1.

        LORD, what I once had done with youthful might,
        Had I been from the first true to the truth,
        Grant me, now old, to do--with better sight,
        And humbler heart, if not the brain of youth;
        So wilt thou, in thy gentleness and ruth,
        Lead back thy old soul, by the path of pain,
        Round to his best--young eyes and heart and brain.

        2.

        A dim aurora rises in my east,
        Beyond the line of jagged questions hoar,
        As if the head of our intombed High Priest
        Began to glow behind the unopened door:
        Sure the gold wings will soon rise from the gray!--
        They rise not. Up I rise, press on the more,
        To meet the slow coming of the Master's day.

        What was thine errand here?
Thy beauty was more exquisite than aught
        That from this marred earth
        Takes its imperfect birth;
It was a radiant, heavenly beauty, caught
        From some far higher sphere,
And though an angel now, thou still must bear
The lovely semblance that thou here didst wear.

        What was thine errand here?
Thy gentle thoughts, and holy, humble mind,
        With earthly creatures coarse,
        Held not discourse,
But with fine spirits, of some purer kind,
        Dwelt in communion dear;
And sure they speak to thee that language now,
Which thou wert wont to speak to us below.

        What was thine errand here?
To adorn anguish, and ennoble death,
        And make infirmity
        A...

    Smith, great writer of stories, drank; found it immortalised his pen;
    Fused in his brain-pan, else a blank, heavens of glory now and then;
    Gave him the magical genius touch; God-given power to gouge out, fling
    Flat in your face a soul-thought - Bing!
    Twiddle your heart-strings in his clutch.
    "Bah!" said Smith, "let my body lie stripped to the buff in swinish shame,
    If I can blaze in the radiant sky out of adoring stars my name.
    Sober am I nonentitized; drunk am I more than half a god.
    Well, let the flesh be sacrificed; spirit shall speak and shame the clod.
    Who would not gladly, gladly give Life to do one thing that will live?"

    Smith had a friend, we'll call him Brown; dearer than brothers were those two.
    When in the wassail Smith ...

Who told my mother of my shame,
    Who told my father of my dear?
Oh who but Maude, my sister Maude,
    Who lurked to spy and peer.

Cold he lies, as cold as stone,
    With his clotted curls about his face:
The comeliest corpse in all the world
    And worthy of a queen's embrace.

You might have spared his soul, sister,
    Have spared my soul, your own soul too:
Though I had not been born at all,
    He'd never have looked at you.

My father may sleep in Paradise,
    My mother at Heaven-gate:
But sister Maude shall get no sleep
    Either early or late.

My father may wear a golden gown,
    My mother a crown may win;
If my dear and I knocked at Heaven-gate
    Perhaps they'd let us in:
But sister Maude, oh sister ...

Now who will speak, and lie not,
And pledge not life, but give?
Slaves herd with herded cattle:
The dawn grows bright for battle,
And if we die, we die not;
And if we live, we live.
The faith our fathers fought for,
The kings our fathers knew,
We fight but as they fought for:
We seek the goal they sought for,
The chance they hailed and knew,
The praise they strove and wrought for,
To leave their blood as dew
On fields that flower anew.
Men live that serve the stranger;
Hounds live that huntsmen tame:
These life-days of our living
Are days of God's good giving
Where death smiles soft on danger
And life scowls dark on shame.
And what would you do other,
Sweet wife, if you were I?
And how should you be other,
My sister, than you...

Just as a little olive offshoot grows
Beneath its orchard elders' shady rows,
No budding leaf as yet, no branching limb,
Only a rod uprising, virgin-slim -
Then if the busy gardener, weeding out
Sharp thorns and nettles, cuts the little sprout,
It fades and, losing all its living hue,
Drops by the mother from whose roots it grew:
So was it with my Ursula, my dear;
A little space she grew beside us here,
Then Death came, breathing pestilence, and she
Fell, stricken lifeless, by her parent tree.
Persephone, Persephone, this flow
Of barren tears! How couldst thou will it so?

I
Life, sublime and serene when time had power upon it and ruled its breath,
Changed it, bade it be glad or sad, and hear what change in the world's ear saith,
Shines more fair in the starrier air whose glory lightens the dusk of death.
Suns that sink on the wan sea's brink, and moons that kindle and flame and fade,
Leave more clear for the darkness here the stars that set not and see not shade
Rise and rise on the lowlier skies by rule of sunlight and moonlight swayed.
So, when night for his eyes grew bright, his proud head pillowed on Shakespeare's breast,
Hand in hand with him, soon to stand where shine the glories that death loves best,
Passed the light of his face from sight, and sank sublimely to radiant rest.

II
Far above us and all our love, beyond all reach of its voice...

Ye have met, ye have met, disencumbered of pain,
Of sorrow, and sickness, and care;
And the slave and the prisoner, now freed from their chain,
Have rejoicingly welcomed you there.

The true light now shines and the darkness is past,
For that which is perfect is come,
And your pure loving spirits are gathered at last,
In their only congenial home.

May the balm of your memory steal through the soul,
Like a gale from Arabia the blest,
Exert o'er the feelings a sacred control,
And hush every murmur to rest!

In the world we shall seek your resemblance in vain,
Your places shall know you no more;
Yet who by a wish would recall you again?
For the days of your mourning are o'er.

The King in His beauty your eyes now behold,
He has sweetly d...

Swings the way still by hollow and hill,
And all the world's a song;
"She's far," it sings me, "but fair," it rings me,
"Quiet," it laughs, "and strong!"

