PROLOGUE

O Lady Flora, let me speak:
A pleasant hour has passed away
While, dreaming on your damask cheek,
The dewy sister-eyelids lay.
As by the lattice you reclined,
I went thro’ many wayward moods
To see you dreaming–and, behind,
A summer crisp with shining woods.
And I too dream’d, until at last
Across my fancy, brooding warm,
The reflex of a legend past,
And loosely settled into form.
And would you have the thought I had,
And see the vision that I saw,
Then take the broidery-frame, and add
A crimson to the quaint Macaw,
And I will tell it. Turn your face,
Nor look with that too-earnest eye–
The rhymes are dazzled from their place
And order’d words asunder fly.



THE SLEEPING PALACE

I.

Th...

I've a friend beyond the ocean
    So regardful, so sincere,
And he sends me in a letter
    Such a pretty souvenir.

It is crushed to death and withered,
    Out of shape and very flat,
But its pure, delicious odor
    Is the richer for all that.

'Tis a rose from Honolulu,
    And it bears the tropic brand,
Sandwiched in this friendly missive
    From that far-off flower-land.

It shall mingle pot-à-pourri
    With the scents I love and keep;
Some of them so very precious
    That remembrance makes me weep.

While I dream I hear the music
    That of happiness foretells,
Like the flourishing of trumpets
    And the sound of marriage bells.

There's a rose upon the prairie,
    Chosen his by happy fate,...

A maiden wept and, as a comforter,
Came one who cried, "I love thee," and he seized
Her in his arms and kissed her with hot breath,
That dried the tears upon her flaming cheeks.
While evermore his boldly blazing eye
Burned into hers; but she uncomforted
Shrank from his arms and only wept the more.

Then one came and gazed mutely in her face
With wide and wistful eyes; but still aloof
He held himself; as with a reverent fear,
As one who knows some sacred presence nigh.
And as she wept he mingled tear with tear,
That cheered her soul like dew a dusty flower,--
Until she smiled, approached, and touched his hand!

We were apart: yet, day by day,
I bade my heart more constant be;
I bade it keep the world away,
And grow a home for only thee:
Nor fear’d but thy love likewise grew,
Like mine, each day more tried, more true.

The fault was grave: I might have known,
What far too soon, alas, I learn’d
The heart can bind itself alone,
And faith is often unreturn’d.
Self-sway’d our feelings ebb and swell:
Thou lov’est no more: Farewell! Farewell!

Farewell! and thou, thou lonely heart,
Which never yet without remorse
Even for a moment didn’t depart
From thy remote and spherèd course
To haunt the place where passions reign,
Back to thy solitude again!

Back, with the conscious thrill of shame
Which Luna felt, that summer night,
Flash through he...

Well may you sit within, and, fond of grief,
Look in each other's face, and melt in tears.
Well may you shun all counsel, all relief.
Oh she was great in mind, tho' young in years!

Chang'd is that lovely countenance, which shed
Light when she spoke; and kindled sweet surprise,
As o'er her frame each warm emotion spread,
Play'd round her lips, and sparkled in her eyes.

Those lips so pure, that mov'd but to persuade,
Still to the last enliven'd and endear'd.
Those eyes at once her secret soul convey'd,
And ever beam'd delight when you appear'd.

Yet has she fled the life of bliss below,
That youthful Hope in bright perspective drew?
False were the tints! false as the feverish glow
That o'er her burning cheek Distemper threw!

And now in joy...

Annie - Oh! what a weary while
It seems since that sad day;
When whispering a fond "good bye,"
I tore myself away.
And yet, 'tis only two short years;
How has it seemed to thee?
To me, those lonesome years appear
Like an eternity.

We loved, - Ah, me! how much we loved;
How happy passed the day
When pouring forth enraptured vows,
The charmed hours passed away.
In every leaf we beauty saw, -
In every song and sound,
Some sweet entrancing melody,
To soothe our hearts we found.

And now it haunts me as a dream, -
A thing that could not be! -
That one so pure and beautiful
Could ever care for me.
But I still have the nut-brown curl,
Which tells me it is true;
And in my fancy I can see
The brow where once it grew.
<...

