The Project Gutenberg eBook of Poems, by Robert Bridges

BY ROBERT BRIDGES

PRINTED AT THE PRIVATE PRESS OF
H. DANIEL
FELLOW OF WORCESTER COLLEGE
OXFORD
1884

THE Author of these poems is too well aware of their demerits to allow them to be republished thus without some apology. But it happens that the Printer, at whose request this selection is made, is willing to take so fair a share of the blame as to make any further explanation unnecessary.

Clear and gentle stream,

Known and loved so long,

That hast heard the song

And the idle dream

Of my boyish day;

While I once again

Down thy margin stray,

In the selfsame strain

Still my voice is spent,

With my old lament,

And my idle dream,

Clear and gentle stream!

Where my old seat was

Here again I sit,

Where the long boughs knit

Over stream and graís

Thick translucent eaves:

Where back eddies play

Shipwreck with the leaves,

And the proud swans stray,

Sailing one by one

Out of stream and sun,

And the fish lie cool

In their chosen pool.

Many an afternoon

Of the summer day

Dreaming here I lay;

And I know how soon

Idly at its hour

First the deep bell hums

From the minster tower,

And then evening comes,

Creeping up the glade,

With her lengthening shade,

And the tardy boon

Of her brightening moon.

Clear and gentle stream,

Ere again I go

Where thou dost not flow,

Well does it beseem

Thee to hear again

Once my youthful song,

That familiar strain

Silent now so long:

Be as I content

With my old lament,

And my idle dream,

Clear and gentle stream!

Dear lady, when thou frownest,

And my true love despisest,

And all thy vows disownest

That sealed my venture wisest;

I think thy pride’s displeasure

Neglects a matchless treasure

Exceeding price and measure.

But when again thou smilest,

And love for love returnest,

And fear with joy beguilest,

And takest truth in earnest;

Then, though I most adore thee,

The sum of my love for thee

Seems poor, scant and unworthy.

Poor withered rose and dry,

Skeleton of a rose,

Risen to testify

To love’s sad close:

Treasured for love’s sweet sake,

That of joy past

Thou might’st again awake

Memory at last:

Yet is thy perfume sweet,

Thy petals red

Yet tell of summer heat,

And the gay bed:

Yet yet recall the glow

Of the gazing sun,

When at thy bush we two

Joined hands in one.

6But, rose, thou hast not seen,

Thou hast not wept

The change that passed between

Whilst thou hast slept.

To me thou seemest yet

The dead dream’s thrall:

While I live and forget

Dream, truth and all.

Thou art more fresh than I,

Rose, sweet and red:

Salt on my pale cheeks lie

The tears I shed.

I found to-day out walking

The flower my love loves best.

What, when I stooped to pluck it,

Could dare my hand arrest?

Was it a snake lay curling

About the root’s thick crown?

Or did some hidden bramble

Tear my hand reaching down?

There was no snake uncurling,

And no thorn wounded me;

’Twas my heart checked me, sighing

She is beyond the sea.

Will Love again awake,

That lies asleep so long?

O hush! ye tongues that shake

The drowsy night with song.

It is a lady fair

Whom once he deigned to praise,

That at the door doth dare

Her sad complaint to raise.

She must be fair of face,

As bold in heart she seems,

If she would match her grace

With the delight of dreams.

Her beauty would surprise

Gazers on Autumn eves,

Who watched the broad moon rise

Upon the scattered sheaves.

9O sweet must be the voice

He shall descend to hear,

Who doth in Heaven rejoice

His most enchanted ear.

The smile, that rests to play

Upon her lip, foretells

What musical array

Tricks her sweet syllables.

And yet her smiles have danced

In vain, if her discourse

Win not the soul entranced

In divine intercourse.

She will encounter all

This trial without shame,

Her eyes men Beauty call,

And Wisdom is her name.

Throw back the portals then,

Ye guards, your watch that keep,

Love will awake again

That lay so long asleep.

Whither, O splendid ship, thy white sails crowding,

Leaning across the bosom of the urgent West,

That fearest nor sea rising, nor sky clouding,

Whither away, fair rover, and what thy quest?

Ah! soon, when Winter has all our vales opprest,

When skies are cold and misty, and hail is hurling,

Wilt thou glide on the blue Pacific, or rest

In a summer haven asleep, thy white sails furling.

