Lady Jane Wilde: Verses about Love

Thou reck’nest seven Heavens; I but one:
And thou art it, Beloved! Voice and hand,
And eye and mouth, are but the angel band
Who minister around that highest throne
Thy godlike heart. And there I reign supreme,
And choose, at will, the angel who I deem
Will sing the sweetest, words I love to hear
That short, sweet song, whose echo clear
Will last throughout eternity:
“I love thee!
How I love thee!”

When the day is brightest,
Darkness draweth near;
When the heart is lightest,
Coming grief I fear.
Eyes of heavenly splendour,
Radiance o’er me fling;
But when their light’s most tender
I fear its vanishing.

Lips, where passion keepeth
Holiest incense, bend to mine;
But when woman speaketh,
Who would trust so false a shrine?
Even in twined caresses
Where love has woven his spells,
Of the mutual love that blesses,
I hear a voice which tells.
As light with darkness weddeth,
So must pleasure with annoy,
And sorrow ever treadeth
On the doomed path of joy.

My love lay there,
In the shadow of my hair,
As my glossy raven tresses downard flow;
And dark as midnight’s cloud,
The fell o’er him like a shroud:
Ah! does he now remember it or no?

With a comb of gold each night
I combed my tresses bright;
But the sportive zephyr tossed them to and fro;
So I pressed them in a heap,
For my love whereon to sleep:
Ah! does he now remember it or no?
He said he loved to gaze
On my tresses’ flowing maze,
And the midnight of my dark Moorish eyes;
And he vowed ’twould give him pain
Should his love be all in vain;
So he won me with his praises and his sighs.
Then I flung my raven hair
As a mantle o’er him there,
Encircling Encirling him within its mazy flow;
And pillowed on my breast,
He lay in sweet unrest:
Ah! does he now remember it or no?

Crowned with a liberated people’s love,
Crowned by the Nations with eternal fame,
His great heart burning still with patriot‐fire,
Tho’ Death’s pale shadow rested on his brow,
Forth went the mighty Chief from his loved Land,
’Mid the hushed reverence paid to dying Kings,
On his last pilgrimage; yearning to find rest
For the o’erwearied hero‐heart and brain,
After great trials pass’d and triumphs won,
Within the Temple‐City of the World.
But, faint with combats of a glorious life,
Tho’ Freedom’s hymns still murmured on his lips,
And his dim eyes still tracked the western Sun
Would rise on Ireland, but no more for him,
Seeking the gates of God’s great Church on earth,
He found the gates of Heaven, and entered in

There Angels met him with the conqueror’s Palm,
And passing from the portal to the Throne,
Circled with golden glitter of their wings,
God crowned him Victor for his work well done!

How beautiful, how beautiful you streamed upon my sight,
In glory and in grandeur, as a gorgeous sunset‐light!
How softly, soul‐subduing, fell your words upon mine ear,
Like low aerial music when some angel hovers near!
What tremulous, faint ecstacy to clasp your hand in mine,
Till the darkness fell upon me of a glory too divine!
The air around grew languid with our intermingled breath,
And in your beauty’s shadow I sank motionless as death.
I saw you not, I heard not, for a mist was on my brain
I only felt that life could give no joy like that again.

And this was Love—I knew it not, but blindly floated on,
And now I’m on the ocean waste, dark, desolate, alone;
The waves are raging round me—I’m reckless where they guide;
No hope is left to light me, no strength to stem the tide.
As a leaf along the torrent, a cloud across the sky,
As dust upon the whirlwind, so my life is drifting by.
The dream that drank the meteor’s light—the form from Heav’n has flown
The vision and the glory, they are passing—they are gone.
Oh! love is frantic agony, and life one throb of pain;
Yet I would bear its darkest woes to dream that dream again.

Its branches up to Heaven a tree is sending,
Rare to see,
For with flowers, fruit, and seed at once is bending
That mystic tree.
Round the giant stem, all rugged, rude, and mossy,
Roses twine,
And the young flowers veil it with their glossy
Hues divine.
The leaves rustle thickly, many‐formed,
So green and bright;
The branches spread out broadly to be warmed
In Heaven’s light.
Now curve they down, all drooping, to the meadows
And cool springs;
Now upwards on the blue air fling their shadows
Like seraphs’ wings.
Pause ye beneath its golden avalanches
Well it’s worth;
For when the breath of Heaven stirs the branches,
The fruit falls to earth.

Mocking apes all day there, in their folly,
Play antic wiles;
All night rest the branches, still and holy
As cathedral aisles.
The nightingale, soft in the moonlight singing,
Stops her grief;
For the magic tones of Oreads seem ringing
From every leaf.
The tree is loved by all, but comprehended
Scarce by one;
Yet each basketh in its glory, many‐blended,
As ’neath a sun.
Many pause, the bright fruit harvest reaping,
Of golden gleam;
But he who loveth shadow saith in weeping
Here let me dream.
Lighter spirits, passing, stop where glisten
Brightest flowers;
While others pause, enchanted, but to listen
The music of its bowers.
And he who nothing loveth goes his way,
Unheeding all;
But they who love the universe will say
Sing on, JEAN PAUL!

O Country, writhing in thy chain
With fierce, wild efforts to be free,
Not seeing that with every strain
The bonds close firmer over thee;
Or grasping blindly in thy hate
The temple pillars of the State,
To hurl them down on friend and foe,
Crushed in one common overthrow
Can none of all thy Poet band
Preach nobler aims, loved Ireland?
As David drove with magic chords
The Evil Spirit back to night;
As Moses by his mighty words
Led Egypt’s bondmen up to light;
Hast thou no Poet, strong to calm
Thy troubled soul with holy psalm?
Or trusted Chief, who, safely on
Across the fatal Rubicon,
Could lead thee with pure heart and hand
To Freedom—my own Ireland?
By those doomed men, in dull despair
Slow wasting in a dungeon’s gloom;
By all youth’s fiery heart can dare
Quenched in the prison’s living tomb
By the corroding felon chain,
That tortures with Promethean pain
Of vultures gnawing at the core
Of their lost lives for evermore
I ask you, People of our Land,
Have ye done well for Ireland?
By History traced on dungeon walls,
By scaffolds, chains, and exiles’ tears,
Slow marking, as the shadow falls,
The mournful sequence of the years;

