Wilfrid Scawen Blunt: Verses about Nature

Come with the summer leaves, love, to my grave,
And, if you doubt among the quiet dead,
Choose out that mound where greenest grasses wave
And where the flowers grow thickest and most red.

Come in the morning while the dews of night,
Which are fair Nature's tears in darkness shed,
Rim the sad petals nor are garnered quite,
Like my lost hopes untimely harvested.

Come to my grave--ah gather, love, those flowers!
Out of my heart they grow for your dear head.
These are its songs unwritten and all yours,
The love I loved you with and left unsaid.

I sue thee not for pity on my case.
If I have sinned, the judgment has begun.
My joy was but one day of all the days,
And clouds have blotted it and hid the sun.
Thou wert so much to me! But soon I knew
How small a part could mine be in thy life,
That all a woman may endure or do
Counts little to her hero in the strife.
I do not blame thee who deserved no blame;
Thou hast so many worlds within thy ken.
I staked my all upon a losing game,
Knowing the nature and the needs of men,
And knowing too how quickly pride is spent.
With open eyes to Love and Death I went.

A YEAR AGO
A year ago I too was proud of May,
I too delighted in the blackbird's song.
When the sun shone my soul made holiday.
When the rain fell I felt it as a wrong.
Then for me too the world was fresh and young.
Oh what a miracle each bluebell was!
How my heart leaped in union with my tongue,
When first I lit upon a stag's horn moss!
--A year ago! Alas, one Summer's fire,
One autumn's chill, one Winter's discontent,
And now one Spring of joy and hope deferred
Have brought me to this pass of undesire
That I behold May's veil of beauty rent
And stand unmoved by sun and flower and bird.

To Switzerland, the land of lakes and snow,
And ancient freedom of ancestral type,
And modern innkeepers, who cringe and bow,
And venal echoes, and Pans paid to pipe!
See, I am come. And here in vineyards, ripe
With sweet white grapes, I will sit down and read
Once more the loves of Rousseau, till I wipe
My eyes in tenderness for names long dead.
This is the birthplace of all sentiment,
The fount of modern tears. These hills in me
Stir what still lives of fancy reverent
For Mother Nature. Here Time's minstrelsy
Awoke, some century since, one sunny morn,
To find Earth fortunate, and Man forlorn.

Hush, gentle stranger. Here lies one asleep
In the tall grass whom we must not awaken.
For see, the wildest winds hush here and keep
Silence for her and not a leaf is shaken,
Lest she should wake and find herself forsaken.
Close to my feet aweary did she creep
And slept, and she is sweetly still mistaken
Deeming I stand by her and watch her sleep.
--Hush, gentle stranger! One as gentle lies
In this poor grave, and weep before you go
For one who knew no weeping, yet abode
Among our human sorrows and was wise
With tenderer sympathy than tears can show,
The gentlest kindliest creature made by God.

EXHORTING HER TO PATIENCE
Why do we fret at the inconstancy
Of our frail hearts, which cannot always love?
Time rushes onward, and we mortals move
Like waifs upon a river, neither free
To halt nor hurry. Sweet, if destiny
Throws us together for an hour, a day,
In the back--water of this quiet bay,
Let us rejoice. Before us lies the sea,
Where we must all be lost in spite of love.
We dare not stop to question. Happiness
Lies in our hand unsought, a treasure trove.
Time has short patience of man's vain distress;
And fate grows angry at too long delay;
And floods rise fast, and we are swept away.

He slept as only under the free heaven
It is given to sleep, a slumber shadowless
As the broad river to whose banks at even
That spirit comes which brings forgetfulness,
A silence undisturbed by the world's tread,
Which sees not, hears not, feels not, yet is girt
With sound and light and sense; which seeming dead
Drinks in Earth's life in cure of every hurt
And so takes consolation. Dreams anon
Come for the soul's refreshment, apparitions
Begot of heaven's beauty and the sun,
No meaningless expectance of sad visions
But tales prophetic of new days more fair
And to be numbered with the things that are,

THE SAME CONTINUED
Give me thy soul, Juliet, give me thy soul!
I am a bitter sea, which drinketh in
The sweetness of all waters, and so thine.
Thou, like a river, pure and swift and full
And freighted with the wealth of many lands,
With hopes, and fears, and death and life, dost roll
Against the troubled ocean of my sin.
Thou doubtest not, though on these desert sands
The billows surge against thee black with brine,
Unwearied. For thy love is fixed and even
And bears thee onward, and thy faith is whole.
Though thou thyself shouldst sin, yet surely Heaven
Hath held thee guiltless and thou art forgiven.

Whence is our pleasure in things beautiful?
We are not born with it, we do not know,
By instinct of the eye or natural rule,
That naked rocks are fairest, or flowers blow
Best in their clefts, or that the world of snow
Has other glory than of cold and ice.
From our mother's hand we viewed these things below
Senseless as goats which browse a precipice,
Till we were taught to know them. With what tears
I con the lessons now I learned so well,
Of mountain shapes, from those dead lips of hers;
And as she spoke, behold, a miracle
Proving her words,--for at our feet there grew,
Beauty's last prodigy, a gentian blue.

