Sadness

I saw a staring virgin stand
Where holy Dionysus died,
And tear the heart out of his side.
And lay the heart upon her hand
And bear that beating heart away;
Of Magnus Annus at the spring,
As though God's death were but a play.
Another Troy must rise and set,
Another lineage feed the crow,
Another Argo's painted prow
Drive to a flashier bauble yet.
The Roman Empire stood appalled:
It dropped the reins of peace and war
When that fierce virgin and her Star
Out of the fabulous darkness called.
In pity for man's darkening thought
He walked that room and issued thence
In Galilean turbulence;
The Babylonian starlight brought
A fabulous, formless darkness in;
Odour of blood when Christ was slain
Made all platonic tolerance vain
And vain a...

    Over my window in pencillings white,
Stealthily traced in the silence of night -
Traced with a pencil as viewless as air,
By an artist unseen, when the star-beams were fair,
Came wonderful pictures, so life-like and true
That I'm filled with amaze as the marvel I view.

    Like, and yet unlike the things I have seen, -
Feathery ferns in the forest-depths green,
Delicate mosses that hide from the light,
Snow-drops, and lilies, and hyacinths white,
Fringes, and feathers, and half-opened flowers,
Closely-twined branches of dim, cedar bowers -
Strange, that one hand should so deftly combine
Such numberless charms in so quaint a design!

    O wondrous creations of silence and night!
I watch as ye fade in the clear morning light, -
As ye melt into te...

An Ode on a Lost Volume of my Poems Which He Desired Me to Replace that He Might Add Them to My Other Works Deposited in the Library.

Strophe I

My two-fold Book! single in show
But double in Contents,
Neat, but not curiously adorn'd
Which in his early youth,
A poet gave, no lofty one in truth
Although an earnest wooer of the Muse
Say, while in cool Ausonian shades
Or British wilds he roam'd,
Striking by turns his native lyre,
By turns the Daunian lute
And stepp'd almost in air,

Antistrophe

Say, little book, what furtive hand
Thee from thy fellow books convey'd,
What time, at the repeated suit
Of my most learned Friend,
I sent thee forth an honour'd traveller
From our great city to the source of Thames,
Caerulean sire...

Beyond yon dim old mountain's shadowy height,
    The restless sun droops low his grand old face;
While downward sweeps the trembling veil of night,
    To hide the earth; the frost king's filmy lace
Rests on the mountain's hoary snow-crowned head,
    And adds to it a softened grace; the light
Which dies afar in faint and fading red
    In purple shadows circles near.

                    The flight
Of birds across the vast and silent plains
    Awakes the echoes of the sleeping earth;
Of all the summer beauty naught remains,
    There come no tidings of the spring's glad birth.

Beyond the valley and far-off height
    The birds in wandering do take their way;
Ah, whither is their strange and trackless flight
    Amid the dying embers of the day;

I.

No more for him, where hills look down,
Shall Morning crown
Her rainy brow with blossom bands!
The Morning Hours, whose rosy hands
Drop wildflowers of the breaking skies
Upon the sod 'neath which he lies.
No more for him! No more! No more!

II.

No more for him, where waters sleep,
Shall Evening heap
The long gold of the perfect days!
The Eventide, whose warm hand lays
Great poppies of the afterglow
Upon the turf he rests below.
No more for him! No more! no more!

III.

No more for him, where woodlands loom,
Shall Midnight bloom
The star-flowered acres of the blue!
The Midnight Hours, whose dim hands strew
Dead leaves of darkness, hushed and deep,
Upon the grave where he doth sleep.
No more for hi...

We went a day's excursion to the stream,
Basked by the bank, and bent to the ripple-gleam,
And I did not know
That life would show,
However it might flower, no finer glow.

I walked in the Sunday sunshine by the road
That wound towards the wicket of your abode,
And I did not think
That life would shrink
To nothing ere it shed a rosier pink.