By genius crushed and progress barred,
By noble aspirations marred,
Till with a smouldering fire’s life
They burn in deadly hate and strife
I ask you, Rulers of our Land,
Have ye done well for Ireland?
O Men! these men are brothers too,
Tho’ frenzied by a fatal dream,
Their living souls were meant to do
Some noble work in God’s great scheme,
Perchance to hew down, branch and root,
The tree that bore such bitter fruit;
But, left unguided in the Right,
They grope out blindly in the night
Of their dark passions; striking down
Their Country’s proud hopes with their own.
But now, ye say, the Land hath rest
Aye, with the death weights on her eyes;
And fettered arms across her breast,
And mail’d hands stifling down her cries.
So rests a corpse within the grave
O’er which the charnal grasses wave.
Oh, better far some kindly word
To stay the vengeance‐lifted sword,
Or Love, with queenly, outstretched hand,
To soothe thee—fated Ireland!

None, unless the saints above,
Knew the secret of their love;
For with calm and stately grace
Isolde held her queenly place,
Tho’ the courtiers’ hundred eyes
Sought the lovers to surprise,
Or to read the mysteries
Of a love—so rumour said
By a magic philtre fed,
Which for ever in their veins
Burn’d with love’s consuming pains.
Yet their hands would twine unseen,
In a clasp ’twere hard to sever;
And whoso watched their glances meet,
Gazing as they’d gaze for ever,

Might have marked the sudden heat
Crims’ning on each flushing cheek,
As the tell‐tale blood would speak
Of love that never should have been
The love of Tristan and his Queen.
But, what hinders that the two,
In the spring of their young life,
Love each other as they do?
Thus the tempting thoughts begin
Little recked they of the sin;
Nature joined them hand in hand,
Is not that a truer band
Than the formal name of wife?
Ah! what happy hours were theirs!
One might note them at the feast
Laughing low to loving airs,
Loving airs that pleased them best;
Or interchanging the swift glance
In the mazes of the dance.
So the sunny moments rolled,
And they wove bright threads of gold
Through the common web of life;
Never dreaming of annoy,
Or the wild world’s wicked strife;
Painting earth and heaven above
In the light of their own joy,
In the purple light of love.
Happy moments, which again
Brought sweet torments in their train:
All love’s petulance and fears,
Wayward doubts and tender tears;
Little jealousies and pride,
That can loving hearts divide:
Murmured vow and clinging kiss,
Working often bane as bliss;
All the wild, capricious changes
Through which lovers’ passion ranges.

Yet would love, in every mood,
Find Heaven’s manna for its food;
For love will grow wan and cold,
And die ere ever it is old,
That is never assailed by fears,
Or steeped in repentant tears,
Or passed through the fire like gold.
So loved Tristan and Isolde,
In youth’s sunny, golden time,
In the brightness of their prime;
Little dreaming hours would come,
Like pale shadows from the tomb,
When an open death of doom
Had been still less hard to bear,
Than the ghastly, cold despair
Of those hidden vows, whose smart
Pale the cheek, and break the heart.

Secretly by night returning,
Jealous fears within him burning,
The Waiwode seeks his young wife’s bed,
And with trembling hand, uncertain,
Backward draws the silken curtain
Death and vengeance—she has fled!

With a frown like tempest weather,
Fierce he knits his brows together,
Tears his beard in wrathful mood
Roars in thunder through the castle,
Summoning each trembling vassal,
“Ho there! slaves—ye devil’s brood!
“Who left the castle gate unguarded,
And slew the hound?—some hand unbarr’d it!
Quick! prepare ye sack and cord!
My arms here, fellows—loaded, ready!
Now, slave, your pistols, follow—steady
Ha, traitress! thou shalt feel this sword
Close in the murky shadows hiding,
Slave and master, onward gliding,
Reach the garden. There, indeed,
Listening to the soft appealing
Of a youth before her kneeling,
Stands she in her white naridd.
Through the marble fountain’s playing,
Passion’s words they hear him saying
“How I love thee, yet thou’st sold
All thy beauty’s glowing treasures,
All this soft hand’s tender pressures,
For the Waiwode’s cursed gold.
“How I loved, as none can love thee;
Waited, wept—if tears could move thee
Ah! and is it thus we meet?
He ne’er strove through tears and troubles,
Only clang’d his silver roubles,
And thou fallest at his feet.
Yet once more, through night and storm,
I ride to gaze upon thy form,
Touch again that thrilling hand;
Pray that peace may rest upon thee
In the home that now has won thee,
Then for ever fly this land.”

Low she bendeth o’er him weeping,
Heeds not stealthy footsteps creeping,
Sees not jealous eye‐balls glare
“Now, slave, steady,—Fool, thou tremblest
Vengeance if thy heart dissemblest
Kill her as she standeth there.”
“Oh, my Lord and master, hear me
Patience yet, or much I fear me
I shall never aim aright.
See, the bitter night wind’s blowing
Numbs my hand, and brings these flowing
Icy tears to dim my sight.”
“Silence! thou accurséd Russian.
Hold—I’ll guide the pistol’s motion;
See’st thou not her gleaming brow?
So, steady—straight before thee—higher
When I give gave the signal, fire
Darker doom awaits him—Now!”
A shot, a groan, and all is over;
Still she standeth by her lover
’Tis the Waiwode falleth dead!
Was ever known such sad disaster?
The bungling slave hath shot his master
Straight and steady through the head.

Our land has lost a glory! Never more,
Tho’ years roll on, can Ireland hope to see
Another Carleton, cradled in the lore
Of our loved Country’s rich humanity.