What is my thought of you, beloved one,
Now you have passed from me and gone your ways?
Glory is gone with you from stars and sun,
And all wise meaning from the nights and days.
There is no colour, no delight, no praise
In the deep forest, where your dear eyes shone,
Nor any dryad face with cheeks ablaze
To paint the glades grown sere as Avalon.
--What is my thought of you? No thought have I
But just to weep the pity of lost things,
Grieve with the wind, and rain tears with the rain.
The sun may smile, who knows, in a blue sky,
To--morrow? But to--day Hope's passionate wings
Are folded and Love waits on only Pain.

ON THE NATURE OF LOVE
You ask my love. What shall my love then be ?
A hope, an aspiration, a desire?
The soul's eternal charter writ in fire
Upon the earth, the heavens, and the sea?
You ask my love. The carnal mystery
Of a soft hand, of finger--tips that press,
Of eyes that kindle and of lips that kiss,
Of sweet things known to thee and only thee?
You ask my love. What love can be more sweet
Than hope or pleasure? Yet we love in vain.
The soul is more than joy, the life than meat.
The sweetest love of all were love in pain,
And that I will not give. So let it be.
--Nay, give me any love, so it be love of thee.

Love, love, in vain
We count the days of Spring.
Lost is all love's pain,
Lost the songs we sing.
Sunshine and Summer rain,
Winter and Spring again
Still the years shall bring,
But we die.

Love, what a noon
Of happy love was ours!
Grief came too soon,
Touched the Autumn flowers,
Grief and the doubt of death,
Mixed with the roses' breath.
Darkly the Winter lowers,
And we die.

His torch, love, the Sun
Turns to the stormy West,
Like a fair dream begun
Changing to jest.
Love, while our souls are one,
Still let us sing the Sun,
Sing and forget the rest
And so die.

This book is written for Man's ultimate need,
A creed of joy sent down to the aged Earth
From days of happier daring and more mirth
To comfort and console all hearts that bleed.
Here shall ye find how Love, that mastering weed
Of tropic growth and paradisal power,
Sprang in a night and found its fortunate hour
And was fulfilled of glory, flower, fruit, seed,
A wonder to the Forest.--O ye souls
Of men and women, who on Time's whim wait
Nor clutch her hem when Pleasure turns to flee!
Read of these two, who ill content with doles
Rose in their rage and gave assault to Fate
And won their birth--fruit. Read. Nay, dare it ye!

TO-DAY, all day, I rode upon the down,
With hounds and horsemen, a brave company
On this side in its glory lay the sea,
On that the Sussex weald, a sea of brown.
The wind was light, and brightly the sun shone,
And still we gallop'd on from gorse to gorse:
And once, when check'd, a thrush sang, and my horse
Prick'd his quick ears as to a sound unknown.
   I knew the Spring was come. I knew it even
Better than all by this, that through my chase
In bush and stone and hill and sea and heaven
I seem'd to see and follow still your face.
Your face my quarry was. For it I rode,
My horse a thing of wings, myself a god.

HE ARGUES WITH HIS LIFE
My life, what strange mad garments hast thou on,
Now that I see thee truly and am wise!
Thou wild, lost Proteus, strangling and undone!
What shapes are these, what metamorphoses
Of a god's soul in pain? I hear thy cries
And see thee writhe and take fantastic forms,
And strike in blindness at the destinies
And at thyself, and at thy brother worms.
Ah, foolish worm, thou canst not change thy lot,
And all like thee must perish 'neath the sun.
Why struggle with thy fellows? Nay, be kind,
Kinder than these. Behold, the flower--pot
Of fate is emptied out, and one by one
The fisher takes you, and his hooks are blind.

THE SAME CONTINUED
Your youth flowed on, a river chaste and fair,
Till thirty years were written to your name.
A wife, a mother, these the titles were
Which conquered for you the world's fairest fame.
In all things you were wise but in this one,
That of your wisdom you yourself did doubt.
Youth spent like age, no joy beneath the sun.
Your glass of beauty vainly running out.
Then suddenly again, ere well you knew,
Love looked upon you tenderly, yet sad:
``Are these wise follies, then, enough for you?''
He said;--``Love's wisdom were itself less mad.''
And you: ``What wouldst thou of me?'' ``My bare due,
In token of what joys may yet be had.''

ON THE POWER OF HER BEAUTY
I am lighthearted now. An hour ago
There was a tempest in my heaven, a flame
Of sullen lightning under a bent brow
And a dull muttering which breathed no name.
Now all is changed. The very winds are tame,
And the birds sing aloud from every bough,
And my heart leaps. What empire dost thou claim,
Child, o'er this Earth, that nature serves thee so?
Sublime magician! Well may Earth and Heaven
Change at thy bidding, and the hearts of men.
Didst thou but know the power that beauty hath,
The sea should leave his bed, the rocks be riven,
And wise men, deeming chaos come again,
Should kneel before thee and conjure thy wrath.