Give me the chance, and I will make
Thy thoughts of me, like worms this day,
Take wings and change to butterflies
That in the golden light shall play;
Thy cold, clear heart, the quiet pool
That never heard Love's nightingale,
Shall hear his music night and day,
And in no seasons shall it fail.

I'll make thy happy heart my port,
Where all my thoughts are anchored fast;
Thy meditations, full of praise,
The flags of glory on each mast.
I'll make my Soul thy shepherd soon,
With all thy thoughts my grateful flock;
And thou shalt say, each time I go,
How long, my Love, ere thou'lt come back?

Then, fare thee well, my own dear love,
    This world has now for us
No greater grief, no pain above
    The pain of parting thus,
            Dear love!
    The pain of parting thus.

Had we but known, since first we met,
    Some few short hours of bliss,
We might, in numbering them, forget
    The deep, deep pain of this,
            Dear love!
    The deep, deep pain of this.

But no, alas, we've never seen
    One glimpse of pleasure's ray,
But still there came some cloud between,
    And chased it all away,
            Dear love!
    And chased it all away.

Yet, even could those sad moments last,
    Far dearer to my heart
Were hours of grief, together past,
    Than years of mirth apart,
            Dear lo...

We will not speak of years to-night, -
For what have years to bring
But larger floods of love and light,
And sweeter songs to sing?

We will not drown in wordy praise
The kindly thoughts that rise;
If Friendship own one tender phrase,
He reads it in our eyes.

We need not waste our school-boy art
To gild this notch of Time; -
Forgive me if my wayward heart
Has throbbed in artless rhyme.

Enough for him the silent grasp
That knits us hand in hand,
And he the bracelet's radiant clasp
That locks our circling band.

Strength to his hours of manly toil!
Peace to his starlit dreams!
Who loves alike the furrowed soil,
The music-haunted streams!

Sweet smiles to keep forever bright
The sunshine on his lips,
And fa...

    Love, thou gayest fancy-weaver,
    Heart-betrayer, soul-deceiver,
    Come with all thy clinging kisses;
    Bringing all thy beaming blisses;
    It may serve the cynic's parts,
        If he curse and if he scout thee,
    But, O, where were gentle hearts,
        If they had to live without thee!

    Weave the spells of thy beguiling
    'Round and 'round me with thy smiling,
    Till the ashen cheek is beaming,
    And the faded eye is gleaming;
    Millions may endure the fight
        In the battle vain to end thee,
    But when taste they thy delight
        They will serve thee and defend thee.

    Bring thy little winsome graces
    And the sweets of glad embraces,
    Till the pleasures all are dancing
    Into mazy wh...

You will be mine; those lightly dancing feet,
    Falling as softly on the careless street
As the wind-loosened petals of a flower,
    Will bring you here, at the Appointed Hour.

And all the Temple's little links and laws
    Will not for long protect your loveliness.
I have a stronger force to aid my cause,
    Nature's great Law, to love and to possess!

Throughout those sleepless watches, when I lay
    Wakeful, desiring what I might not see,
I knew (it helped those hours, from dusk to day),
    In this one thing, Fate would be kind to me.

You will consent, through all my veins like wine
    This prescience flows; your lips meet mine above,
Your clear soft eyes look upward into mine
    Dim in a silent ecstasy of love.

The clustered ...

CHTHONOË    MYRTILLA
RHODOPE    PASIPHASSA
GORGO    SITYS

**    *    *    *

SCENE

The women's house in the House of Paris in Troy.

TIME.--The Tenth year of the War.

**    *    *    *

Helen's women are lying alone in the twilight hour. Chthonoë presently rises and throws a little incense upon the altar flame. Then she begins to speak to the Image of Aphrodite in a low and tired voice.


    CHTHONOË

Goddess of burning and little rest,
By the hand swaying on thy breast,
By glancing eye and slow sweet smile
Tell me what long look or what guile
Of thine it was that like a spear
Pierced her heart, who caged me here
In this close house, to be with her
Mistress at once and prisoner!
Far from earth a...