The weird traditions, the old, plaintive strain,
The murmured legends of a vengeful past,
When a down‐trodden people stove in vain
To rend the fetters centuries made fast;
These, with the song and dance and tender tale,
Linked to our ancient music, have swept on
And died in far‐off echoes, like the wail
Of Israel’s broken Harps in Babylon.
No hand like his can wake them now, for he
Sprang from amidst the people: bathed his soul
In their strong passions, stormy as the sea,
And wild as skies before the thunder‐roll.
Yet, was he gentle; with divinest art
And tears that shook his nature over much,
He struck the key‐note of a people’s heart,
And all the nation answered to his touch,
Even as he swayed them, giving smiles for gloom,
And childlike tenderness for hate that kills
As rain clouds threat’ning with a weight of doom
Flash sudden, silver light upon the hills.
But, he had faults—men said. Oh, fling them back,
These cold deductions, marring praise with blame;
When earthquakes rend the rocks they leave a track
For central fires issuing forth in flame;
And by the passionate heat of gifted minds
The ruddest stones are crystallised to gems
Of glorious worth, such as a poet binds
Upon his brow, right royal diadems!
Like the great image of the Monarch’s dream,
Genius lifts up on high the head of gold,
And cleaves with iron limbs Time’s mighty stream,
Tho’ all too deep the feet may press earth’s mould.
Yet, by his gifts made dedicate to God
In noblest teachings of each gentle grace,
Through every land that Irishmen have trod
We claim for him the homage of our race.

With pen of light he drew great pictures when
Nothing but scorn was ours; and without fear
He flung them down before the face of men,
Saying, in words the whole world paused to hear:
So brave, so pure, so noble, grand, and true
Is this, our Irish People. Thus he gave
His fame to build our glory, and undo
The taunts of ages,—strong to lift and save
So, with a nation’s gratitude we vow
In every Irish heart a shrine shall be
To The Great Peasant, on whose deathless brow
Rests the star‐crown of immortality.
The kings of mind, unlike the kings of earth,
Can bear their honours with them to illume
The grave’s dark vault; so Carleton passes forth,
As through triumphal triumpal arches, to the tomb!

On the green sward Thekla’s lying,
Summer winds are round her sighing,
At her feet the ocean plays;
In that mirror idly gazing
She beholds, with inward praising,
Her own beauty in amaze.
And with winds and waves attuning
Her low voice, in soft communing
Said: “If truly I’m so fair,
Might the best in our Swedish land
Die all for love of my white hand,
Azure eyes and golden hair.”

And fair Thekla bent down gazing,
Light her golden curls upraising
From her bosom fair to see,
Which, within the azure ocean,
Glittered back hack in soft commotion,
Like a lotus tremblingly.
Saying soft, with pleasure trembling,
“If so fair is the resembling,
How much fairer I must be!
Rose‐lipped shadow, smiling brightly,
Are we angels floating lightly
Through the azure air and sea?
“Oh! that beauty never faded,
That years passing never shaded
Youthful cheek with hues of age!
Oh! thou fairest crystal form,
Can we not time’s hand disarm?”
Hark! the winds begin to rage;
And with onward heaving motion
Rise the waves in wild commotion
Spirits mournfullest they seem
Round the crystal shadow plaining,
Shivered, shattered, fades it waning
From the maiden like a dream.
And from midst the drooping oziers
Of the sunny banks’ enclosures
Rose a woman weird to see:
Strange her mien mein and antique vesture,
Yet with friendly look and gesture
To the trembling girl spake she.
“As the cruel winds bereft thee
Of the shadow that hath left thee,
Maiden, will thy children steal
One by one these treasures from thee,
Till all beauty hath foregone thee:
Mother’s woe is children’s weal.

“For the beauty of the mother
Is the children’s—sister, brother,
As she fades away, will bloom.
Mother’s eyes grow dim by weeping,
Wan her cheek cheak , lone vigils keeping:
Youthful virgin, ’ware your doom!
“Wifely name is sweet from lover,
Yet ere many years are over,
From the fatal day you wed,
Sore you’ll rue the holy altar,
And the salt sea will grow salter
For the bitter tears you’ll shed.
“See the pallid cheek reflected,
Hollow, sunken eyes dejected,
Look of weary, wasting pain;
All changed for thy beauty rarest:
Maiden, tell me, if thou darest
Then come here, and look again.
“But should lovers’ pleading gain thee,
Haste thee quick and I will sain thee
Ere the marriage vows are said;
By the might of magic power,
I can save thee from the hour
Of a mother’s anguish dread.”
Answered Thekla:: “Save me! save me!
Witch or woman, then I crave thee,
From a mother’s fated doom!
So my beauty never fading
Thou canst make with magic aiding,
Fatal Mother, I shall come.”

“A Million A Decade!” Calmly and cold
The units are read by our statesmen sage;
Little they think of a Nation old,
Fading away from History’s page;
Outcast weeds by a desolate sea
Fallen leaves of Humanity.

“A million a decade!”—of human wrecks,
Corpses lying in fever sheds
Corpses huddled on foundering decks,
And shroudless dead on their rocky beds;
Nerve and muscle, and heart and brain,
Lost to Ireland—lost in vain.

“A million a decade!” Count ten by ten,
Column and line of the record fair;
Each unit stands for ten thousand men,
Staring with blank, dead eye‐balls there;
Strewn like blasted trees on the sod,
Men that were made in the image of God.

“A million a decade!”—and nothing done;
The Cæsars had less to conquer a world;
And the war for the Right not yet begun,
The banner of Freedom not yet unfurled:
The soil is fed by the weed that dies;
If forest leaves fall, yet they fertilise.

But ye—dead, dead, not climbing the height,
Not clearing a path for the future to tread;
Not opening the golden portals of light,
Ere the gate was choked by your piled‐up dead:
Martyrs ye, yet never a name
Shines on the golden roll of Fame.

Had ye rent one gyve of the festering chain,
Strangling the life of the Nation’s soul;
Poured your life‐blood by river and plain,
Yet touched with your dead hand Freedom’s goal;
Left of heroes one footprint more
On our soil, tho’ stamped in your gore

We could triumph while mourning the brave,
Dead for all that was holy and just,
And write, through our tears, on the grave,
As we flung down the dust to dust
“They died for their country, but led
Her up from the sleep of the dead.”
VIII.
“A million a decade!” What does it mean?
A Nation dying of inner decay
A churchyard silence where life has been
The base of the pyramid crumbling away:
A drift of men gone over the sea,
A drift of the dead where men should be.

Was it for this ye plighted your word,
Crowned and crownless rulers of men?
Have ye kept faith with your crucified Lord,
And fed His sheep till He comes again?
Or fled like hireling shepherds away,
Leaving the fold the gaunt wolf’s prey?