THE OASIS OF SIDI KHALED
How the earth burns! Each pebble underfoot
Is as a living thing with power to wound.
The white sand quivers, and the footfall mute
Of the slow camels strikes but gives no sound,
As though they walked on flame, not solid ground.
'Tis noon, and the beasts' shadows even have fled
Back to their feet, and there is fire around
And fire beneath, and overhead the sun.
Pitiful heaven! What is this we view?
Tall trees, a river, pools, where swallows fly,
Thickets of oleander where doves coo,
Shades, deep as midnight, greenness for tired eyes.
Hark, how the light winds in the palm--tops sigh.
Oh this is rest. Oh this is paradise.

What shall I tell you, child, in this new Sonnet?
Life's art is to forget, and last year's sowing
Cast in Time's furrow with the storm winds blowing
Bears me a wild crop with strange fancies on it.
Last year I wore your sole rose in my bonnet.
This year--who knows--who, even the All--knowing,
What to my vagrant heart, for its undoing,
Of weeds shall blossom ere my tears atone it?
--New Spring is in the air with new desirings;
New wonders fructify Earth, Sea, and Heaven,
And happy birds sing loud from a new nest.
Ah, why then grieve Love's recreant aspirings,
His last year's hopes, his vows forgot, forgiven?
Child, be we comforted! New things are best.

I LONG have had a quarrel set with Time
Because he robb'd me. Every day of life
Was wrested from me after bitter strife:
I never yet could see the sun go down
But I was angry in my heart, nor hear
The leaves fall in the wind without a tear
Over the dying summer. I have known
No truce with Time nor Time's accomplice, Death.
   The fair world is the witness of a crime
Repeated every hour. For life and breath
Are sweet to all who live; and bitterly
The voices of these robbers of the heath
Sound in each ear and chill the passer-by.
--What have we done to thee, thou monstrous Time?
What have we done to Death that we must die?

The stricken hart had fled the brake,
His courage spent for life's dear sake.
He came to die beside the lake.

The golden trout leaped up to view,
The moorfowl clapped his wings and crew,
The swallow brushed him as she flew.

He looked upon the glorious sun,
His blood dropped slowly on the stone,
He loved the life so nearly won,

And then he died. The ravens found
A carcase couched upon the ground,
They said their god had dealt the wound.

The Eternal Father calmly shook
One page untitled from life's book.
Few words. None ever cared to look.

Yet woe for life thus idly riven.
He blindly loved what God had given,
And love, some say, has conquered Heaven.

HE DESIRES THE IMPOSSIBLE
If it were possible the fierce sun should,
Standing in heaven unloved, companionless,
Enshrinèd be in some white--bosomed cloud,
And so forget his rage and loneliness;
If it were possible the bitter seas
Should suddenly grow sweet, till at their brink
Birds with bright eyes should stoop athirst and drink;
--If these were possible; and if to these
It should be proved that love has sometimes been
'Twixt lambs and leopards, doves and hawks, that snow
Clasps the bare rocks, that rugged oaks grow green
In the west wind, that pinkest blossoms blow
Upon May's blackest thorn;--then, only then,
I might believe that love between us two
Was still in heaven's gift, sweet child.--And you?

TROUT--FISHING

This morning, through my window, half awake,
I felt the south wind blow; and presently,
With a tumultuous thrill and then a shake,
The nightingale broke forth in melody.
I rose in haste, and looked at the grey sky,
And read an omen. From its corner next
A book I drew, blest book, where fly on fly
Are all the letters of its well--thumbed text.

I chose my cast, a march--brown and a dun,
And ran down to the river, chasing hope.
At the first throw a mighty trout was on,
A very Samson, fit to burst a rope,
Yet tamed by one sad hank of yielding hair
And Fate, the fisherman of King and Pope.
Upon the grass he lies, and gasps the air,
Four silver pounds, sublimely fat and fair.

AWAY TO EGYPT

Enough, enough! This winter is too rude,
Too dark of countenance, of tooth too keen.
Nature finds rebels now in flesh and blood,
And hearts grow sick for change and eyes for green.
Let us away! What profits it that men
Are wise as gods, if winter holds its sway,
If blood be chilled, and numbness clasp the brain?
Frost is too stubborn. Let us then away!

Away to Egypt! There we may forget
All but the presence of the blessed sun.
There in our tents well--housed, sublimely set
Under a pyramid, with horse and gun,
We may make terms with Nature and, awhile,
Put as it were our souls to grass, and run
Barefooted and barehearted in the smile
Of that long summer which still girds the Nile.

