Before me, careless lying,
Young Love his ware comes crying;
Full soon the elf untreasures
His pack of pains and pleasures,--
With roguish eye,
He bids me buy
From out his pack of treasures.

His wallet's stuffed with blisses,
With true-love-knots and kisses,
With rings and rosy fetters,
And sugared vows and letters;--
He holds them out
With boyish flout,
And bids me try the fetters.

Nay, Child (I cry), I know them;
There's little need to show them!
Too well for new believing
I know their past deceiving,--
I am too old
(I say), and cold,
To-day, for new believing!

But still the wanton presses,
With honey-sweet caresses,
And still, to my undoing,
He wins me, with his wooing,
To buy his ware
With...

It's oh in Paradise that I fain would be,
Away from earth and weariness and all beside;
Earth is too full of loss with its dividing sea,
But Paradise upbuilds the bower for the bride.

Where flowers are yet in bud while the boughs are green,
I would get quit of earth and get robed for heaven;
Putting on my raiment white within the screen,
Putting on my crown of gold whose gems are seven

Fair is the fourfold river that maketh no moan,
Fair are the trees fruit-bearing of the wood,
Fair are the gold and bdellium and the onyx stone,
And I know the gold of that land is good.

O my love, my dove, lift up your eyes
Toward the eastern gate like an opening rose;
You and I who parted will meet in Paradise,
Pass within and sing when the gates unclose.

In his arms thy silly lamb,
Lo, he gathers to his breast!
See, thou sadly bleating dam,
See him lift thy silly lamb!
Hear it cry, "How blest I am!
Here is love, and love is rest!"
In his arms thy silly lamb
See him gather to his breast!

'Twas on a day of cold and sleet,
A little nomad of the street
With tattered garments, shoeless feet,
    And face with hunger wan,
Great wonder-eyes, though beautiful,
Hedged in by features pinched and dull,
Betraying lines so pitiful
    By sorrow sharply drawn;

Ere yet the service half was o'er,
Approached the great cathedral door
As choir and organ joined to pour
    Their sweetness on the air;
Then, sudden, bold, impelled to glide
With fleetness to the altar's side,
Her trembling form she sought to hide
    Amid the shadows there,

Half fearful lest some worshiper,
Enveloped close in robes of fur,
Had cast a scornful glance at her
    As she had stolen by,
But soon the swelling anthem, fraught
With reverence, her spirit...

Why speak of Rajah rubies,
And roses of the South?
I know a sweeter crimson
A baby's mouth.

Why speak of Sultan sapphires
And violet seas and skies?
I know a lovelier azure
A baby's eyes.

Go seek the wide world over!
Search every land and mart!
You 'll never find a pearl like this
A baby's heart.

1

The chestnut steed stood by the gate
His noble master's will to wait,
The woody park so green and bright
Was glowing in the morning light,
The young leaves of the aspen trees
Were dancing in the morning breeze.
The palace door was open wide,
Its lord was standing there,
And his sweet lady by his side
With soft dark eyes and raven hair.
He smiling took her wary hand
And said, 'No longer here I stand;
My charger shakes his flowing mane
And calls me with impatient neigh.
Adieu then till we meet again,
Sweet love, I must no longer stay.'

2

'You must not go so soon,' she said,
'I will not say farewell.
The sun has not dispelled the shade
In yonder dewy dell;
Dark shadows of gigantic length
Are sleeping on the l...

I am thinking of fern forests that once did towering stand,
Crowning all the barren mountains, shading all the dreary land.

Oh, the dreadful, quiet brooding, the solitude sublime,
That reigned like shadowy spectres o'er the third great day of time.

In long, low lines the tideless seas on dull gray shores did break,
No song of bird, no gleam of wing, o'er wood or reedy lake -

No flowers perfumed the pulseless air, no stars, no moon, no sun
To tell in silver language, night was past, or day was done.

Only silence rising with the ghostly morning's misty light,
Silence, silence, settling down upon the moonless, starless night.

And the ferns, and giant mosses, noiseless sentinels did stand,
Looking o'er the tideless ocean, watching o'er the dreary land.
<...

He placed a rose in my nut-brown hair--
A deep red rose with a fragrant heart
And said: "We'll set this day apart,
So sunny, so wondrous fair."

His face was full of a happy light,
His voice was tender and low and sweet,
The daisies and the violets grew at our feet--
Alas, for the coming of night!

The rose is black and withered and dead!
'Tis hid in a tiny box away;
The nut-brown hair is turning to gray,
And the light of the day is fled!

The light of the beautiful day is fled,
Hush'd is the voice so sweet and low--
And I--ah, me! I loved him so--
And the daisies grow over his head!

Oh, 'tis a touching thing, to make one weep, -
A tender infant with its curtain'd eye,
Breathing as it would neither live nor die
With that unchanging countenance of sleep!
As if its silent dream, serene and deep,
Had lined its slumber with a still blue sky
So that the passive cheeks unconscious lie
With no more life than roses - just to keep
The blushes warm, and the mild, odorous breath.
O blossom boy! so calm is thy repose.
So sweet a compromise of life and death,
'Tis pity those fair buds should e'er unclose
For memory to stain their inward leaf,
Tinging thy dreams with unacquainted grief.