Have ye given of your purple to cover,
Have ye given of your gold to cheer,
Have ye given of your love, as a lover
Might cherish the bride he held dear,
Broken the Sacrament‐bread to feed
Souls and bodies in uttermost need?

Ye stand at the Judgment‐bar to‐day
The Angels are counting the dead‐roll, too;
Have ye trod in the pure and perfect way,
And ruled for God as the crowned should do?
Count our dead—before Angels and Men,
Ye’re judged and doomed by the Statist’s pen.

Neath the casement stood a Ritter,
Sings by night with sweetest tone:
“Thekla, dearest Thekla, listen,
Wilt thou be my bride, mine own?

“Castles have I, parks and forests,
Mountains veined with the red gold;
And a heart that pineth for thee,
With a wealth of love untold.
“I will deck my love in jewels,
Gold and pearl peril on brow and hand,
Broidered robes and costly girdles,
From the far‐off Paynim land.
“Here I hang upon the rose‐tree,
Love, a little golden ring;
Wilt thou take it? wilt thou wear it,
Love?” Thus did the Ritter sing.
Then upon his black steed mounting,
Kissed his hand and doffed his plume.
Lovely Thekla stole down gently,
Sought the gold ring in the gloom.
“Little ring, wilt thou deceive me?
Like the rose dost hide a thorn?”
As she takes it, close beside her
Sounds a ringing laugh of scorn.
And the fatal Mother, mocking,
Points her finger to the ring:
“What, my maiden! sold thy beauty
For that paltry glittering thing?
“Plucked the bauble from a rose‐tree?
Ring and rose and doom in all;
Roses bright from cheek of beauty,
Roses bright must fade and fall.
“Wilt thou follow me?” They glided
Over heath, through moor and wood,
Till beside an ancient windmill,
In the lone, dark night they stood.
All the mighty wheels were silent,
All the giant arms lay still
“Bride and wife, but never mother,
Maiden, swear, is such thy will?

“Dost swear?” “I swear!” They glided
Up the stairs and through the door,
With her wand the magic Mother
Draws a circle on the floor.
Grains of yellow corn, seven,
Takes she from a sack beside,
Draws the gold ring of her lover
From the finger of the bride.
“Seven children would have stolen
Light and beauty from thine eyes,
But as I cast the yellow corn
Through thy gold ring, each one dies.
Slowly creaked the mill, then faster
Whirled the giant arms on high;
Shuddering, hears the trembling maiden
Crushing bones, and infant’s cry.
Now there is a deathlike silence,
Thekla hears her heart alone
Again the weird one flings the corn,
Again that plaintive plantive infant’s moan.
Two—three—four—the mill goes faster,
Whirling, crushing.—Ah! those cries!
“Bride, thou’lt never be a mother;
Thy beauty’s saved—the seventh dies!”
Seven turns the mill hath taken,
Seven moans hath Thekla heard:
Then all is still. The moon from Heaven
Shines down calm upon the sward.
“Now take back thy ring in safety;
Mother’s joy or mother’s woe,
Wasting pain or fading beauty,
Maiden, thou shalt never know!
“Home, before the morning hour!”
Home in terror Thekla flies,
Shuddering, she hears behind her
Laugh of scorn, infants’ cries.

Undiné by the lonely shore,
In lonely grief, is pacing;
The vows her perjured lover swore
No more with hope retracing.
Yet none in beauty could compare
With ocean's bright‐haired daughter.
Her cheek is like the lotus fair
That lieth on the water;

Her eye is like the azure sky,
The azure deep reflecteth;
Her smile, the glittering lights on high,
The glittering wave collecteth.
Her robe of green with many a gem
And pearl of ocean shineth,
And round her brow a diadem
Of rosy coral twineth.

Like diamonds scattered here and there,
The crystal drops are glistening
Amid her flowing golden hair,
As thus she paceth listening
Listening through the silver light,
The light that lover loveth;
Listening through the dark midnight,
But still no lover cometh.

An earthly love her heart enthralls,
She loves with earth's emotion;
For him she left her crystal halls
Beneath the crystal ocean.
Abjured them since he placed that day
The gold ring on her finger,
Though still the sparkling diamond spray
Around her robe would linger.

And she hath gained a human soul,
The soul of trusting woman;
But love hath only taught her dole,
Through tears she knows the human.
So from her sisters far apart,
Her lonely path she taketh,
With human sorrow in the heart
That human love forsaketh.

She weaves a crown of dripping reeds,
On which the moon shines ghastly
'A wedding crown my lover needs,
My pale hands weave it fastly.'
She treads a strange and solemn dance,
The waves around her groaning,
And mingles, with prophetic sense,
Her singing with their moaning.

'My bridegroom, nought can save thee now,
Since plighted troth is broken
The fatal crown awaits thy brow,
The fatal spell is spoken.
Thou'rt standing by another bride,
Before the holy altar
A shadowy form at thy side
Will make thy strong heart falter.

'To her, within the holy church,
Thy perjured vows art giving;
But never shalt thou cross the porch
Again amidst the living.
I wait thee 'neath the chill cold waves,
While marriage‐bells are tolling;
Our bridal chant, 'neath ocean's caves,
Be ocean's billows rolling.'

The bridegroom, in his pride of youth,
Beside the fair bride standeth
'Now take her hand to plight thy troth,'
The solemn Priest commandeth.
But lo! a shadowy form is seen
Betwixt the bridal greeting,
A shadowy hand is placed between,
To hinder theirs from meeting.

The priest is mute, the bridegroom pale
He knows the sea‐nymph's warning;
The fair bride trembles 'neath 'neth her veil,
The bridal's turned to mourning.
No more within the holy church,
Love's holy vows are giving;
They bear the bridegrom from the porch
The dead amidst the living!

Far from her Royal lover, by Mondego’s sunny tide,
Does the Lady Inez wander, Don Pedro’s lovely bride;
Her long hair fell around her, like a veil of a golden light,
And the jewelled zone that bound her in the noontide sparkled bright.

But heavy showers are falling fast adown her azure eyes,
As on Heaven with anguish calling, she lifts them to the skies.
Where is her princely lover? Is there none to save her nigh?
Does he know that King Alonzo hath sworn that she shall die?