ON THE THAMES

The river Thames has many a dear delight
In summer days for souls which know not guile,
Or souls too careless of the vain world's spite
To heed its frowning while the heavens smile.
In boyhood all our pleasure was in toil,
As with bent backs we laboured at the oar;
We loved to spend our strength in the turmoil
Of speed disputed, conquered, conqueror.

But other years brought other joys. Alas!
Where is fair Rosamund, our heart's first queen,
Whose foot so lightly trod with us the grass,
Though burdened with the hundred loves of men,
At Kew, at Skindle's? But no more of this.
We still have joys, and still old Thames is green.
Still on his back we float awhile and press
His hand in hope, and call it happiness.

ON A LOST OPPORTUNITY
We might, if you had willed, have conquered Heaven.
Once only in our lives before the gate
Of Paradise we stood, one fortunate even,
And gazed in sudden rapture through the grate.
And, while you stood astonished, I, our fate
Venturing, pushed the latch and found it free.
There stood the tree of knowledge fair and great
Beside the tree of life. One instant we
Stood in that happy garden, guardianless.
My hands already turned towards the tree
And in another moment we had known
The taste of joy and immortality
And been ourselves as gods. But in distress
You thrust me back with supplicating arms
And eyes of terror, till the impatient sun
Had time to set and till the heavenly host
Rushed forth on us with clarions and alarms
And cast us out for ever, blind and lost.

HE LAMENTS THAT HIS LOVE IS DEAD
My love is dead, dead and in spite of me,--
Dead while I lived,--while yet my blood was rife
With hope and pleasure and the pride of life.
For my love ended unexpectedly
During the Winter, stricken like a tree
By a night's cold, and frozen to the blood,
Whose leaves fell off and never were renewed
By any promise of the years to be.
And, when the Spring came, and the birds, to mate
Among its branches, lo! they found it bare,
Though all around was Summer in the wood.
Yet they took heart awhile, incredulous
That such a tree should be for ever dead.
``'Tis early yet,'' they cried. ``The Spring is late.
It shall still be as in the days that were.''
But Summer came and went while the tree stood
Bare in the sun like a deserted house.
--Then the birds suddenly despaired and fled.

You have let the beauty of the day go over,
You have let the glory of the noon go by.
Clouds from the West have gathered close and cover
All but a remnant now of our proud sky.

Dumbly the rain beats on our darkened faces.
Hushed are the woods. Alas, for us no bird
Shall sing to--day of pleasure in green places,
No touch shall thrill, no soul of leaves be stirred.

Why did we wait? What faith was ours in fortune?
What was our pride that fate should kneel to us?
Oh, we were fools. Love loves not to importune,
And he is silent here in this sad house.

Alas, dear love, the day for us is ended,
The pleasure of green fields, of streams, of skies.
One hour remains, one only of joy blended
With coming night. Ah, seize it ere it flies.

Draw fast the curtains. Close the door on sorrow.
Shut out the dusk. It only makes us grieve.
Here we may live a life,--and then, to--morrow,
If fate still wills it, we may take our leave.

Glad bird, I do bewail thee,
Thy song it was so sweet
That Earth looked up to hail thee
Till wings grew to her feet.
But, ah! thy mate is lying dead
Among the new--mown hay,
And a fowler comes to jail thee
Where thou shalt pine away.

Bright butterfly, I wail thee,
So dainty was thy wing,
So bravely didst regale thee
On every honied thing.
But thou art all too lightly clad
For any month but May,
And Autumn rains shall trail thee
And wash thy paint away.

Sweet childhood, I bewail thee.
Thy smile it shifteth ever
As the ship that thou dost sail thee
Adown the running river.
But ah! life's river runneth fast
And forward lies the sea,
And what shall then avail thee
Thy laughter and thy glee?

And youth, I most bewail thee,
Thy purpose was so great,
But the fools that did assail thee
Were stronger than thy fate,
And thy heart it was so ruddy red
That every archer knew
Where he might best impale thee
And drive his arrows through.

To her whose name,
With its sweet sibilant sound like sudden showers
Splashing the grass and flowers,
Hath set my April heart aflame;

To her whose face,
The flower and crown of all created things,
Dearer than even Spring's,
Hath been to me a sacrament of grace;

Whose luminous mind,
Stored with all gladness of the earth and sky,
Hath lightened my sad eye
And made it wise in love which erst was blind;

Whose voice of pleasure,
Calling to joys as a blithe wedding bell
When ringers ring it well,
Hath tuned my soul to its own happy measure;

Whose blessed hand,
With its white mystery of fingers five,
Each one a soul alive,
Hath taught me truths no angels understand;

Whose arms within,
Should she once clasp me to her very heart,
God knoweth we should not part
But live for aye in Heaven's own bliss divine;

To her, alas,
Who is so near, yet standeth still so far,
Seeing the mortal bar
Betwixt us ever which we cannot pass,

These lines I send
With my heart's tears to--night beseeching her,
Of her dear love more dear,
To be no less to me my sweetest soul and friend.