Unlooked for I arrived on a rainy night,
And you hailed me at the door by the swaying light,
And I full forgot
That life might not
Again be touching that ecstatic height.

And that calm eve when you walked up the stair,
After a gaiety prolonged and rare,
No thought soever
That you might never
Walk down again, struck me as I stood there.

You have shut me out from your tears and grief
Over the man laid low and hoary.
Listen to me now: I am no thief!
You have shut me out from your tears and grief,
Listen to me, I will tell my story.

The love of a man is transitory.
What do you know of his past? the years
He gave to another his manhood's glory?
The love of a man is transitory.
Listen to me now: open your ears.

Over the dead have done with tears!
Over the man who loved to madness
Me the woman you met with sneers,
Over the dead have done with tears!
Me the woman so sunk in badness.

He loved me ever, and that is gladness!
There by the dead now tell her so;
There by the dead where she bows in sadness.
He loved me ever, and that is gladness!
Mine the gladness and hers ...

I nearly died, I almost touched the door
That swings between forever and no more;
I think I heard the awful hinges grate,
Hour after hour, while I did weary wait
Death's coming; but alas! 'twas all in vain:
The door half-opened and then closed again.

What were my thoughts? I had but one regret --
That I was doomed to live and linger yet
In this dark valley where the stream of tears
Flows, and, in flowing, deepens thro' the years.
My lips spake not -- my eyes were dull and dim,
But thro' my heart there moved a soundless hymn --
A triumph song of many chords and keys,
Transcending language -- as the summer breeze,
Which, through the forest mystically floats,
Transcends the reach of mortal music's notes.
A song of victory -- a chant of bliss:
Wedded to...

    The wind of evening cried along the darkening trees,
    Along the darkening trees, heavy with ancient pain,
    Heavy with ancient pain from faded centuries,
    From faded centuries....    O foolish thought and vain!

    O foolish thought and vain to think the wind could know,
    To think the wind could know the griefs of men who died,
    The griefs of men who died and mouldered long ago:
    "And mouldered long ago," the wind of evening cried.

Lines written by the late A. L. Gordon
On 4th August, 1853,
Being three days before he sailed for Australia.

Across the trackless seas I go,
No matter when or where,
And few my future lot will know,
And fewer still will care.
My hopes are gone, my time is spent,
I little heed their loss,
And if I cannot feel content,
I cannot feel remorse.

My parents bid me cross the flood,
My kindred frowned at me;
They say I have belied my blood,
And stained my pedigree.
But I must turn from those who chide,
And laugh at those who frown;
I cannot quench my stubborn pride,
Nor keep my spirits down.

I once had talents fit to win
Success in life’s career,
And if I chose a part of sin,
My choice has cost me dear.
But th...

Of fret, of dark, of thorn, of chill,
Complain no more; for these, O heart,
Direct the random of the will
As rhymes direct the rage of art.

The lute's fixt fret, that runs athwart
The strain and purpose of the string,
For governance and nice consort
Doth bar his wilful wavering.

The dark hath many dear avails;
The dark distils divinest dews;
The dark is rich with nightingales,
With dreams, and with the heavenly Muse.

Bleeding with thorns of petty strife,
I'll ease (as lovers do) my smart
With sonnets to my lady Life
Writ red in issues from the heart.

What grace may lie within the chill
Of favor frozen fast in scorn!
When Good's a-freeze, we call it Ill!
This rosy Time is glacier-born.

Of fret, of dark, of thorn...

Go, little flutt'rer! seek thy feather'd loves,
And leave a wretched mourner to his woe;
Seek out the bow'rs of bliss, seek happier groves,
Nor here unheeded let thy music flow.

Yet think me not ungrateful for thy song,
If meant to cheer me in my lone retreat;
Ah! not to thee, my little friend! belong
The pow'rs to soothe the pangs of adverse fate.

Fly, then! the window of the wretched, fly!
And be thy harmless life for ever blest;
I only can reward thee with a sigh,
And wish that joys may crown thy peaceful nest.