I there before thee, in the country so well thou knowest,

Already arrived am inhaling the odorous air:

I watch thee enter unerringly where thou goest,

And anchor queen of the strange shipping there,

Thy sails for awning spread, thy masts bare:

Nor is aught from the foaming reef to the snowcapped, grandest

Peak, that is over the feathery palms more fair

Than thou, so upright, so stately, and still thou standest.

11And yet, O splendid ship, unhailed and nameless,

I know not if, aiming a fancy, I rightly divine

That thou hast a purpose joyful, a courage blameless,

Thy port assured in a happier land than mine.

But for all I have given thee, beauty enough is thine,

As thou, aslant with trim tackle and shrouding,

From the proud nostril curve of a prow’s line

In the offing scatterest foam, thy white sails crowding.

I saw the Virgin-mother clad in green,

Walking the sprinkled meadows at sundown;

While yet the moon’s cold flame was hung between

The day and night, above the dusky town:

I saw her brighter than the Western gold,

Whereto she faced in splendour to behold.

Her dress was greener than the tenderest leaf

That trembled in the sunset glare aglow:

Herself more delicate than is the brief,

Pink apple-blossom, that May showers lay low,

And more delicious than ’s the earliest streak

The blushing rose shows of her crimson cheek.

With jealous grace her idle ears to please,

A music entered, making passion fain:

Three nightingales sat singing in the trees,

And praised the Goddess for the fallen rain;

Which yet their unseen motions did arouse,

Or parting Zephyrs shook out from the boughs.

13And o’er the treetops, scattered in mid air,

The exhausted clouds, laden with crimson light,

Floated, or seemed to sleep; and, highest there,

One planet broke the lingering ranks of night;

Daring day’s company, so he might spy

The Virgin-queen once with his watchful eye.

And when I saw her, then I worshipped her,

And said,—O bounteous Spring, O beauteous Spring,

Mother of all my years, thou who dost stir

My heart to adore thee and my tongue to sing,

Flower of my fruit, of my heart’s blood the fire,

Of all my satisfaction the desire!

How art thou every year more beautiful,

Younger for all the winters thou hast cast:

And I, for all my love grows, grow more dull,

Decaying with each season overpast!

In vain to teach him love must man employ thee,

The more he learns the less he can enjoy thee.

I know not how I came,

New on my knightly journey,

To win the fairest dame

That graced my maiden tourney.

Chivalry’s lovely prize

With all men’s gaze upon her,

Why did she free her eyes

On me, to do me honour?

Ah! ne’er had I my mind

With such high hope delighted,

Had she not first inclined,

And with her eyes invited.

15But never doubt I knew,

Having their glance to cheer me,

Until the day joy grew

Too great, too sure, too near me.

When hope a fear became,

And passion, grown too tender,

Now trembled at the shame

Of a despised surrender;

And where my love at first

Saw kindness in her smiling,

I read her pride, and cursed

The arts of her beguiling.

Till winning less than won,

And liker wooed than wooing,

Too late I turned undone

Away from my undoing;

And stood beside the door,

Whereto she followed, making

My hard leave-taking more

Hard by her sweet leave-taking.

16Her speech would have betrayed

Her thought, had mine been colder:

Her eyes distress had made

A lesser lover bolder.

But no! Fond heart distrust,

Cried Wisdom, and consider:

Go free, since go thou must,

And so farewell I bid her.

And brisk upon my way

I smote the stroke to sever,

And should have lost that day

My life’s delight for ever;

But when I saw her start

And turn aside and tremble;—

Ah! she was true, her heart

I knew did not dissemble.

There is a hill beside the silver Thames,

Shady with birch and beech and odorous pine:

And brilliant underfoot with thousand gems

Steeply the thickets to his floods decline.

Straight trees in every place

Their thick tops interlace,

And pendant branches trail their foliage fine

Upon his watery face.

Swift from the sweltering pasturage he flows:

His stream, alert to seek the pleasant shade,

Pictures his gentle purpose, as he goes

Straight to the caverned pool his toil has made.

His winter floods lay bare

The stout roots in the air:

His summer streams are cool, when they have played

Among their fibrous hair.

18A rushy island guards the sacred bower,

And hides it from the meadow, where in peace

The lazy cows wrench many a scented flower,

Robbing the golden market of the bees:

And laden barges float

By banks of myosote;

And scented flags and golden flower-de-lys

Delay the loitering boat.