Oh! spite of the miles and years between us,
Spite of your chosen part,
I do remember; and I go
With laughter in my heart.

So above the little folk that know not,
Out of the white hill-town,
High up I clamber; and I remember;
And watch the day go down.

Gold is my heart, and the world's golden,
And one peak tipped with light;
And the air lies still about the hill
With the first fear of night;

Till mystery down the soundless valley
Thunders, and dark is here;
And the wind blows, and the light goes,
And the night is full of fear,

And I know, one night, on some fa...

"I am here to time, you see;
The glade is well-screened - eh? - against alarm;
Fit place to vindicate by my arm
The honour of my spotless wife,
Who scorns your libel upon her life
In boasting intimacy!

"'All hush-offerings you'll spurn,
My husband. Two must come; one only go,'
She said. 'That he'll be you I know;
To faith like ours Heaven will be just,
And I shall abide in fullest trust
Your speedy glad return.'"

"Good. Here am also I;
And we'll proceed without more waste of words
To warm your cockpit. Of the swords
Take you your choice. I shall thereby
Feel that on me no blame can lie,
Whatever Fate accords."

So stripped they there, and fought,
And the swords clicked and scraped, and the onsets sped;
Till the husband fell...

Sweet mother, in a minute’s span
Death parts thee and my love of thee;
Sweet love, that yet art living man,
Come back, true love, to comfort me.
Back, ah, come back! ah wellaway!
But my love comes not any day.

As roses, when the warm West blows,
Break to full flower and sweeten spring,
My soul would break to a glorious rose
In such wise at his whispering.
In vain I listen; wellaway!
My love says nothing any day.

You that will weep for pity of love
On the low place where I am lain,
I pray you, having wept enough,
Tell him for whom I bore such pain
That he was yet, ah! wellaway!
My true love to my dying day.

Let not thy tombstone e'er be laid by me:
Nor let my hearse be wept upon by thee:
But let that instant when thou diest be known
The minute of mine expiration.
One knell be rung for both; and let one grave
To hold us two an endless honour have.

The sword slew one in deadly strife;
One perish’d by the bowl;
The third lies self-slain by the knife;
For three the bells may toll,
I loved her better than my life,
And better than my soul.

Aye, father! hast thou come at last?
’Tis somewhat late to pray;
Life’s crimson tides are ebbing fast,
They drain my soul away;
Mine eyes with film are overcast,
The lights are waning grey.

This curl from her bright head I shore,
And this her hands gave mine;
See, one is stained with purple gore,
And one with poison’d wine;
Give these to her when all is o’er,
How serpent-like they twine!

We three were brethren in arms,
And sworn companions we;
We held this motto, “Whoso harms
The one shall harm the three!”
Till, matchless for...

That such have died enables us
The tranquiller to die;
That such have lived, certificate
For immortality.

(Macmillan's Magazine, March 1868.)


Oh what is that country
    And where can it be,
Not mine own country,
    But dearer far to me?
Yet mine own country,
    If I one day may see
Its spices and cedars,
    Its gold and ivory.

As I lie dreaming
    It rises, that land:
There rises before me
    Its green golden strand,
With its bowing cedars
    And its shining sand;
It sparkles and flashes
    Like a shaken brand.

Do angels lean nearer
    While I lie and long?
I see their soft plumage
    And catch their windy song,
Like the rise of a high tide
    Sweeping full and strong;
I mark the outskirts
    Of their reverend throng.

Oh what is a king here,
    Or what is a boor?

I.
What am I doing, you say to me, ‘wasting the sweet summer hours’?
Haven’t you eyes? I am dressing the grave of a woman with flowers.

II.
For a woman ruin’d the world, as God’s own scriptures tell,
And a man ruin’d mine, but a woman, God bless her, kept me from Hell.

III.
Love me? O yes, no doubt—how long—till you threw me aside!
Dresses and laces and jewels and never a ring for the bride.

IV.
All very well just now to be calling me darling and sweet,
And after a while would it matter so much if I came on the street?

V.
You when I met you first—when he brought you!—I turn’d away
And the hard blue eyes have it still, that stare of a beast of prey.

VI.
You were his friend—you—you—when he promised to make me his bride,
And you...

FEBRUARY 1, 18 - .

        Here - am I here?
        Or is it fancy, born of fear?
        Yes - O God, save me! - this is I,
        And not some wretch of whom I've read,
        In that bright girlhood, when the sky
        Each night strewed star-dust o'er my head;
        When each morn meant a gala-day,
        And all my little world was gay.
        I had not felt the touch of Care;
        I'd heard of something called Despair,
        But knew it only by its name.
        (How far it seemed! - how soon it came!)
        Yes, all the bright years hurried by;
        Sorrow was near, and - this is I!

        Is't the same girl that stood, one night,
        There in the wide hall's thrilling light,
        With all the costly robes ast...

The season was the childhood of sweet June,
Whose sunny hours from morning until noon
Went creeping through the day with silent feet,
Each with its load of pleasure; slow yet sweet;
Like the long years of blest Eternity
Never to be developed. Joy to thee,
Fiordispina and thy Cosimo,
For thou the wonders of the depth canst know
Of this unfathomable flood of hours,
Sparkling beneath the heaven which embowers -

...

They were two cousins, almost like to twins,
Except that from the catalogue of sins
Nature had rased their love - which could not be
But by dissevering their nativity.
And so they grew together like two flowers
Upon one stem, which the same beams and showers
Lull or awaken in their purple prime,
Which the same hand will gather - t...