, so she died soon after I knew her first, and it was I myself who entombed her, upon a day when spring swung her censer even in the burial-ground. It was I myself who entombed her, fast closed in a coffin of perfumed wood, as uncorruptible as the coffers of India.
And, as my eyes rested upon the spot where my treasure lay hidden, I became suddenly aware of a little being who singularly resembled the dead; and who, stamping the newly-turned earth with a curious and hysterical violence, burst into laughter, and said:
"It is I, the true Benedicta! It is I, the notorious d...

The house is silent, it is late at night, I am alone.
        From the balcony I can hear the Isar moan,
        Can see the white
Rift of the river eerily, between the pines, under a sky of stone.

Some fireflies drift through the middle air Tinily.
        I wonder where
Ends this darkness that annihilates me.

Twilight. Red in the West.
Dimness. A glow on the wood.
The teams plod home to rest.
The wild duck come to glean.
O souls not understood,
What a wild cry in the pool;
What things have the farm ducks seen
That they cry so--huddle and cry?
Only the soul that goes.
Eager. Eager. Flying.
Over the globe of the moon,
Over the wood that glows.
Wings linked. Necks a-strain,
A rush and a wild crying.

A cry of the long pain
In the reeds of a steel lagoon,
In a land that no man knows.

Provoked By Calverley's "Forever"


"Farewell!" Another gloomy word
    As ever into language crept.
'Tis often written, never heard,
            Except

In playhouse. Ere the hero flits,
    In handcuffs, from our pitying view.
"Farewell!" he murmurs, then exits
            R. U.

"Farewell" is much too sighful for
    An age that has not time to sigh.
We say, "I'll see you later," or
            "Good by!"

When, warned by chanticleer, you go
    From her to whom you owe devoir,
"Say not 'good by,'" she laughs, "but
            'Au Revoir!'"

Thus from the garden are you sped;
    And Juliet were the first to tell
You, you were silly if you said
            "Farewell!"

"Farewell," meant long ago, b...

"For he looked for a city that hath foundations, whose Maker and Builder is God."


I.

Somewhere, I know, there waits for me
    A home that mocks the pomp of Earth,
Eye hath not seen its majesty,
    Nor heart conceived its priceless worth, -
Talk not of crystal, gems, or gold,
    Or towers that flame in changeless light,
Imagination, weak and cold,
    Faints far below the unmeasured height!
And through its open doors for aye,
    As ages after ages glide,
Without a moment's pause or stay,
    Flows grandly in the living tide -
Brothers, redeemed ones, pressing home
    From every clime, from every shore,
Beneath that fair celestial dome
    Meet to be parted nevermore!


II.

Somewhere, I know, there waits for ...