Sweet for a little even to fear, and sweet,
O love, to lay down fear at love’s fair feet;
Shall not some fiery memory of his breath
Lie sweet on lips that touch the lips of death?
Yet leave me not; yet, if thou wilt, be free;
Love me no more, but love my love of thee.
Love where thou wilt, and live thy life; and I,
One thing I can, and one love cannot—die.
Pass from me; yet thine arms, thine eyes, thine hair,
Feed my desire and deaden my despair.
Yet once more ere time change us, ere my cheek
Whiten, ere hope be dumb or sorrow speak,
Yet once more ere thou hate me, one full kiss;
Keep other hours for others, save me this.
Yea, and I will not (if it please thee) weep,
Lest thou be sad; I will but sigh, and sleep.
Sweet, does death hurt? thou canst not do me wro...

All houses wherein men have lived and died
    Are haunted houses.    Through the open doors
The harmless phantoms on their errands glide,
    With feet that make no sound upon the floors.

We meet them at the door-way, on the stair,
    Along the passages they come and go,
Impalpable impressions on the air,
    A sense of something moving to and fro.

There are more guests at table, than the hosts
    Invited; the illuminated hall
Is thronged with quiet, inoffensive ghosts,
    As silent as the pictures on the wall.

The stranger at my fireside cannot see
    The forms I see, nor hear the sounds I hear;
He but perceives what is; while unto me
    All that has been is visible and clear.

We have no title-deeds to house or lands;
    Ow...

Oh yet we trust that somehow good
Will be the final goal of ill,
To pangs of nature, sins of will,
Defects of doubt, and taints of blood;

That nothing walks with aimless feet;
That not one life will be destroy’d,
Or cast as rubbish to the void,
When God hath made the pile complete;

That not a worm is cloven in vain;
That not a moth with vain desire
Is shrivell’d in a fruitless fire,
Or but subserves another gain.

Behold, we know not anything;
I can but trust that good shall fall
At last, far off, at last to all,
And every winter change to spring.

So runs my dream; but who am I?
An infant crying in the night;
An infant crying for the light,
And with no language, but a cry.

        There is a haunting phantom called Regret,
    A shadowy creature robed somewhat like Woe,
    But fairer in the face, whom all men know
        By her sad mien and eyes forever wet.
        No heart would seek her; but once having met,
    All take her by the hand, and to and fro
    They wander through those paths of long ago -
        Those hallowed ways 'twere wiser to forget.

        One day she led me to that lost land's gate
    And bade me enter; but I answered "No!
        I will pass on with my bold comrade, Fate;
    I have no tears to waste on thee - no time;
    My strength I hoard for heights I hope to climb:
        No friend art thou for souls that would be great."

Let us go far from here!
Here there is sadness in the early year:
Here sorrow waits where joy went laughing late:
The sicklied face of heaven hangs like hate
Above the woodland and the meadowland;
And Spring hath taken fire in her hand
Of frost and made a dead bloom of her face,
Which was a flower of marvel once and grace,
And sweet serenity and stainless glow.
Delay not. Let us go.

Let us go far away
Into the sunrise of a fairer May:
Where all the nights resign them to the moon,
And drug their souls with odor and soft tune,
And tell their dreams in starlight: where the hours
Teach immortality with fadeless flowers;
And all the day the bee weights down the bloom,
And all the night the moth shakes strange perfume,
Like music, from the flower-bel...

Sorrows our portion are: ere hence we go,
Crosses we must have; or, hereafter woe.

    His father had a large family
    Of girls and boys and he was born and bred
    In a barn or kind of cattle shed.
    But he was a hardy youngster and grew to be
    A boy with eyes that sparkled like a rod
    Of white hot iron in the blacksmith shop.
    His face was ruddy like a rising moon,
    And his hair was black as sheep's wool that is black.
    And he had rugged arms and legs and a strong back.
    And he had a voice half flute and half bassoon.
    And from his toes up to his head's top
    He was a man, simple but intricate.
    And most men differ who try to delineate
    His life and fate.