And on this side the island, where the pool

Eddies away, are tangled mass on mass

The water-weeds, that net the fishes cool

And scarce allow a narrow stream to pass;

Where spreading crowfoot mars

The drowning nenuphars,

Waving the tassels of her silken grass

Below her silver stars.

But in the purple pool there nothing grows,

Not the white water-lily spoked with gold;

Though best she loves the hollows, and well knows

On quiet streams her broad shields to unfold:

Yet should her roots but try

Within these deeps to lie,

Not her long reaching stalk could ever hold

Her waxen head so high.

19Sometimes an angler comes, and drops his hook

Within its hidden depths, and ’gainst a tree

Leaning his rod, reads in some pleasant book,

Forgetting soon his pride of fishery;

And dreams, or falls asleep,

While curious fishes peep

About his nibbled bait, or scornfully

Dart off and rise and leap.

And sometimes by the pathway through the trees

An aged dame at evening trudges home:

And merry voices greet her, and she sees

Her dear grandchildren, down the hill that come

To meet her, and to bear

Her basket home with care,

Divining that, of all her treasures, some

Will be for them to share.

Else, he that wishes solitude is safe,

Whether he bathe at morning in the stream:

Or lead his love there when the hot hours chafe

The meadows, busy with a blurring steam;

Or watch, as fades the light,

The gibbous moon grow bright,

Until her magic rays dance in a dream,

And glorify the night.

20Where is this bower beside the silver Thames?

O pool and flowery thickets, hear my vow!

O trees of freshest foliage and straight stems,

No sharer of my secret I allow:

Lest ere I come the while

Strange feet your shades defile;

Or lest the burly oarsman turn his prow

Within your guardian isle.

Again with pleasant green

Has Spring renewed the wood,

And where the bare trunks stood

Are leafy arbours seen;

And back on budding boughs

Come birds, to court and pair,

Whose rival amorous vows

Amaze the scented air.

The streams unbound anew

Refill their mossy banks,

The forward season pranks

With flowers of varied hue:

And scattered down the meads

From hour to hour unfold

A thousand buds and beads

In stars and cups of gold.

22Now hear, and see, and note,

The farms are all astir,

And every labourer

Has doffed his winter coat;

And how with specks of white

They dot the brown hillside,

Or jaunt and sing outright

As by their teams they stride.

They sing to feel the Sun

Regain his wanton strength;

To know the year at length

Rewards their labour done;

To see the rootless stake

They set bare in the ground,

Burst into leaf, and shake

Its grateful scent around.

Ah now an evil lot

Is his who toils for gain,

Where crowded chimneys stain

The heavens his choice forgot;

’Tis on the blighted trees

That deck his garden dim,

And in the tainted breeze

That sweet spring comes to him.

23Far rather would I choose

The grace of brutes that bask,

Than in an eager task,

My inborn honour lose:

Would rather far enjoy

The body, than invent

A duty, to destroy

The ease which nature sent;

And country life I praise

And lead, because I find

The philosophic mind

Can take no middle ways;

She will not leave her love

To mix with men, her art

Is all to strive above

The crowd, or stand apart.

Thrice happy he, the rare

Prometheus, who can play

With hidden things, and lay

New realms of nature bare:

Whose venturous step has trod

Hell underfoot, and won

A crown from man and God

For all that he has done.—

24That highest gift of all,

Since crabbèd fate did flood

My heart with sluggish blood,

I look not mine to call;

But, like a truant freed,

Fly to the woods, and claim

A pleasure for the deed

Of my inglorious name.

And am content, denied

The best, in choosing right;

For Nature can delight

Fancies unoccupied

With ecstasies so sweet

As none can even guess,

Who walk not with the feet

Of joy in idleness.

Then leave your joyless ways,

My friend, my joys to see.

The day you come shall be

The choice of chosen days:

You shall be lost, and learn

New being, and forget

The world, till your return

Shall bring your first regret.

Behold! the radiant Spring,

In splendour decked anew,

Down from her heaven of blue

Returns on sunlit wing:

The zephyrs of her train

In fleecy clouds disport,

And birds to greet her reign

Summon their sylvan court.

For even in street and square

Her tardy trees relent,

As some far-travell’d scent

Kindles the morning air;

And forth their buds provoke,

Forgetting winter brown,

And all the mire and smoke

That wrapped the dingy town.