Nature that day a woman was in weakness,
A woman in her impotent high wrath.
At the dawn we watched it, a low cloud half seen
Under the sun; an innocent child's face
It seemed to us rose--red and fringed with light
Boding no hurt, a pure translucent cloud,
Deep in the East where the Sun's disk began.
We did not guess what strengths in it were pent,
What terrors of rebellion. An hour more,
And it had gathered volume and the form
Of a dark mask, the she--wolf's of old Rome,
The ears, the brow, the cold unpitying eyes,
Through which gleams flashed. And, as we watched, the roll
Of thunder from a red throat muttering
Gave menace of the wild beast close at hand.
Anon a wall of darkness in the South
Black to the Zenith, and a far--off wail,
The wind among the trees.--And then, behold,
Flying before it a mad clamorous rout
Of peewits, starlings, hawks, crows, dishwashers,
Blackbirds and jays, by hundreds, scattering,
While the Earth trembled holding as it were its breath;
Till suddenly an answer from the ground,
And the fields shook and a new mighty roar
Crashed through the oaks, and in a pent--up flow
The storm's rage broke in thunder overhead,
And all the anger of the passionate heaven
Burst into tears.

Moan on with thy loud changeless wail,
Desolate sea,
Grinding thy pebbles into thankless sand.
Oh, could I lash my angry heart like thee
Until it broke upon an iron land,
The very rocks should tremble and turn pale
To be the witness of my agony.

Fierce wind, the sob of thy dull pitiless voice
Is thick with snow.
Hiss out thy tale into my ice--bound ear
In sleety whispers, for full well I know
That in thy wanderings thou hast seen my joys,
My young joys, dead in some far hemisphere,
A land of blackness and colossal woe.

Naked they lay, my shipwrecked mariners,
Upon the shore.
The low moon pointed her long fingers, red
As a murderer's hand, between their prison bars
In the ribbed wreck, which hungry ocean tore
At the first spring--tide to reclaim the dead
And hide them in his jaws for evermore.

Tell me, thou silence, what sad death they died,
Poor castaways!
What wolfish eyes were on each other there,
When they had eaten all that hunger stays,
And thirst no longer could be quenched with pride!
Didst thou not see their teeth grow white and bare,
Grinding a savage thought for many days,

Until they fell upon their own red hearts?
Thou didst not see,
Or Thou hadst surely had some pity, God,
When they crept gnawing to the vital parts,
My joys, which I had nursed so tenderly
In the very cradle of my love's abode.
Or art Thou pitiless as wind or sea?

He.
To what, love, shall I liken thee?
Thou, methinks, shalt firstly be
A blue flower with nodding bells
In the hollow of a tree.
When the wind blows wantonly,
Thou shalt ever shake thy head
At the idle tale he tells.
But at evening from the clover,
When the world is all abed,
And the noisy day is over,
And the birds have gone to rest,
In the darkness will I hover
Till thou bid me come to thee,
Till I creep into thy nest,
I thy long--expected lover,
I thy sweet, thy honey bee.
To what, love, shall I liken thee?
Tell me, love, what wouldst thou be?

She.
I would be a white cloud lying
In the bosom of the sky,
And at noon, when Earth is sighing
For the sun my fleeces hide,
I would bask in his bright eye,
Till he drew me up on high,
Till be took me for his bride.
Thou shalt be my sun to me.

Love, but I would be a well
In the sands of Araby,
So thyself wert a gazelle
Which must either drink or die.
Bend above me, love, and lo!
In my waters thou shalt spy
All that my heart cares to show,
Thy own face against the sky.

He.
To what more shall I liken thee?
Thou, my love, shalt lastly be
A clear silver--tonguèd brook
Running downwards to the Sea,
And the reeds shall seek to stay thee
Under every shaded nook,
And the pebbles shall waylay thee,
With their bald heads to dismay thee,
Till thy pretty face grows white,
Half in anger, half in fright.
See, thy troubles are forgot
In the still pool suddenly,
And a smile has found thee out,
Taking shape of thy delight,
Laughing, weeping, onward ever
Till thou join thyself to me,
For my love shall be the river.
Thou and I shall run together
Ever till we meet the Sea.

Lavender, sea lavender!
Pale sweet flower how full of her!
Flower discreet, with your priest's eyes
Trained in all time's mysteries,
Yet how chastely calmly sealed!
Flower of passions unrevealed,
Stainless eyes, but none the less
Wise in life's most nakedness,
With its inward hours of sin,
Known to thee, and all therein;
And how soul with soul found might,
In the watches of the night,
Cherishing an unseen joy,
Man with woman, girl with boy,
Under the sky's multitude,
Till the pulsings of their blood
Led them into ways unknown,
Flesh of flesh and bone of bone
Clasped in one, till doubt was over,
And they went forth loved and lover
Bride and groom to their new home.

