BRIDE

O love, love, hold me fast,
He draws me away from thee;
I cannot stem the blast,
Nor the cold strong sea:
Far away a light shines
Beyond the hills and pines;
It is lit for me.

    BRIDEGROOM

I have thee close, my dear,
No terror can come near;
Only far off the northern light shines clear.

    GHOST

Come with me, fair and false,
To our home, come home.
It is my voice that calls:
Once thou wast not afraid
When I woo'd, and said,
'Come, our nest is newly made'--
Now cross the tossing foam.

    BRIDE

Hold me one moment longer,
He taunts me with the past,
His clutch is waxing stronger,
Hold me fast, hold me fast.
He draws me from thy heart,
And I cannot withhold:

As I ebb'd with the ocean of life,
As I wended the shores I know,
As I walk'd where the ripples continually wash you Paumanok,
Where they rustle up hoarse and sibilant,
Where the fierce old mother endlessly cries for her castaways,
I musing late in the autumn day, gazing off southward,
Held by this electric self out of the pride of which I utter poems,
Was seiz'd by the spirit that trails in the lines underfoot,
The rim, the sediment that stands for all the water and all the land of the globe.

Fascinated, my eyes reverting from the south, dropt, to follow those slender windrows,
Chaff, straw, splinters of wood, weeds, and the sea-gluten,
Scum, scales from shining rocks, leaves of salt-lettuce, left by the tide,
Miles walking, the sound of breaking waves the other side of me...

Who is the shepherd sent to lead,
Through pastures green, the Master's sheep?
What guileless "Israelite indeed"
The folded flock may watch and keep?

He who with manliest spirit joins
The heart of gentlest human mould,
With burning light and girded loins,
To guide the flock, or watch the fold;

True to all Truth the world denies,
Not tongue-tied for its gilded sin;
Not always right in all men's eyes,
But faithful to the light within;

Who asks no meed of earthly fame,
Who knows no earthly master's call,
Who hopes for man, through guilt and shame,
Still answering, "God is over all";

Who makes another's grief his own,
Whose smile lends joy a double cheer;
Where lives the saint, if such be known? -
Speak softly, - such an one i...

Did you hear of the Widow Malone
            O hone!
Who lived in the town of Athlone
            Alone?
O, she melted the hearts
Of the swains in them parts;
So lovely the Widow Malone,
            O hone!
So lovely the Widow Malone.
Of lovers she had a full score
            Or more;
And fortunes they all had galore
            In store;
From the minister down
To the clerk of the Crown,
All were courting the Widow Malone
            O hone!
All were courting the Widow Malone.

But so modest was Mrs. Malone,
            'Twas known,
That no one could see her alone,
            O hone!
Let them ogle and sigh,
They could ne'er catch her eye;
So bashful the Widow Malone,
            O hone!
So bashful the Wi...

Though the winds be dank,
And the sky be sober,
And the grieving Day
In a mantle gray
Hath let her waiting maiden robe her,--
All the fields along
I can hear the song
Of the meadow lark,
As she flits and flutters,
And laughs at the thunder when it mutters.
O happy bird, of heart most gay
To sing when skies are gray!

When the clouds are full,
And the tempest master
Lets the loud winds sweep
From his bosom deep
Like heralds of some dire disaster,
Then the heart alone
To itself makes moan;
And the songs come slow,
While the tears fall fleeter,
And silence than song by far seems sweeter.
Oh, few are they along the way
Who sing when skies are gray!

Time, and thy charms, thou fanciest will redeem
    Yon aweless Libertine from rooted vice.
    Misleading thought! has he not paid the price,
    His taste for virtue? - Ah, the sensual stream
Has flow'd too long. - What charms can so entice,
    What frequent guilt so pall, as not to shame
    The rash belief, presumptuous and unwise,
    That crimes habitual will forsake the Frame? -
[1]Thus, on the river's bank, in fabled lore,
    The Rustic stands; sees the stream swiftly go,
    And thinks he soon shall find the gulph below
A channel dry, which he may safe pass o'er. -
    Vain hope! - it flows - and flows - and yet will flow,
    Volume decreaseless, to the FINAL HOUR.

