My heart is like a ship that finds no rest,
Tossed here and there upon the stormy breast
Of loves of many hearts too oft conferred.

Thy love is like the harbour, safe and still,
Into whose calm that ship may glide at will,
Under the slope of God's Eternal Will.

So near the perfect peace that knows no word;
Yet with an empty, white emotion stirred,
It folds its wings like some contented bird.

At rest, and yet not anchored; and some day
Out of the restful peace of this calm bay
The winds of Fate will drift it far away.

Fresco ambroso fiorito e verde colle.

HE CONGRATULATES HIS HEART ON ITS REMAINING WITH HER.


    O hill with green o'erspread, with groves o'erhung!
Where musing now, now trilling her sweet lay,
Most like what bards of heavenly spirits say,
Sits she by fame through every region sung:
My heart, which wisely unto her has clung--
More wise, if there, in absence blest, it stay!
Notes now the turf o'er which her soft steps stray,
Now where her angel-eyes' mild beam is flung;
Then throbs and murmurs, as they onward rove,
"Ah! were he here, that man of wretched lot,
Doom'd but to taste the bitterness of love!"
She, conscious, smiles: our feelings tally not:
Heartless am I, mere stone; heaven is thy grove--
O dear delightful shade, O consecrated spo...

    I

    A molten ruby clear as wine
        Along the east the dawning swims;
    The morning-glories swing and shine,
        The night dews bead their satin rims;
    The bees rob sweets from shrub and vine,
        The gold hangs on their limbs.

            Sweet morn, the South,
                A royal lover,
            From his fragrant mouth,
            Sweet morn, the South
                Breathes on and over
    Keen scents of wild honey and rosy clover.


    II

    Beside the wall the roses blow
        Long summer noons the winds forsake;
    Beside the wall the poppies glow
        So full of fire their hearts do ache;
            The dipping butterflies come slow,
                Half dreaming, half ...

Take, since you bade it should bear,
These, of the seed of your sowing,
Blossom or berry or weed.
Sweet though they be not, or fair,
That the dew of your word kept growing,
Sweet at least was the seed.

Men bring you love-offerings of tears,
And sorrow the kiss that assuages,
And slaves the hate-offering of wrongs,
And time the thanksgiving of years,
And years the thanksgiving of ages;
I bring you my handful of songs.

If a perfume be left, if a bloom,
Let it live till Italia be risen,
To be strewn in the dust of her car
When her voice shall awake from the tomb
England, and France from her prison,
Sisters, a star by a star.

I bring you the sword of a song,
The sword of my spirit’s desire,
Feeble; but laid at your feet,
...

Love thee, dearest? love thee?
    Yes, by yonder star I swear,
Which thro' tears above thee
    Shines so sadly fair;
Tho' often dim,
With tears, like him,
Like him my truth will shine,
    And--love thee, dearest? love thee?
Yes, till death I'm thine.

Leave thee, dearest? leave thee?
    No, that star is not more true;
When my vows deceive thee,
    He will wander too.
A cloud of night
May veil his light,
And death shall darken mine--
    But--leave thee, dearest? leave thee?
No, till death I'm thine.

This is the lesson I have learned of Beauty:
Who gathers flowers finds that flowers fade:
Who sets love in his heart above his duty
Misses the part for which that love was made.
Than passion, haply, there is nothing madder:
Who plucks its red rose plucks with it a thorn:
More than soul's pain what hurt can make us sadder?
And yet of this immortal things are born.

There was a rose in Eden once: it grows
On Earth now, sweeter for its rare perfume:
And Paradise is poorer by one bloom,
And Earth is richer. In this blossom glows
More loveliness than old seraglios
Or courts of kings did ever yet illume:
More purity, than ever yet had room
In soul of nun or saint. O human rose,
Who art initial and sweet period of
My heart's divinest sentence, where I read
Love, first and last, and in the pauses love;
Who art the dear ideal of each deed
My life aspires by to some high goal,
Set in the haunted garden of my soul!

Rose-cheeked Laura, come,
Sing thou smoothly with thy beauty's
Silent music, either other
Sweetly gracing.

Lovely forms do flow
From concert divinely framed;
Heav'n is music, and thy beauty's
Birth is heavenly.

These dull notes we sing
Discords need for helps to grace them;
Only beauty purely loving
Knows no discord,

But still moves delight,
Like clear springs renewed by flowing,
Ever perfect, ever in them-
Selves eternal.

Darkness had stretched its colour,
Deep blue across the pane:
No cloud to make night duller,
No moon with its tarnish stain;
But only here and there a star,
One sharp point of frosty fire,
Hanging infinitely far
In mockery of our life and death
And all our small desire.

Now in this hour of waking
From under brows of stone,
A new pale day is breaking
And the deep night is gone.
Sordid now, and mean and small
The daylight world is seen again,
With only the veils of mist that fall
Deaf and muffling over all
To hide its ugliness and pain.

But to-day this dawn of meanness
Shines in my eyes, as when
The new world's brightness and cleanness
Broke on the first of men.
For the light that shows the huddled things
Of this cl...

Underneath an apple-tree
Sat a maiden and her lover;
And the thoughts within her he
Yearned, in silence, to discover.
Round them danced the sunbeams bright,
Green the grass-lawn stretched before them;
While the apple-blossoms white
Hung in rich profusion o'er them.