See, to--day to you I come,
Flower of wisdom who know all,
To your mute confessional,
Wanting love and wanting her,
(Lavender, sea lavender!)
In a world where she is not,
Mined with plot and counterplot
Built against our happiness.
You, who know her most, can guess
What her thought is far from me,
What soft wind of memory
Fans her with a scent of pleasure,
What sweet song in what sweet measure
Trilled by birds when day was breaking
And each tremulous throat awaking
Strained to make its passion heard
Louder there than other bird,
While we listened, we too, straining
Heart to heart, and watched the waning
Moon fade slowly like a feather
In the red East, close together,
Near, how near, who now are far.
Tell me what her fancies are.
Does she love still? Does she cherish,
In the waste of days that perish
That one dawn, which cannot die?
Nay, I know it, nor will I
Doubt of love or doubt of her,
(Lavender, sea lavender!)
Since she knows and understands
That my hands still hold her hands.

Ghost of the beautiful past, of the days long gone, of a queen, of a fair sweet woman.
Ghost with the passionate eyes, how proud, yet not too proud to have wept, to have loved, since to love is human.

Angel in fair white garments, with skirts of lawn, by the autumn wind on the pathway fluttered,
Always close by the castle wall and about to speak. But the whisper dies on her lips unuttered.

Yellow leaves deep strewn on the sward, dead leaves of a far--off glorious summer.
Yea, the leaves of the roses she plucked, petal by petal, with beating heart, for him the delayed loved comer.

Why doth she weep thus year on year? He hath tarried long, ah me, a thousand desolate years.
Why doth she weep? She hath wept enough. For see, dark down in the gardens dim, a lake. It is filled with her tears.

If I should ask her name, her title with men? But I need not ask it. I know it, alas, of old, though of old unspoken.
Is there another name but one for that face divine, for those sad sweet lips, like a bow unbent, like a bent bow broken?

No, it is none but her's, the Queen, the beloved of all, the beloved of one, when the Table Round was set in thy mead, Carleon.
None but hers, who was Guenevere, when the trumpets blew and the knights full clad rode down to joust at noon, with their clamorous shout, ``The Queen!''

Doth she remember all, or is all forgotten, pennon proud and lance in rest, the thunder of hoofs and the light swift tread of the foremost runner?
Dareth she raise her eyes, those passionate eyes, at the crowd that gazed? None of them all might meet her look, save he, her one true passionate knight, who adoring won her.

Surely, surely, she seeth; she knoweth all; she is no lost vision of death.
She hath still a smile deep hidden. She hath a name on her lips. She shall sigh, she shall speak, she shall move, when the light winds breathe from the Western Seas with the Spring that quickeneth.

Oh, she shall laugh and sing, though the shadow of Death be a cloud behind her!
Oh, she shall love! Though the dragon of grief keep watch, he shall sleep when the trees in the mead grow green, and awaking he shall not find her.

Read me a sweeter meaning, O Lady, O thou whom I serve, of this pictured story.
Read. Nay the tale is told. To it's truth I swear, by my sword, by my knightly faith, by the fame of the King and the Table Round, and the souls of the Saints in glory!

My only title to her grace
Is her sad, too silent face;
All my right to call her mine
The twin tears that on it shine,
Tears that tell of griefs long hid
In the shadows of each lid,
And of doubts that wound her sore
Our twin lives shall meet no more.
Nay, my right and title this,
That she gave me one shy kiss
'Twixt the dawning and the day,
Benediction on my way,
When the vain world was asleep
And no ear to hear us weep,
And that once my fingers pressed
The warm treasures of her breast,
Just a moment, and the truth
Learned of her close--hidden youth
With its joys and sweetnesses
Deep beyond all wit to guess,
All but mine, and what might be
Were she wholly joined with me.


Such my title is and treasure,
Such my glory beyond measure,
Such my thought for the new years,
Burdened with what doubts and fears,
Yet one day to claim her mine.
Here, beyond this shadowy Rhine,
Far from her and journeying still,
Feel I her young pulses thrill,
Her warm body nestled close
To my own with all its woes.
And I know that some far hour
I shall call to her with power,
When the sun is fast in prison
And the midnight stars have risen
Clear and kind in a warm sky,
And the shepherd's hour is nigh,
In a language she shall heed,
``Life is fleeting, love hath need.
Time it is tears should not be.
Come, my love, and dwell with me.''
And I know that without stay,
'Twixt the dawning and the day,
When the vain world is asleep
And no ear to hear her weep,
She shall dry her tears and come;
And we too through Christendom
And beyond this shadowy Rhine,
With its fields of corn and wine,
And the snow--clad Alps and Rome,
And the blue sea capped with foam,
And far--famed Constantinople
With its domes of pearl and opal,
And the sea of Marmora,
Where the dolphins sport and play,
And the utmost isles of Greece
Guarding still their golden fleece,
As when Paris to them came
With his Helen all aflame
On their glorious honeymoon;
And so on from noon to noon
Journeying still and still beyond,
Fond as they and yet more fond,
To the ancient tearless East
Shall be borne as to a feast,
And sit down there our lives long,
With Love's silence for our song
And Love's guile for our disguise,
While I teach her to be wise.
And my title to her grace
Shall the smiles be on her face,
Her blue eyes, where no tears be,
Being wholly joined with me.