She trembles at each murmured sound that’s wafted on the breeze:
It is the murderer’s footstep that rustles through the trees;
But wearily, all wearily, with watching and with weeping,
She sank in troubled slumber, while her maidens guard were keeping.

She dream’d that in the palace, by her Royal lover’s side,
She sat upon the high throne, as his crownéd Queen and bride;
And words of love he murmured, and the crowd knelt down to praise,
And she proudly took their homage, but blushed beneath his gaze.

Fair cloth of silver brighter than the sunbeam’s woven light,
And marble pillars whiter than the pale queen of night—
Flowers and odours blending, all loveliest lovliest things were there,
Incense‐clouds upsending, for her—the beautiful, the fair!

Her robes of tissue golden outvied her golden tresses,
As she lay enfolden in her lover’s soft caresses;
But brighter than the diamonds that circled round her brow,
Were the flashing eyes beneath them—he murmured with a vow.

And redder than the rubies that enclasped her jewelled zone,
Were the roses on her cheek when he whispered—Thou’rt mine own.
And he stooped his plumed head gently to kiss her—so she dreamed
But his lips were icy cold, like the touch of death it seemed.

And she started from her slumber all tearfully and pale,
For hurrying steps and voices were heard, and woman’s wail
“O God! the hour has come,” they cried—“the murderers are near!
Why weep ye so, my maidens, now?—your cheeks are blanched with fear.

“I see—I see their shadows—down the marble steps they run;
I see their daggers gleaming in the red light of the sun
O Pedro! Pedro! save me!”—help from God nor man is nigh:
All vainly to her murderers for mercy did she cry.


Then she raised her eyes to Heaven, and threw back her golden hair,
And in the streaming sunlight calm and saintly stood she there;
While upon her snowy bosom she meekly crossed her hands
You’d take her for an Angel as she there in beauty stands.

What! shrink ye now, false cravens!—do ye fear yon pale faced girl?
Tigers, traitors, as ye are, dare ye touch one golden curl?
King Alonzo’s gold is tempting, yet fain ye now would fly
From the calm and holy glance of that tearful azure eye.

It was but for a moment’s pause—the next their daggers gleam,
And she falls, the young and lovely, by Mondego’s fated stream;
Like red rain on the young flowers, pours forth life’s crimson tide
And softly murmuring, Pedro! she looked to Heaven, and died.

We stand in the light of a dawning day,
With its glory creation flushing;
And the life‐currents up from the pris’ning clay
Through the world’s great heart are rushing.
While from peak to peak of the spirit land
A voice unto voice is calling:
The night is over, the day is at hand,
And the fetters of earth are falling!

Yet, faces are pale with a mystic fear
Of the strife and trouble looming;
And we feel that mighty changes are near,
Tho’ the Lord delayeth his coming.

For the rent flags hang from each broken mast,
And down in the ocean’s surges
The shattered wreck of a foundering Past
Sinks mid the night wind’s dirges.

But the world goes thundering on to the light,
Unheeding our vain presages;
And nations are cleaving a path to Right
Through the mouldering dust of ages.
Are we, then, to rest in a chill despair,
Unmoved by these new elations;
Nor carry the flag of our Island fair
In the onward march of nations?

Shall our hands be folded in slumber, when
The bonds and the chains are shattered;
As stony and still as enchanted men,
In a cave of darkness fettered?
The cave may be dark, but we’ll flash bright gleams
Of the morning’s radiance on it,
And tread the New Path, tho’ the noontide beams,
As yet, fall faintly upon it.

For souls are around us, with gifts divine,
Unknown and neglected dying;
Like the precious ore in a hidden mine,
Unworked and as useless lying.
We summon them forth to the banded war,
The sword of the Spirit using,
To come with their forces from near and far,
New strength with our strength infusing.

Let each bear a torch with the foremost bands,
Through the Future’s dark outgoing;
Or stand by the helm, mid the shoals and sands
Of the river of life fast flowing.

Or as guides on the hills, with a bugle note,
Let us warn the mountain ranger
Of the chasms that cross and the mists that float
O’er his upward path of danger.

For the chasms are deep, and the river is strong,
And the tempest is wildly waking;
We have need of brave hands to guide us along
The path which the Age is taking.
With our gold and pearls let us build the State;
Faith, courage, and tender pity
Are the gems that shine on the golden gate
Of the Angels’ Heavenly city.

O People! so richly endowed with all
The splendours of spirit power,
With the poet’s gift and the minstrel‐soul,
And the orator’s glorious dower;
Are hearts not amongst us, or lips to vow,
With patriot fervour breathing,
To crown with their lustre no alien brow
While the thorn our own is wreathing.

Ev’n lovelier gifts on our lowly poor,
Kind Nature lavishly showers,
As the gold rain falls on the cottage door,
Of the glowing laburnam flowers;
The deathless love for their Country and God
Undimmed through the ages keeping,
Tho’ the fairest harvests that grew on our sod
Were left for the stangers’ reaping.

The gentle grace that to commonest words
Gives a rare and tender beauty;
With the zeal that would face a thousand swords
For their Country, home and duty.

Still breathing the prayer for their Motherland
Her wrongs and her sorrows taught them;
Tho’ the scaffold’s doom, or the felon‐brand,
Were the only gifts she brought them.

But we, let us bring her—as eastern kings,
At the foot of Christ low kneeling
The gold that symbols our costliest things,
And myrrh for the spirit’s healing
Oh, Brothers! be with us, our aim is high,
The highest of man’s vocation:
With these priceless jewels, that round us lie,
To build up a noble Nation.

Oremus! Oremus! Look down on us, Father!
Like visions of Patmos Thy last judgments gather
The angels of doom, in bright, terrible beauty,
Rise up from their thrones to fulfil their stern duty.
Woe to us, woe! the thunders have spoken,
The first of the mystical seals hath been broken.

Through the cleft thunder‐cloud the weird wierd coursers are rushing
Their hoofs will strike deep in the hearts they are crushing;
And the crown'd and the proud of the old kingly races
Fall down at the vision, like stars from their places:
Oremus! Oremus! The pale earth is heark'ning;
Already the spirit‐steeds round us are dark'ning.