26Now he that loves indeed

His pleasure must awake,

Lest any pleasure take

Its flight, and he not heed;

For of his few short years

Another now invites

His hungry soul, and cheers

His life with new delights.

And who loves Nature more

Than he, whose painful art

Has taught and skilled his heart

To read her skill and lore?

Whose spirit leaps more high,

Plucking the pale primrose,

Than his whose feet must fly

The pasture where it grows?

One long in city pent

Forgets, or must complain:

But think not I can stain

My heaven with discontent;

Nor wallow with that sad,

Backsliding herd, who cry

That Truth must make man bad,

And pleasure is a lie.

27Rather while Reason lives

To mark me from the beast,

I’ll teach her serve at least

To heal the wound she gives:

Nor need she strain her powers

Beyond a common flight,

To make the passing hours

Happy from morn till night.

Since health our toil rewards,

And strength is labour’s prize,

I hate not, nor despise

The work my lot accords;

Nor fret with fears unkind

The tender joys, that bless

My hard-won peace of mind,

In hours of idleness.

Then what charm company

Can give, know I,—if wine

Go round, or throats combine

To set dumb music free.

Or deep in wintertide

When winds without make moan,

I love my own fireside

Not least when most alone.

28Then oft I turn the page

In which our country’s name,

Spoiling the Greek of fame,

Shall sound in every age:

Or some Terentian play

Renew, whose excellent

Adjusted folds betray

How once Menander went.

Or if grave study suit

The yet unwearied brain,

Plato can teach again,

And Socrates dispute;

Till fancy in a dream

Confront their souls with mine,

Crowning the mind supreme,

And her delights divine.

While pleasure yet can be

Pleasant, and fancy sweet,

I bid all care retreat

From my philosophy;

Which, when I come to try

Your simpler life, will find,

I doubt not, joys to vie

With those I leave behind.

I have loved flowers that fade,

Within whose magic tents

Rich hues have marriage made

With sweet unmemoried scents:

A honeymoon delight,—

A joy of love at sight,

That ages in an hour:—

My song be like a flower!

I have loved airs, that die

Before their charm is writ

Upon the liquid sky

Trembling to welcome it.

Notes, that with pulse of fire

Proclaim the spirit’s desire,

Then die, and are nowhere:—

My song be like an air!

Die, song, die like a breath,

And wither as a bloom:

Fear not a flowery death,

Dread not an airy tomb!

Fly with delight, fly hence!

’Twas thine love’s tender sense

To feast, now on thy bier

Beauty shall shed a tear.

Wherefore to-night so full of care,

My soul, revolving hopeless strife,

Pointing at hindrance, and the bare

Painful escapes of fitful life?

Shaping the doom that may befall

By precedent of terror past:

By love dishonoured, and the call

Of friendship slighted at the last?

By treasured names, the little store

That memory out of wreck could save

Of loving hearts, that gone before

Call their old comrade to the grave?

O soul be patient: thou shalt find

A little matter mend all this;

Some strain of music to thy mind,

Some praise for skill not spent amiss.

31Again shall pleasure overflow

Thy cup with sweetness, thou shalt taste

Nothing but sweetness, and shalt grow

Half sad for sweetness run to waste.

O happy life! I hear thee sing,

O rare delight of mortal stuff!

I praise my days for all they bring,

Yet are they only not enough.

Thou didst delight my eyes:

Yet who am I? nor first

Nor last nor best that durst

Once dream of thee for prize;

Nor this the only time

Thou shalt set love to rhyme.

Thou didst delight my ear:

Ah! little praise; thy voice

Makes other hearts rejoice,

Makes all ears glad that hear;

And short my joy: but yet,

O song, do not forget.

For what wert thou to me?

How shall I say? The moon,

That poured her midnight noon

Upon his wrecking sea;—

A sail, that for a day

Has cheered the castaway.

When men were all asleep the snow came flying,

In large white flakes falling on the city brown,

Stealthily and perpetually settling and loosely lying,

Hushing the latest traffic of the drowsy town;

Deadening, muffling, stifling its murmurs failing;

Lazily and incessantly floating down and down:

Silently sifting and veiling road, roof and railing;

Hiding difference, making unevenness even,

Into angles and crevices softly drifting and failing.