1:

"Rusticus exspectat dum defluit amnis: at ille Labitur, et labetur in omne...

My boat is on the bounding tide,
Away, away from surge and shore;
A waif upon the wave I ride,
Without a rudder or an oar.

Blow as ye list, ye breezes, blow
The compass now is nought to me;
Flow as ye will, ye billows, flow,
If but ye bear me out to sea.

Yon waving line of dusky blue,
Where care and toil oppress the heart
To thee I bid a long adieu,
And smile to feel that thus we part.

There let the sweating ploughman toil,
The yearning miser count his gain,
The fevered scholar waste his oil,
But I am bounding o'er the main!

How fresh these breezes to the brow
How dear this freedom to the soul;
Bright ocean, I am with thee now,
So let thy golden billows roll!

* * * * *

But stay what means this throbb...

A Sufi debauchee of dreams
Spake this: From Sodomite to Peri
Earth tablets us; we live and are
Man's own long commentary.

Is one begat in Bassora,
One lies in Damietta dying
The plausibilities of God
All possibles o'erlying.

But burns the lust within the flesh?
Hell's but a homily to Heaven,
Put then the individual first,
And of thyself be shriven.

Neither in adamant nor brass
The scrutinizing eye records it;
The arm is rooted in the heart,
The heart that rules and lords it.

Be that it is and thou art all;
And what thou art so thou hast written
Thee of the lutanists of Love,
Or of the torture-smitten.

The uses of sorrow I comprehend
Better and better at each year's end.

Deeper and deeper I seem to see
Why and wherefore it has to be.

Only after the dark, wet days
Do we fully rejoice in the sun's bright rays.

Sweeter the crust tastes after the fast
Than the sated gourmand's finest repast.

The faintest cheer sounds never amiss
To the actor who once has heard a hiss.

To one who the sadness of freedom knows,
Light seem the fetters love may impose.

And he who has dwelt with his heart alone,
Hears all the music in friendship's tone.

So better and better I comprehend
How sorrow ever would be our friend.

    Thou comest to the year,
And bringest all things beautiful and sweet;
Thy lovely miracles themselves repeat
        In the green glory of the grass,
And peeping flowers that stay our lingering feet
    With their soft eyes, blue like the sky and clear;
        Thou bringest not, alas,
    Our lily, our May-blossom, O New Year!

    Thou bringest all things fair,
And bright, and gentle, but thou bring'st not her:
The May-birds warble, and May breezes stir
        In the sweet-scented lilac boughs;
But our one May--our gentlest minister
    Of gladness, with the beauty of her hair.
        Her place in our still house
Is empty,--and the world is bleak and bare.

I love the silent hour of night,
For blissful dreams may then arise,
Revealing to my charmed sight
What may not bless my waking eyes!

And then a voice may meet my ear
That death has silenced long ago;
And hope and rapture may appear
Instead of solitude and woe.

Cold in the grave for years has lain
The form it was my bliss to see,
And only dreams can bring again
The darling of my heart to me.

It does not hurt. She looked along the knife
Smiling, and watched the thick drops mix and run
Down the sheer blade; not that which had been done
Could hurt the sweet sense of the Roman wife,
But that which was to do yet ere the strife
Could end for each for ever, and the sun:
Nor was the palm yet nor was peace yet won
While pain had power upon her husband’s life.

It does not hurt, Italia. Thou art more
Than bride to bridegroom; how shalt thou not take
The gift love’s blood has reddened for thy sake?
Was not thy lifeblood given for us before?
And if love’s heartblood can avail thy need,
And thou not die, how should it hurt indeed?