I LIKE the hunting of the hare
Better than that of the fox;
I like the joyous morning air,
And the crowing of the cocks.

I like the calm of the early fields,
The ducks asleep by the lake,
The quiet hour which Nature yields
Before mankind is awake.

I like the pheasants and feeding things
Of the unsuspicious morn;
I like the flap of the wood-pigeon’s wings
As she rises from the corn.

I like the blackbird’s shriek, and his rush
From the turnips as I pass by,
And the partridge hiding her head in a bush,
For her young ones cannot fly.

I like these things, and I like to ride,
When all the world is in bed,
To the top of the hill where the sky grows wide,
And where the sun grows red.

The beagles at my horse heels trot
In silence after me;
There ’s Ruby, Roger, Diamond, Dot,
Old Slut and Margery,—

A score of names well used, and dear,
The names my childhood knew;
The horn, with which I rouse their cheer,
Is the horn my father blew.

I like the hunting of the hare
Better than that of the fox;
The new world still is all less fair
Than the old world it mocks.

I covet not a wider range
Than these dear manors give;
I take my pleasures without change,
And as I lived I live.

I leave my neighbors to their thought;
My choice it is, and pride,
On my own lands to find my sport,
In my own fields to ride.

The hare herself no better loves
The field where she was bred,
Than I the habit of these groves,
My own inherited.

I know my quarries every one,
The meuse where she sits low;
The road she chose to-day was run
A hundred years ago.

The lags, the gills, the forest ways,
The hedgerows one and all,
These are the kingdoms of my chase,
And bounded by my wall;

Nor has the world a better thing,
Though one should search it round,
Than thus to live one’s own sole king,
Upon one’s own sole ground.

I like the hunting of the hare;
It brings me, day by day,
The memory of old days as fair,
With dead men passed away.

To these, as homeward still I ply
And pass the churchyard gate,
Where all are laid as I must lie,
I stop and raise my hat.

I like the hunting of the hare;
New sports I hold in scorn.
I like to be as my fathers were,
In the days e’er I was born.

I had clean forgotten all, her face who had caused my trouble.
Gone was she as a cloud, as a bird which passed in the wind, as a glittering stream--borne bubble,
As a shadow set by a ship on the sea, where the sail looks down on its double.

I had laid her face to the wall, on the shelf where my fancies sleep.
I had laid my pain in its grave, in its rose--leaf passionless grave, with the things I had dared not keep.
I had left it there. I had dried my tears. I had said, ``Ah, why should I weep?''

I will not be fooled by her, by the spell of her fair child's face.
What is its meaning to me, who have seen, who have known, who have loved what miracle forms of grace?
What are its innocent wiles, its smiles, its idle sweet girlishness?

I will not love without love. I despise the ways of a fool.
Let me prevail as of old, as lover, as lord, as king, or have done with Love's tyrant rule.
I was born to command, not serve, not obey. No boy am I in Love's school.

I have fled to the fields, the plains, the desert places of rest,
To the forest's infinite smile, where the cushat calls from the trees and the yaffle has lined her nest,
To the purple hills with the spray of the sea, when the wind blows loud from the west.

I have done with her love and her, the wine--draughts of human pleasure.
The voice of nature is best, the cradle song of the trees which is hymned to Time's stateliest measure,
As once a boy in the woods I heard it and held it an exquisite treasure.

I had clean forgotten all. I had sung to the indolent hills
Songs of joy without grief, since grief is of human things the shadow of human ills.
I sang aloud in my pride of song to the chime of the answering rills.

And, behold, the whole world heard, the dull mad manridden Earth.
And they cried, ``A prophet hath risen, a sage with the heart of a child, a bard of no human birth,
A soul that hath known nor pain, nor sin, a singer of infinite mirth.''

And she too heard it and came. And she knew it was I grown wise.
And she stood from the rest apart, and I watched her with pitying scorn, and then with a sad surprise,
And last with a new sweet passionate joy, for I saw there were tears in her eyes.

And she came and sat at my feet, as in days ere our grief began.
And I saw her a woman grown. And I was a prophet no more, but a desolate voiceless man.
And I clasped her fast in my arms in joy and kissed her tears as they ran.

And I shall not be fooled by her, though her face is fair as a rose.
And I shall not live without love, though the world should forget my songs and I should forget its woes,
And the purple hills should forget the sea and the spray when the west wind blows.

What is my quarrel with thee, beautiful sea,
That thus I cannot love thy waves or thee,
Or hear thy voice but it tormenteth me?

Why do I hate thee, who art beautiful
Beyond all beauty, when the nights are cool,
And the stars fade because the moon is full?

Why do I hate thee? Thou art new and young,
And life is thine for loving, and thy tongue
Hath tones that I have known and loved and sung.