    He never seemed ashamed
    Of poverty or of his origin. He was a wayward child,
    Nevertheless though wise and mild,
    And thoughtful...

“Arcane danze
D’immortal piede i ruinosi gioghi
Scossero e l’ardue selve (oggi romito
Nido de’ vend).”
- LEOPARDI.


Through the country to the town
Ran a rumour and renown,
That a woman grand and tall,
Swift of foot, and therewithal
Naked as a lily gleaming,
Had been seen by eyes not dreaming,
Darting down far forest glades,
Flashing sunshine through the shades.

With this rumour’s swelling word
All the city buzzed and stirred;
Solemn senators conferred;
Priest, astrologer, and mage,
Subtle sophist, bard, and sage,
Brought their wisdom, lore, and wit,
To expound or riddle it:
Last a porter ventured “We
Might go out ourselves to see.”

Thus, upon a summer morn,
Lo the city all forlorn;
Every ho...

Because thou wast most delicate,
A woman fair for men to see,
The earth did compass thy estate,
Thou didst hold life and death in fee,
And every soul did bend the knee.

[Sidenote: (Wherein the corrupt spirit of privilege is symbolized by Delilah and the People by Samson.)]

Much pleasure also made thee grieve
For that the goblet had been drained.
The well spiced viand thou didst leave
To frown on want whose throat was strained,
And violence whose hands were stained.

The purple of thy royal cloak,
Made the sea paler for its hue.
Much people bent beneath the yoke
To fetch thee jewels white and blue,
And rings to pass thy gold hair through.

Therefore, Delilah wast thou called,
Because the choice wines nourished thee
In Sorek, by t...

Aristonoë, the fading shepherdess,
Gathers the young girls round her in a ring,
Teaching them wisdom of love,
What to say, how to dress,
How frown, how smile,
How suitors to their dancing feet to bring,
How in mere walking to beguile,
What words cunningly said in what a way
Will draw man's busy fancy astray,
All the alphabet, grammar and syntax of love.

The garden smells are sweet,
Daisies spring in the turf under the high-heeled feet,
Dense, dark banks of laurel grow
Behind the wavering row
Of golden, flaxen, black, brown, auburn heads,
Behind the light and shimmering dresses
Of these unreal, modern shepherdesses;
And gaudy flowers in formal patterned beds
Vary the dim long vistas of the park,
Far as the eye can see,
Till at the fore...

Giunto è già.


Now hath my life across a stormy sea
        Like a frail bark reached that wide port where all
        Are bidden, ere the final reckoning fall
        Of good and evil for eternity.

Now know I well how that fond phantasy
        Which made my soul the worshipper and thrall
        Of earthly art, is vain; how criminal
        Is that which all men seek unwillingly.

Those amorous thoughts which were so lightly dressed,
        What are they when the double death is nigh?
        The one I know for sure, the other dread.

Painting nor sculpture now can lull to rest
        My soul that turns to His great love on high,
        Whose arms to clasp us on the cross were spread.

L' alto signor, dinanzi a cui non vale.

HIS SORROW FOR THE ILLNESS OF LAURA INCREASES, NOT LESSENS, HIS FLAME.


    The sovereign Lord, 'gainst whom of no avail
Concealment, or resistance is, or flight,
My mind had kindled to a new delight
By his own amorous and ardent ail:
Though his first blow, transfixing my best mail
Were mortal sure, to push his triumph quite
He took a shaft of sorrow in his right,
So my soft heart on both sides to assail.
A burning wound the one shed fire and flame,
The other tears, which ever grief distils,
Through eyes for your weak health that are as rills.
But no relief from either fountain came
My bosom's conflagration to abate,
Nay, passion grew by very pity great.

MACGREGOR.