The shadows lay along Broadway,
’T was near the twilight-tide,
And slowly there a lady fair
Was walking in her pride.
Alone walked she; but, viewlessly,
Walked spirits at her side.

Peace charmed the street beneath her feet,
And Honor charmed the air;
And all astir looked kind on her,
And called her good as fair,
For all God ever gave to her
She kept with chary care.

She kept with care her beauties rare
From lovers warm and true,
For her heart was cold to all but gold,
And the rich came not to woo,
But honored well are charms to sell
If priests the selling do.

Now walking there was one more fair,
A slight girl, lily-pale;
And she had unseen company
To make the spirit quail:
’Twixt Want and Scorn she walked forlorn...

Farewell, my Highland lassie! when the year returns around,
Be it Greece, or be it Norway, where my vagrant feet are found,
I shall call to mind the place, I shall call to mind the day,
The day that’s gone for ever, and the glen that’s far away;
I shall mind me, be it Rhine or Rhone, Italian land or France,
Of the laughings and the whispers, of the pipings and the dance;
I shall see thy soft brown eyes dilate to wakening woman thought,
And whiter still the white cheek grow to which the blush was brought;
And oh, with mine commixing I thy breath of life shall feel,
And clasp thy shyly passive hands in joyous Highland reel;
I shall hear, and see, and feel, and in sequence sadly true,
Shall repeat the bitter-sweet of the lingering last adieu;
I shall seem as now to leave thee, with ...

The elect angels and the souls in bliss,
The citizens of heaven, when, that first day,
My lady passed from me and went their way,
Of marvel and pity full, did round her press.
"What light is this, and what new loveliness?"
They said among them; "for such sweet display
Did never mount, that from the earth did stray
To this high dwelling, all this age, we guess!"[1]
She, well content her lodging chang'd to find,
Shows perfect, by her peers most perfect placed;
And now and then half turning looks behind
To see if I walk in the way she traced:
Hence I lift heavenward all my heart and mind
Because I hear her pray me to make haste.

I hear the Shadowy Horses, their long manes a-shake,
Their hoofs heavy with tumult, their eyes glimmering white;
The North unfolds above them clinging, creeping night,
The East her hidden joy before the morning break,
The West weeps in pale dew and sighs passing away,
The South is pouring down roses of crimson fire:
O vanity of Sleep, Hope, Dream, endless Desire,
The Horses of Disaster plunge in the heavy clay:
Beloved, let your eyes half close, and your heart beat
Over my heart, and your hair fall over my breast,
Drowning love’s lonely hour in deep twilight of rest,
And hiding their tossing manes and their tumultuous feet.

The Play is over. While the light
Yet lingers in the darkening hall,
I come to say a last Good-night
Before the final Exeunt all.

We gathered once, a joyous throng:
The jovial toasts went gayly round;
With jest, and laugh, and shout, and song,
We made the floors and walls resound.

We come with feeble steps and slow,
A little band of four or five,
Left from the wrecks of long ago,
Still pleased to find ourselves alive.

Alive! How living, too, are they
Whose memories it is ours to share!
Spread the long table's full array, -
There sits a ghost in every chair!

One breathing form no more, alas!
Amid our slender group we see;
With him we still remained "The Class," -
Without his presence what are we?

The hand...

You'll wait a long, long time for anything much
To happen in heaven beyond the floats of cloud
And the Northern Lights that run like tingling nerves.
The sun and moon get crossed, but they never touch,
Nor strike out fire from each other nor crash out loud.
The planets seem to interfere in their curves
But nothing ever happens, no harm is done.
We may as well go patiently on with our life,
And look elsewhere than to stars and moon and sun
For the shocks and changes we need to keep us sane.
It is true the longest drouth will end in rain,
The longest peace in China will end in strife.
Still it wouldn't reward the watcher to stay awake
In hopes of seeing the calm of heaven break
On his particular time and personal sight.
That calm seems certainly safe to last to-night...