With crown and with bow, on his white steed immortal,
The Angel of Wrath passes first through the portal;
But faces grow paler, and hush'd is earth's laughter,
When on his pale steed comes the Plague Spirit after.

Oremus! Oremus! His poison‐breath slayeth;
The red will soon fade from each bright lip that prayeth.

Now, with nostrils dilated and thunder hoofs crashing,
On rushes the war‐steed, his lurid eyes flashing;
There is blood on the track where his long mane is streaming,
There is death where the sword of his rider is gleaming.
Woe to the lands where that red steed is flying!
There tyrants are warring, and heroes are dying.

Oh! the golden‐hair'd children reck nought but their playing,
Thro' the rich fields of corn with their young mothers straying;
And the strong‐hearted men, with their muscles of iron,
What reck they of ills that their pathway environ?
There's a tramp like a knell—a cold shadow gloometh
Woe! 'tis the black steed of Famine that cometh

At the breath of its rider the green earth is blasted,
And childhood's frail form droops down pallid, and wasted;
The soft sunny hair falleth dank on the arm
Of the mother, whose love shields no longer from harm:
For strength is scarce left her to weep o'er the dying,
Ere dead by the loved one the mother is lying.

But can we only weep, when above us thus lour
The death‐bearing wings of the angels of power;
When around are the arrows of pestilence flying
Around, the pale heaps of the famine‐struck lying
—No, brother of sorrow, when life's light is weakest,
Look up, it is nigh the redemption thou seekest.

Still WORK, though the tramp of the weird spirit‐horses,
Fall dull on the ear, like the clay upon corses;

Still Freedom must send forth her young heroes glowing,
Though her standard be red with their life‐current flowing;
Still the preacher must cast forth the seed, as God's sower,
Though he perish like grass at the scythe of the mower.

Still do the Lord's work through life's tragical drama,
Though weeping goes upward like weeping at Rama;
The path may be thorny, but Spirit eyes see us;
The cross may be heavy, but Death will soon free us:
Still, strong in Christ's power we'll chant the Hosanna,
Fling down Christ's defiance—Υπαγε Σατανα!

I see in a vision the shadowy portal,
That leadeth to regions of glory immortal;
I see the pale forms from the seven wounds bleeding,
Which up to God's Throne the bright angels are leading;
I see the crown placed on each saint bending lowly,
While sounds the Trisagion—Holy, thrice Holy!

I have Paradise dreams of a band with palm‐branches,
Whose wavings give back their gold harps' resonances,
And a jewelled‐walled city, where walketh in splendour
Each one who his life for God's truth did surrender.
Who would weep their death‐doom, if such bliss we inherit,
When the veil of the human falls off from the spirit?

The Christian may shrink from the last scenes of trial,
And the woes yet unknown of each mystical vial;
But the hosts of Jehovah will gather beside him,
The rainbow‐crowned angel stoop downward to guide him;
And to him, who as hero and martyr hath striven,
Will the Crown, and the Throne, and the Palm‐branch be given.

Has not vengeance been sated at last?
Will the holy and beautiful chimes
Ring out the old wrongs of the past,
Ring in the new glories and times?
Will the eyes of the pale prisoners rest
Once again on their loved mountain scenes,
When the crimson of East or of West
Falls o’er them as mantles on Queens?
Will they muse once again by the sea,
List the thunder of waves on the strand,
As exultant, as fearless and free
As the foam‐flakes that dash on the land?
Will they lift their wan faces to God
In the radiant, bright, infinite air,
Press their lips to the old native sod
In a rapture of praise and of prayer?

Ah, the years of their young lives pass over,
Still wept out in dungeons alone,
Where the lips of a wife, child, or mother
Were never yet pressed to their own;
Years of torture and sorrow and trials,
In the gloom of the desolate cell,
Where the wrath of the sevenfold vials
Seem poured to turn Earth to a Hell;
Where strong brains are seared into madness,
And burning hearts frozen to stone,
And despair surges over life’s gladness,
And young life goes out with a moan.

Go, kneel as at graves, weeping woman
When the last fatal sentence was said,
All ties that are tender and human
Were rent as from those that are dead.

They were young then, in youth’s glorious fashion
With a pulse‐throb of fire in each vein,
And the glow and the splendours of passion
Flashing up from the heart to the brain.
Sharp as falchions their keen words reproving
Great words moved by no coward breath
And no crime on their souls save of loving
Their Country with love strong as death.
Oh, their hearts, how they leaped to the surface,
As a sword from the scabbard unsheathed,
Their pale faces stern with a purpose,
Their brows with Fate’s cypress enwreathed.
Grave, earnest, the judgment unheeding,
Or the wreck of their lives lying prone,
From these doomed lips the strong spirits’ pleading
Soared up from man’s bar to God’s Throne.

“We but taught men,” they said, “from the pages
Graven deep in our history and soil,
From the Litanies poured through the ages
Of sorrow, and torture, and toil;
By the insults, the mockings, the scornings,
The bondage on body and soul;
By the ruin, the slaughters, the burnings,
When death was the patriot’s goal;
By the falsehood enthroned in high places,
By the feeble hearts cowering within,
By the slave‐brand read plain on their faces,
Though the ermine might cover the sin.
We were broken and sundered and shattered,
Made thrall by the tyrant’s strong arm,
To the wild waves and fierce winds were scattered
As dead leaves swept on by the storm.

For each age gave a traitor or tyrant
To build up the wrongs that we see,
But each age, too, gives heroes aspirant
Of the Fame or the death of the Free!”

Oh, Chimes ringing out in our city,
Oh, Angels that walk to and fro,
Oh, Christ‐words of pardon and pity,
Can ye speak to those souls lying low
In a sorrow no festal chime scatters,
In a night where no Angel appears,
The wasted limbs heavy with fetters,
The weary heart heavy with tears;
With the ghost of dead youth crushing on them,
And the gloom of the years yet to be,
With a blackness of darkness upon them
As of night when it falls on the sea?