O misera ed orribil visione.

HE CANNOT BELIEVE IN HER DEATH, BUT IF TRUE, HE PRAYS GOD TO TAKE HIM ALSO FROM LIFE.


    O misery! horror! can it, then, be true,
That the sweet light before its time is spent,
'Mid all its pains which could my life content,
And ever with fresh hopes of good renew?
If so, why sounds not other channels through,
Nor only from herself, the great event?
No! God and Nature could not thus consent,
And my dark fears are groundless and undue.
Still it delights my heart to hope once more
The welcome sight of that enchanting face,
The glory of our age, and life to me.
But if, to her eternal home to soar,
That heavenly spirit have left her earthly place,
Oh! then not distant may my last day be!

MACGREGOR.

Splendor of ended day, floating and filling me!
Hour prophetic hour resuming the past!
Inflating my throat you, divine average!
You, Earth and Life, till the last ray gleams, I sing.

Open mouth of my Soul, uttering gladness,
Eyes of my Soul, seeing perfection,
Natural life of me, faithfully praising things;
Corroborating forever the triumph of things.

Illustrious every one!
Illustrious what we name space sphere of unnumber'd spirits;
Illustrious the mystery of motion, in all beings, even the tiniest insect;
Illustrious the attribute of speech the senses the body;
Illustrious the passing light! Illustrious the pale reflection on the new moon in the western sky!
Illustrious whatever I see, or hear, or touch, to the last.

Good in all,
In the satisfac...

God gave us an hour for our tears,
One hour out of all the years,
For all the years were another's gold,
Given in a cruel troth of old.

And how did we spend his boon?
That sweet miraculous flower
Born to die in an hour,
Late born to die so soon.

Did we watch it with breathless breath
By slow degrees unfold?
Did we taste the innermost heart of it
The honey of each sweet part of it?
Suck all its hidden gold
To the very dregs of its death?

Nay, this is all we did with our hour -
We tore it to pieces, that precious flower;
Like any daisy, with listless mirth,
We shed its petals upon the earth;
And, children-like, when it all was done,
We cried unto God for another one.

Sad is that woman's lot who, year by year,
Sees, one by one, her beauties disappear;
As Time, grown weary of her heart-drawn sighs,

Impatiently begins to "dim her eyes!"
Herself compelled, in life's uncertain gloamings,
To wreathe her wrinkled brow with well saved "combings"
Reduced, with rouge, lipsalve, and pearly grey,
To "make up" for lost time, as best she may!

Silvered is the raven hair,
Spreading is the parting straight,
Mottled the complexion fair,
Halting is the youthful gait.
Hollow is the laughter free,
Spectacled the limpid eye,
Little will be left of me,
In the coming bye and bye!

Fading is the taper waist
Shapeless grows the shapely limb,
And although securely laced,
Spreading is the figure trim!
Stouter than...

There is silence that saith, "Ah me!"
There is silence that nothing saith;
One the silence of life forlorn,
One the silence of death;
One is, and the other shall be.

One we know and have known for long,
One we know not, but we shall know,
All we who have ever been born;
Even so, be it so, -
There is silence, despite a song.

Sowing day is a silent day,
Resting night is a silent night;
But whoso reaps the ripened corn
Shall shout in his delight,
While silences vanish away.

One would say your gaze was a misted screen:
your strange eyes (are they blue, grey or green?)
changeable, tender, dreamy, cruel, and again
echoing the indolence and pallor of heaven.

You bring me those blank days, mild and hazy,
that melt bewitched hearts into weeping,
when twisted, stirred by some unknown hurt,
our over-stretched nerves mock the numbed spirit.

Often you resemble the loveliest horizons
lit by the suns of foggy seasons....
how splendid you are, a dew-wet country,
inflamed by the rays of a misted sky!

O dangerous woman, o seductive glow,
will I someday adore your frost and snow,
and learn to draw, from implacable winter
sharp-edged as steel or ice, new pleasure?