Naught within her eyes he read
That would tell her mind unto him;
Though their light, he after said,
Quivered swiftly through and through him;
Till at last his heart burst free
From the prayer with which 'twas laden,
And he said, "When wilt thou be
Mine for evermore, fair maiden?"

"When," said she, "the breeze of May
With white flakes our heads shall cover,
I will be thy brideling gay--
Thou shall be my husband-lover."
"How," said he, in sorrow bowed,
"Can I hope...

Sing; how 'a would sing!
How 'a would raise the tune
When we rode in the waggon from harvesting
By the light o' the moon!

Dance; how 'a would dance!
If a fiddlestring did but sound
She would hold out her coats, give a slanting glance,
And go round and round.

Laugh; how 'a would laugh!
Her peony lips would part
As if none such a place for a lover to quaff
At the deeps of a heart.

Julie, O girl of joy,
Soon, soon that lover he came.
Ah, yes; and gave thee a baby-boy,
But never his name . . .

- Tolling for her, as you guess;
And the baby too . . . 'Tis well.
You knew her in maidhood likewise? - Yes,
That's her burial bell.

"I suppose," with a laugh, she said,
"I should blush that I'm not a wife;
But how ...

The moth and beetle wing about
The garden ways of other days;
Above the hills, a fiery shout
Of gold, the day dies slowly out,
Like some wild blast a huntsman blows:
And o'er the hills my Fancy goes,
Following the sunset's golden call
Unto a vine-hung garden wall,
Where she awaits me in the gloom,
Between the lily and the rose,
With arms and lips of warm perfume,
The dream of Love my Fancy knows.

The glowworm and the firefly glow
Among the ways of bygone days;
A golden shaft shot from a bow
Of silver, star and moon swing low
Above the hills where twilight lies:
And o'er the hills my Longing flies,
Following the star's far-arrowed gold,
Unto a gate where, as of old,
She waits amid the rose and rue,
With star-bright hair and night-...

I will not despair while thou rulest the storm,
    Though the red lightning stream o'er the cloud's sable-breast,
For I catch through the darkness bright gleams of thy form,
    And I know 'tis thy voice lulls the tempest to rest -
                The wild tempest to rest:
Nor yet, though the shadows of deepening night,
    Hang over my path like the pall of despair;
For one star through the gloom sends its hallowed light,
    And I know 'tis thy love smiling tenderly there,
                - Ah! tenderly there.

I will not despair, though the fountain that burst
    For me in life's desert be wasted and dry;
For thy love was the fountain that cheered me at first,
    And again to its life-giving waters I fly -
                O Holiest, fly!
No; I will not d...

My Mopsa is little, my Mopsa is brown,
But her cheek is as smooth as the peach's soft down,
    And, for blushing, no rose can come near her;
In short, she has woven such nets round my heart,
That I ne'er from my dear little Mopsa can part,--
    Unless I can find one that's dearer.

Her voice hath a music that dwells on the ear,
And her eye from its orb gives a daylight so clear,
    That I'm dazzled whenever I meet her;
Her ringlets, so curly, are Cupid's own net,
And her lips, oh their sweetness I ne'er shall forget--
    Till I light upon lips that are sweeter.

But 'tis not her beauty that charms me alone,
'Tis her mind, 'tis that language whose eloquent tone
    From the depths of the grave could revive one:
In short, here I swear, that if death wer...

        I.
        LOVE'S YOUNG DREAM. A.D. 1880.


        "Thank you much obliged, old boy,
            Yes, it's so; report says true.
        I'm engaged to Nell Latine
            What else could a fellow do?
        Governor was getting fierce;
            Asked me, with paternal frown,
        When I meant to go to work,
            Take a wife, and settle down.
        Stormed at my extravagance,
            Talked of cutting off supplies
        Fairly bullied me, you know
            Sort of thing that I despise.
        Well, you see, I lost worst way
            At the races Governor raged
        So, to try and smooth him down,
            I went off, and got engaged.
        Sort of put-up job, you know
            All ar...

(Lyra Eucharistica, 1863.)


I am pale with sick desire,
    For my heart is far away
From this world's fitful fire
    And this world's waning day;
In a dream it overleaps
    A world of tedious ills
To where the sunshine sleeps
    On th' everlasting hills.
    Say the Saints - There Angels ease us
    Glorified and white.
    They say - We rest in Jesus,
    Where is not day nor night.

My Soul saith - I have sought
    For a home that is not gained,
I have spent yet nothing bought,
    Have laboured but not attained;
My pride strove to rise and grow,
    And hath but dwindled down;
My love sought love, and lo!
    Hath not attained its crown.
    Say the Saints - Fresh Souls increase us,
    None languish...

    When God's own child came down to earth,
    High heaven was very glad;
    The angels sang for holy mirth;
    Not God himself was sad!

    Shall we, when ours goes homeward, fret?
    Come, Hope, and wait on Sorrow!
    The little one will not forget;
    It's only till to-morrow!

When I love
I feel that I am the king of time
I possess the earth and everything on it
and ride into the sun upon my horse.

When I love
I become liquid light
invisible to the eye
and the poems in my notebooks
become fields of mimosa and poppy.

When I love
the water gushes from my fingers
grass grows on my tongue
when I love
I become time outside all time.

When I love a woman
all the trees
run barefoot toward me...