He who binds to himself a joy
Does the winged life destroy;
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in eternity's sun rise.

    Thou flattering work of friendship kind,
    Still may thy pages call to mind
            The dear, the beauteous donor;
    Though sweetly female every part,
    Yet such a head, and more the heart,
            Does both the sexes honour.
    She showed her taste refined and just,
            When she selected thee,
    Yet deviating, own I must,
            For so approving me!
                But kind still, I'll mind still
                    The giver in the gift;
                I'll bless her, and wiss her
                    A Friend above the Lift.

Mossgiel, April, 1786.

    Were thou and I the white pinions
    On some eager, heaven-born dove,
    Swift would we mount to the old dominions,
    To our rest of old, my love!

    Were thou and I trembling strands
    In music's enchanted line,
    We would wait and wait for magic hands
    To untwist the magic twine.

    Were we two sky-tints, thou and I,
    Thou the golden, I the red;
    We would quiver and glow and darken and die,
    And love until we were dead!

    Nearer than wings of one dove,
    Than tones or colours in chord,
    We are one--and safe, and for ever, my love,
    Two thoughts in the heart of one Lord.

    High state and honours to others impart,
        But give me your heart:
    That treasure, that treasure alone,
        I beg for my own.

    So gentle a love, so fervent a fire,
        My soul does inspire;
    That treasure, that treasure alone,
        I beg for my own.
    Your love let me crave;
            Give me in possessing
        So matchless a blessing;
    That empire is all I would have.
            Love's my petition,
                All my ambition;
            If e'er you discover
            So faithful a lover,
            So real a flame,
            I'll die, I'll die,
            So give up my game.

(1674.)


I have desired, and I have been desired;
But now the days are over of desire,
Now dust and dying embers mock my fire;
Where is the hire for which my life was hired?
Oh vanity of vanities, desire!

Longing and love, pangs of a perished pleasure,
Longing and love, a disenkindled fire,
And memory a bottomless gulf of mire,
And love a fount of tears outrunning measure;
Oh vanity of vanities, desire!

Now from my heart, love's deathbed, trickles, trickles,
Drop by drop slowly, drop by drop of fire,
The dross of life, of love, of spent desire;
Alas, my rose of life gone all to prickles, -
Oh vanity of vanities, desire!

Oh vanity of vanities, desire;
Stunting my hope which might have strained up higher,
Turning my garden ...

My head is at your feet,
Two Cytherean doves,
The same, O cruel sweet,
As were the Queen of Love's;
They brush my dreaming brows
With silver fluttering beat,
Here in your golden house,
Beneath your feet.

No man that draweth breath
Is in such happy case:
My heart to itself saith -
Though kings gaze on her face,
I would not change my place;
To lie here is more sweet,
Here at her feet.

As one in a green land
Beneath a rose-bush lies,
Two petals in his hand,
With shut and dreaming eyes,
And hears the rustling stir,
As the young morning goes,
Shaking abroad the myrrh
Of each awakened rose;
So to me lying there
Comes the soft breath of her, -
O cruel sweet! -
There at her feet.

O little careles...

I never have been false to thee!--
    The heart I gave thee still is thine;
Though thou hast been untrue to me,
    And I no more may call thee mine!
I've loved, as woman ever loves,
    With constant soul in good or ill:
Thou'st proved as man too often proves,
    A rover--but I love thee still!

Yet think not that my spirit stoops
    To bind thee captive in my train!--
Love's not a flower at sunset droops,
    But smiles when comes her god again!
Thy words, which fall unheeded now,
    Could once my heart-strings madly thrill!
Love a golden chain and burning vow
    Are broken--but I love thee still!

Once what a heaven of bliss was ours,
    When love dispelled the clouds of care,
And time went by with birds and flowers,
    While...

One memory trembles on our lips;
It throbs in every breast;
In tear-dimmed eyes, in mirth's eclipse,
The shadow stands confessed.

O silent voice, that cheered so long
Our manhood's marching day,
Without thy breath of heavenly song,
How weary seems the way!

Vain every pictured phrase to tell
Our sorrowing heart's desire, -
The shattered harp, the broken shell,
The silent unstrung lyre;

For youth was round us while he sang;
It glowed in every tone;
With bridal chimes the echoes rang,
And made the past our own.

Oh blissful dream! Our nursery joys
We know must have an end,
But love and friendship's broken toys
May God's good angels mend!

The cheering smile, the voice of mirth
And laughter's gay surprise
T...

("Puisqu'ici-bas tout âme.")

[XL, May 19, 1836.]

Since everything below,
Doth, in this mortal state,
Its tone, its fragrance, or its glow
Communicate;

Since all that lives and moves
Upon the earth, bestows
On what it seeks and what it loves
Its thorn or rose;

Since April to the trees
Gives a bewitching sound,
And sombre night to grief gives ease,
And peace profound;

Since day-spring on the flower
A fresh'ning drop confers,
And the fresh air on branch and bower
Its choristers;

Since the dark wave bestows
A soft caress, imprest
On the green bank to which it goes
Seeking its rest;

I give thee at this hour,
Thus fondly bent o'er thee,
The best of all the things in dow'r
T...