When the Christmas bells ring out at even
The song of the Angels’ bright spheres,
Their sad eyes will strain up to Heaven,
Their bread will be bitter with tears.
Through our laughter will come that sad vision,
Through the ivy‐wreathed wine‐cup’s red glow,
Through our wassail the wail from their prison,
Lamentation and mourning and woe.
With sorrow wrapped round like a garment,
With ashes for joy as their crown,
With bonds tight’ning close as a cerement
They wait till God’s morning comes down;
Yet no echo from their lips will falter
Of the solemn, sweet carol or song,
But a cry, as of souls ’neath the Altar,
“How long! oh, our Lord God, how long?”

Joy in Ilion's hall resoundeth,
Ere the mighty city fell;
Festive hymns of triumph sounded
With the gold harp's richest swell.
Each stern warrior rests at last
From that strife of direst slaughter;
For the brave Pelides weds
Royal Priam's loveliest daughter.

Troop on troop, with laurel garlands,
Slowly swept the bridal train
Onward to the sacred temple
Where arose the Thymbrian's fane.
By them ran, with long hair streaming,
Ivy‐crownéd Mænades;
One alone, of sorrow dreaming,
Wandered in her wretchedness.

Joyless, while they chant their praises
None to soothe her, none to love
Did Cassandra tread the mazes
Of Apollo's laurel grove;
To the wild wood's deepest shadow
Fled the mystic maiden now,
And she dashed the priestess‐fillet
Wildly from her throbbing brow.

"Everywhere are sounds of gladness,
From each happy heart awoke;
I alone must rove in sadness,
I alone must grief invoke.
Joy illumes my father's features,
Garlanded my sisters stand
Yet I hear the rushing pinions
Of Destruction o'er our land.

"Wildly high a torch is flashing,
But 'tis not from Hymen's hand;
Upward see the red stream dashing,
But 'tis not an altar brand.
Costly viands, festal dances,
Wait the bridegroom and the bride
Yet the Avenger's step advances,
Who will crush them in their pride.

"And they mock my prophet wailing,
And they scorn my words of woe;
Fatal gift and unavailing
Still I've wandered to and fro,
Shunn'd by all the happy round me,
Scorned by all where'er I trod;
Heavily thou hast foredoomed me,
Oh! thou mighty Pythian God!

"Why on me was laid the mission:
Lift the future's mystic shroud?
Why to me the seer's vision
'Mid a spirit‐darkened crowd?
When the mortal arm is weak,
Wherefore give the prophet's power?
Can it turn the stream, or break
Clouds of woe that darkly lower?

"Wherefore lift the pall o'ershading
Dark and dread Futurity?
Ignorance is joy unfading
Knowledge, death and misery.
Oh! recall thy mournful mission
Take the future from my sight:
Fatal is the prophet's vision
To the form that shrines its light.

"Give me back the happy blindness,
Ere my childhood felt thy spell;
Never sang I in joy's wildness
Since I heard thy oracle.
Clear the future lies before me,
But the present veiled away;
Oh! to life and joy restore me
Take thy cruel gift away!

"Never round my perfumed tresses
May the bridal wreath entwine;
'Mid thy temple's drear recesses
Doomed in loneliness to pine.
Never o'er my youth of weeping
Did one happy moment rise
Never aught but sorrow reaping
From thy fatal mysteries.

"See my gay companions round me,
Blessed with all that love can give;
I alone, my youth consuming,
Live to weep, and weep to live.
Vain to me the sun, the skies,
The flowers on the green earth bending;
Who the joys of life would prize
That could know their bitter ending?

"Thou, Polyxena, art happy
In thy love's first deep excess,
Hellas gives her bravest hero
To thy young heart's fond caress.
Proudly is her bosom heaving,
Conscious of her bridegroom's love,
Whilst her dreams of pleasure weaving,
Envies not the Gods above.

"And I, too, have trembled gazing
Upon one my heart adored
In his deep eyes' soft appraising
Reading love's unspoken word.
Bridal vows I'd fain have uttered,
Oh, to him how willingly!
But there stepped a Stygian spectre
Nightly between him and me.

"Pale and hideous phantoms haunt me,
From the realms of Proserpine;
Ghastly shades of gloom confront me,
Everywhere my steps incline;
Even in festive scenes of pleasure,
Stifling bright youth's careless glee
Oh! that I could know the treasure
Of a young heart's gaiety!

"Ha! the murderer's steel is beaming!
The murderer's eye glares wildly bright!
Whither shall I fly the gleaming
Of the Future's lurid light?
All in vain I turn my glances
Still the vision's ghastly hand
Points my doom as it advances:
Death within the stranger's land."

Does the phophet‐maiden falter?
Hark! those wild disordered cries!
Slain before the sacred altar,
Dead the son of Thetis lies.
Eris shakes her wreathed serpents
All the Gods their temples shun
And a thunder‐cloud is resting
Heavily on Ilion!

Vain the love that looketh upward; we may worship, may adore;
From the heart's o'erflowing chalice all the tide of feeling pour;
Dash our souls against the barriers that divide us from the shrine;
Fling the incense; pour libations—aye, of life's own ruddy wine;
But, the angel we gaze up to, calm as form of pictured saint,
From its golden mist of glory bendeth never to our plaint plant;
Heedeth not if crushed the temple where the altar fires burned,
For the doom runs through the ages—Love was never yet returned.
page: 90
II.
Thus it was he loved a lady: never priest in Ispahàn
So adored when mount and ocean morning's flashing glories span.
Never sun‐god in its glory, marching stately from the east,
Crimson‐robed and cloud‐attended, heeded less the praying priest,
Than the lady that pale lover, while her lonely path she took
O'er the spirit's glittering summits, with her proud and queenly look;
Like that Roman Sybil bearing in her hands the mystic scroll,
And her large eyes looking onward where the future ages roll.

So, in lone and lofty beauty, she stood high above the world,
Never heeding, dashing neathward, how life's stormy billows curled;
As a pine upon the mountain, warring tempests raging round,
As an island peak of ocean, with the starry midnight crowned.
How could she who trod the pathway of the spirit's starry zones
Stoop to listen, bending earthward, to a lover's murmuring tones? —
While her ear was gathering music from Creation's golden chords,
List the human tears low falling, with the pleading human words?