Thou hast a smile which would my smiling greet;
Thy brave heart beateth as my own doth beat,
And thou hast tears which should be true and sweet.

Thou art a creature, strong and fair and brave,
Such as I might have given the world to have
And love and cherish;--and thou art my slave.

I have my home in thee. Thy arms enfold
Me all night long, and I am rocked and rolled,
And thou art never weary of thy hold.

Thou art a woman in thy constancy,
And worthy better love than mine could be;
And yet, behold, I cannot suffer thee.

If thou wert dumb; if thou wert like the sky,
Which has not learned to speak our misery
In any voice less rude than the wind's cry;

If thou wert wholly young and didst not know
The secret of our ancient human woe,
Or if thou knewest it wholly as I know;

Or yet if thou wert old with all these years;
If thou wert dull to hopes and loves and fears;
If thou wert blind and couldst not see our tears;

If thou wert bounded by some rocky shore,
And hadst not given thyself thus wholly o'er
To our poor single selves with all thy store;

If thou wert not in thy immensity,
A single circle circling with the sky,
Where we must still be centres changelessly;

If thou wert other than thou art; alas,
If thou wert not of water, but a mass
Of formless earth, a waveless plain of grass;

If thou wert shapeless as the mountains are;
If thou wert clad in some discordant wear;
If thou wert not so blue and trim and fair;

If thou wert decked with towns and villages;
If there was heard, across the silent seas,
The music of church bells upon the breeze;

If thou wert this; or if thou wert not near,
But I could only sit apart and hear
The beating of thy waves, and find it drear,

But wild and quite unknown, and far from me;
Sea, if thou couldst no longer be the sea,
Then I could love thee as thou lovest me.

If thou wouldst have me love thee, beautiful sea,
Build up a wall of dark 'twixt thee and me;
Let me not see thee; call the night to thee.

League with the winds; rise up, and send them driven
To roll mad clouds about thy back at even.
Make thee a desolation of the heaven.

Thou shouldst compel me, with thy angry voice,
To choose 'twixt death and thee; and, at the choice,
If my cheek grew not pale, thou might'st rejoice,

And I might love thee, oh thou monstrous sea;
But now I cannot love thy waves or thee,
Or bear thy beauty in my misery.

Do you remember, Lucy,
How, in the days gone by
We spent a summer together,
A summer in Tuscany,
In the chestnut woods by the river,
You and the rest and I?

Your house had the largest garden,
But ours was next to the bridge,
And we had a mulberry alley
Which sloped to the water's edge.
You were always talking and laughing
On your side of the hedge.

How many sisters and brothers,
Lucy, then did you own?
Harriet and Francis and Horace
And Phyllis, a flower half--blown.
I liked you more than the others,
For you had the longest gown.

What has become of the laughter,
What of the mulberry trees?
Is there no record in Heaven,
No echo of days like these?
Francis is married and happy
And Horace beyond the seas.

Phyllis was first to desert us,
She had no soul for the Earth
But lingered a guest impatient
Alike of our sorrow and mirth.
Death's step to her on the threshold
Seemed news of a glorious birth.

Harriet, whose eyes were the brightest
The fullest of innocent guile,
Has hidden her joy and our sorrow
Under a Carmelite veil.
They call her the ``mother abbess.''
She has hardly leisure to smile.

Do you remember the ponies
We used to ride on the hill,
Every knee of them broken,
Every back like a quill,
Cesare, Capitano,
Milor and Jack and Jill?

High o'er the plains and the valleys,
Wherever our leader led,
We two, closest of allies,
Were with him still in his tread,
Sworn to be first on his footsteps,
To serve him alive or dead.

Dead--ah dead! Who could think it?
The laughter so strong on his lips
Had seemed an elixir of living.
Where now are his jibes and his quips,
The fair paradoxes he flung us,
The fire of him?--Lost in eclipse!

All are scattered and vanished,
Laughter and smiles and tears,
Gone with the dust on the sandals
Which cling to the feet of the years.
Time has no time to remember,
And Fortune no face for our fears.

Do you remember, Lucy,
The day which too soon had come,
The first sad day of the Autumn,
The last of our summer home,
The day of my journey to England
And yours to your convent at Rome?

We rose with the dawn that morning--
--The others were hardly awake--
And took our walk by the river.
Lucy, did your heart ache?
Or was it the chill of the sunrise
That made you shiver and shake?

Lucy, the dog rose you gave me
Still lies in its secret place.
Lucy, the tears, my fool's answer,
Have left on my cheeks a trace.
The kiss you gave me at parting
I yet can feel on my face.

These are the things I remember.
These are the things that I grieve,
The joys that are scattered and vanished,
The friends I am loath to leave.
I grudge them to death and silence
And age which is death's reprieve.

Vanished, forgotten and scattered,
All but you, Lucy, and I,
Who cling some moments together
Till Time shall have hurried us by:
A moment and yet a moment,
Till we too forget and die!