It is a circumstance connected with the history of Nero, that every spring and summer, for many years after his death, fresh and beautiful flowers were nightly scattered upon his grave by some unknown hand.

Tradition relates that it was done by a young maiden of Corinth, named Acle, whom Nero had brought to Rome from her native city, whither he had gone in the disguise of an artist, to contend in the Nemean, Isthinian, and Floral games, celebrated there; and whence he returned conqueror in the Palaestra, the chariot race, and the song; bearing with him, like Jason of old, a second Medea, divine in form and feature as the first, and who like her had left father, friends, and country, to follow a stranger.

Even the worse than savage barbarity of this sanguinary tyrant, had not cut him off from all human affection; and ...

The dull world clamors at my feet
And asks my hand and helping sweet;
And wonders when the time shall be
I'll leave off dreaming dreams of thee.
It blames me coining soul and time
And sending minted bits of rhyme--
A-wooing of thee still.

Shall I make answer? This it is:
I camp beneath thy galaxies
Of starry thoughts and shining deeds;
And, seeing new ones, I must needs
Arouse my speech to tell thee, dear,
Though thou art nearer, I am near--
A-wooing of thee still.

I feel thy heart-beat next mine own;
Its music hath a richer tone.
I rediscover in thine eyes
A balmier, dewier paradise.
I'm sure thou art a rarer girl--
And so I seek thee, finest pearl,
A-wooing of thee still.

With blood of roses on thy lips--
Canst...

In the silence of my heart,
I will spend an hour with thee,
When my love shall rend apart
All the veil of mystery:

All that dim and misty veil
That shut in between our souls
When Death cried, "Ho, maiden, hail!"
And your barque sped on the shoals.

On the shoals? Nay, wrongly said.
On the breeze of Death that sweeps
Far from life, thy soul has sped
Out into unsounded deeps.

I shall take an hour and come
Sailing, darling, to thy side.
Wind nor sea may keep me from
Soft communings with my bride.

I shall rest my head on thee
As I did long days of yore,
When a calm, untroubled sea
Rocked thy vessel at the shore.

I shall take thy hand in mine,
And live o'er the olden days
When thy smile to me was wine,--

What bashful wildness in those crystal eyes,
    Fair Zillia! - Ah! more dear to LOVE the gaze
    That dwells upon its object, than the rays
    Of that vague glance, quick, as in summer skies
The lightning's lambent flash, when neither rise
    Thunder, nor storm. - I mark, while transport plays
    Warm in thy Lover's eye, what dread betrays
    Thy throbbing heart: - yet why from his soft sighs
Fleet'st thou so swift away? - like the young Hind[1],
    That bending stands the fountain's brim beside,
    When, with a sudden gust, the western wind
Rustles among the boughs that shade the tide:
    See, from the stream, innoxious and benign,
    Starting she bounds, with terror vain as thine!

1: "Vitas hinnuleo me similis Chloe." HORACE.

From publick Noise and factious Strife,
From all the busie Ills of Life,
Take me, My Celia, to Thy Breast;
And lull my wearied Soul to Rest:
For ever, in this humble Cell,
Let Thee and I, my Fair One, dwell;
None enter else, but Love and He
Shall bar the Door, and keep the Key.

To painted Roofs, and shining Spires
(Uneasie Seats of high Desires)
Let the unthinking Many croud,
That dare be Covetous and Proud:
In golden Bondage let Them wait,
And barter Happiness for State:
But Oh! My Celia, when Thy Swain
Desires to see a Court again;
May Heav'n around This destin'd Head
The choicest of it's Curses shed:
To sum up all the Rage of Fate,
In the Two Things I dread and hate;
May'st Thou be False, and I be Great.

Thus, on his Cel...

O dearest bloom the seasons know,
Flowers of the Resurrection blow,
Our hope and faith restore;
And through the bitterness of death
And loss and sorrow, breathe a breath
Of life forevermore!

The thought of Love Immortal blends
With fond remembrances of friends;
In you, O sacred flowers,
By human love made doubly sweet,
The heavenly and the earthly meet,
The heart of Christ and ours