And could he, who tracked the eagle borne on through cloud and light,
With her glorious regnant beauty filling soul and sense and sight,

Stoop to gaze on me, half‐blasted by fierce Passion's fiery skies,
Only Love, the love of woman, burning strangely in my eyes?
Oh! I've watched his glance dilating, as it rested where afar
Rose her lofty brow, as riseth the pale glory of a star;
Heard the world's praise hymning round her, saw his cheek of flushing pride,
Whilst I, writhing in heart‐agony, all calmly sat beside.

No rays of genius crowning, such as brows like hers enrol,
With no flashing thoughts, like North‐lights, rushing up my darkened darkned soul;
Waking but his earnest feelings with, perchance, my graver words,
While her spirit, like a tempest, swept the range of Passion's chords.
Oh, Woman! calmest sufferer! what deep agony oft lies
In thy low, false‐hearted laughter, glancing bright through tearless eyes!
And how little deemed he truly that the calmest eyes he met
Were but Joy's funereal torches, on Life's ruined altar set.

How could I light up his nature, with no glory in my own?
Soul like his, that throbbed and glittered in the radiance of her throne.
Bitter came the words of plaining:—Why should fate to me deny
All the beauty of the mortal, all the soul to deify?
What had she done, then, for Heaven, so that Heaven should confer
Every gift, to make man prostrate at her feet as worshipper?

Raised her high enough to scorn him—aye, to trample in disdain
On the heart flung down before her—heart that I had died to gain!

Trod his love down calmly, queenly, like a mantle 'neath her feet,
While with lordly spirit‐monarchs she moved proudly to her seat,
Grand as eagle in the zenith, with the noonday radiance crowned
Lone and icy as an Alp‐peak, with the circling glaciers round.
But an echo of all beauty through her fine‐toned spirit rang,
As a golden harp re‐echoes to each passing music clang,
Till in thrilling, clear vibrations rang her poet‐words in air,
Summoning souls to lofty duties, as an Angelus to prayer.

Oh! she flung abroad her fancies, free as waves dash off the foam
As the palm‐tree flings its branches on the blue of Heaven's dome,
With a genius‐shadow dark'ning in the stillness of her eyes
With her rainbow‐spirit arching half the circle of the skies,
Like a dark‐browed Miriam chanting songs of triumph on the foe,
As the rushing waters bore them to the Hades halls below,
Till up through the startled ether, down the far horizon's rim,
Clashed the swords of men in music to her lofty prophet‐hymn.

But no beauty thrill'd my nature, noon, or night or sunset skies;
For the only heaven I gazed on was the heaven of his eyes—

I'd have bartered Freedom, Justice, People's rights, or native Land,
All the island homes of Ocean, for one pressure of his hand;
Trembling, weak, a coward spirit, only wishing low to lie,
As a flower beneath his footstep, breathe my life out, and so die.
Yet he liked me—aye, he liked me—'twas the phrase—O saints above!
Cold and cruel sounds this liking from the lips of one we love.

They said that he was dying; could I longer silence keeping,
Only pour forth my deep passion in my chamber lonely weeping?
I reck'd not if 'twere womanly, cold convention little heeding,
But in mine his hand enfolding, said, with tearful raised eyes pleading
"She hath left you, left you lonely—sorrow's harvest death may reap;
I say not—love me; let me only watch here by you and weep! "
Then he said, his pale brow raising, with a faint, unquiet smile,
And with saddest eyes upgazing upon mine for all the while

"Sweetest friend, this sorrow‐blighted, faded form, and searéd heart,
To pale death, I fear, are plighted, yet 'twere bitter now to part;
For the chords of life are shaken by a sympathy so true,
And they tremble, in vibration, with a pleasure strange and new.

Still, no love‐dream may be cherished—ah! the time of love is o'er
Youthful heart, by passion blighted, can be kindled never more;
But if sympathy thou darest with a heart so wrecked as mine,
I will give thee back the rarest kindred souls can inter twine."

And so bending coldly, gently, on my brow he placed his lips;
While, I trembling in the shadow of that faint and brief eclipse,
Murmur'd:—"Tell me, tell me truly, do you love her then so well? "
And the hot tears, all unruly, through my twinèd fingers fell,
And I sank down there unheeding so of maidenhood or wrong,
While I told him, weeping, pleading, how I'd loved him, loved him long;
Seen my hopes all faded, perished, spread around in pale dismay,
Wept their pallid corses over—I alone, like Niobe!

Thank God, that no cruel scorning dimm'd his starry eyes divine,
Softly, tender, earnest gazing down the tearful depths of mine—
But with warmest splendours resting on the paleness of his cheek,
As the roseate tinted sunset on a snowy Alpine peak,
Bent he down upon my shoulder, murmuring loverlike and low,
While his breathing softly trembled on my pale lips lying so:

"Ah! such deep and tender loving hath recall'd me from the grave
And this heart with soft approving bids you keep the life you gave;

"Woman's soothing grief to lighten hath a mystic healing power,
And their sympathy can brighten man's most dark and destined hour.
Let the holy words be spoken that bind soul to soul for life;
Let me place the symbol token on this hand—my wedded wife! "
Oh! never yet did an angel breathe diviner words of bliss,
Never mortal heard evangel of a joy like unto this;
In my gladness, smiling, weeping, knelt I down before him there,
Blessing God with wild words leaping from my full heart's inward prayer;

And a glory, ruddy, golden‐hued, streamed down on me from high,
As with lifted hands enfolden gazed I up into the sky
Ever brighter, flashing downward, till my pained eyes ached with light,
And I turned from gazing sunward back to earth's more calm delight.
But—was it spell, or was it charm? —when I turned me to the room,
Fading seem'd the loved one's form, half in light and half in gloom
Throbb'd my brain in wild confusion, slowly died his words in air,
All around me seemed illusion, save that streaming golden glare.


On my fevered eyelids aching, madly press'd my hands I keep
Then arose like one awaking from a strange and magic sleep;
Round I gazed in wild amazement for the glorious light that shone,
Was morn streaming through my casement, but it shone on me alone!
The last cold words he had written still lay there beside my bed;
The last flowers he had given lay beside them, faded, dead;
Life's lonely bitter desolation was true, for aye, I deem,
But, joy's blessed revelations, that—oh, that—was but a dream!