I have sought and followed you, drunk with your sacred wine;
Led out by a laughing wind on a tumbling sea,
On crags amid clouds, in cups that allure the bee,
And deep in the gem-lit gloom of the tortuous mine,
And on widespread wings where the great worlds dance and shine
I have sought by the golden light; but have bent the knee
At last where you lie, a humble goddess and free,
Naked and flushed in the warmth of a crimson shrine.
The hordes of hate have trampled your blooms in mire,
And cackle and roar as their mockery priests blaspheme,
And sing the marching hymn of a wingless might.
They forge their god in the heat of unholy fire
The squat strong incubus born of an evil dream;
And it shrinks and crumbles away in the golden light.

If Death should claim me for her own to-day,
And softly I should falter from your side,
Oh, tell me, loved one, would my memory stay,
And would my image in your heart abide?
Or should I be as some forgotten dream,
That lives its little space, then fades entire?
Should Time send o'er you its relentless stream,
To cool your heart, and quench for aye love's fire?

I would not for the world, love, give you pain,
Or ever compass what would cause you grief;
And, oh, how well I know that tears are vain!
But love is sweet, my dear, and life is brief;
So if some day before you I should go
Beyond the sound and sight of song and sea,
'T would give my spirit stronger wings to know
That you remembered still and wept for me.

HE

One decade and a half since first we came
With hearts aflame
Into Love's Paradise, as man and mate;
And now we separate.
Soon, all too soon,
Waned the white splendour of our honeymoon.
    We saw it fading; but we did not know
    How bleak the path would be when once its glow
Was wholly gone.
And yet we two were forced to follow on -
    Leagues, leagues apart while ever side by side.
    Darker and darker grew the loveless weather,
Darker the way,
Until we could not stay
    Longer together.
    Now that all anger from our hearts has died,
And love has flown far from its ruined nest,
To find sweet shelter in another breast,
    Let us talk calmly of our past mistakes,
    And of our faults; if only for the sakes
Of those wit...

Too much my heart of Beauty's power hath known,
Too long to Love hath reason left her throne;
Too long my genius mourn'd his myrtle chain,
And three rich years of youth consum'd in vain.
My wishes, lull'd with soft inglorious dreams,
Forgot the patriot's and the sage's themes:
Through each Elysian vale and fairy grove,
Through all the enchanted paradise of love,
Misled by sickly hope's deceitful flame,
Averse to action, and renouncing fame.

At last the visionary scenes decay,
My eyes, exulting, bless the new-born day,
Whose faithful beams detect the dangerous road
In which my heedless feet securely trod,
And strip the phantoms of their lying charms
That lur'd my soul from Wisdom's peaceful arms.

For silver streams and banks bespread with flowers,

    As, in the lonely night,
    Above the silvered fields and streams
    Where zephyr gently blows,
    And myriad objects vague,
    Illusions, that deceive,
    Their distant shadows weave
    Amid the silent rills,
    The trees, the hedges, villages, and hills;
    Arrived at heaven's boundary,
    Behind the Apennine or Alp,
    Or into the deep bosom of the sea,
    The moon descends, the world grows dim;
    The shadows disappear, darkness profound
    Falls on each hill and vale around,
    And night is desolate,
    And singing, with his plaintive lay,
    The parting gleam of friendly light
    The traveller greets, whose radiance bright,
    Till now, hath guided him upon his way;

    So vanishes, so desolate
    Youth le...

Greystone, Aug. 4, 1886.


Once more, O all-adjusting Death!
The nation's Pantheon opens wide;
Once more a common sorrow saith
A strong, wise man has died.

Faults doubtless had he. Had we not
Our own, to question and asperse
The worth we doubted or forgot
Until beside his hearse?

Ambitious, cautious, yet the man
To strike down fraud with resolute hand;
A patriot, if a partisan,
He loved his native land.

So let the mourning bells be rung,
The banner droop its folds half way,
And while the public pen and tongue
Their fitting tribute pay,

Shall we not vow above his bier
To set our feet on party lies,
And wound no more a living ear
With words that Death denies