All night it fell, and when full inches seven

It lay in the depth of its uncompacted lightness,

Its clouds blew off from a high and frosty heaven;

And all woke earlier for the unaccustomed brightness

Of the winter dawning, the strange unheavenly glare:

The eye marvelled—marvelled at the dazzling whiteness;

The ear hearkened to the stillness of the solemn air;

No sound of wheel rumbling nor of foot falling,

And the busy morning cries came thin and spare.

34Then boys I heard, as they went to school, calling,

They gathered up the crystal manna to freeze

Their tongues with tasting, their hands with snow-balling;

Or rioted in a drift, plunging up to the knees;

Or peering up from under the white-mossed wonder,

“O look at the trees!” they cried, “O look at the trees!”

With lessened load a few carts creak and blunder,

Following along the white deserted way,

A country company long dispersed asunder:

When now already the sun, in pale display

Standing by Paul’s high dome, spread forth below

His sparkling beams, and awoke the stir of the day.

For now doors open and war is waged with the snow;

And trains of sombre men, past tale of number,

Tread long brown paths as towards their toil they go:

But even for them no cares awhile encumber

Their minds diverted; the daily word unspoken,

The daily thoughts of labour and sorrow slumber

At the sight of the beauty that greets them, for the charm they have broken.

I stand on the cliff and watch the veiled sun paling

A silver field afar in the mournful sea,

The scourge of the surf, and plaintive gulls sailing

At ease on the gale that smites the shuddering lea:

Whose smile severe and chaste

June never hath stirred to vanity, nor age defaced.

In lofty thought strive, O spirit, for ever:

In courage and strength pursue thine own endeavour.

Ah! if it were only for thee, thou restless ocean

Of waves that follow and roar, the sweep of the tides;

Were’t only for thee, impetuous wind, whose motion

Precipitate all o’errides, and turns, nor abides:

For you sad birds and fair,

Or only for thee, bleak cliff, erect in the air;

Then well could I read wisdom in every feature,

O well should I understand the voice of Nature.

36But far away, I think, in the Thames valley,

The silent river glides by flowery banks:

And birds sing sweetly in branches that arch an alley

Of cloistered trees, moss-grown in their ancient ranks:

Where if a light air stray,

’Tis laden with hum of bees and scent of may.

Love and peace be thine, O spirit, for ever:

Serve thy sweet desire: despise endeavour.

And if it were only for thee, entrancèd river,

That scarce dost rock the lily on her airy stem,

Or stir a wave to murmur, or a rush to quiver;

Were’t but for the woods, and summer asleep in them:

For you my bowers green,

My hedges of rose and woodbine, with walks between,

Then well could I read wisdom in every feature,

O well should I understand the voice of Nature.

Perfect little body, without fault or stain on thee,

With promise of strength and manhood full and fair!

Though cold and stark and bare,

The bloom and the charm of life doth awhile remain on thee.

Thy mother’s treasure wert thou;—alas! no longer

To visit her heart with wonderous joy; to be

Thy father’s pride;—ah, he

Must gather his faith together, and his strength make stronger.

To me, as I move thee now in the last duty,

Dost thou with a turn or a gesture anon respond;

Startling my fancy fond

With a chance attitude of the head, a freak of beauty.

Thy hand clasps, as ’twas wont, my finger, and holds it:

But the grasp is the clasp of Death, heartbreaking and stiff;

Yet feels to my hand as if

’Twas still thy will, thy pleasure and trust that enfolds it.

38So I lay thee there, thy sunken eyelids closing,—

Go lie thou there in thy coffin, thy last little bed!—

Propping thy wise, sad head,

Thy firm, pale hands across thy chest disposing.

So quiet! doth the change content thee?—Death, whither hath he taken thee?

To a world, do I think, that rights the disaster of this?

The vision of which I miss,

Who weep for the body, and wish but to warm thee and awaken thee?

Ah! little at best can all our hopes avail us

To lift this sorrow, or cheer us, when in the dark,

Unwilling, alone we embark,

And the things we have seen and have known and have heard of, fail us.

Joy, sweetest lifeborn joy, where dost thou dwell?

Upon the formless moments of our being

Flitting, to mock the ear that heareth well,

To escape the trained eye that strains in seeing,

Dost thou fly with us whither we are fleeing;

Or home in our creations, to withstand

Blackwingèd death, that slays the making hand?

The making mind, that must untimely perish

Amidst its work which time may not destroy,

The beauteous forms which man shall love to cherish,

The glorious songs that combat earths annoy?

Thou dost dwell here, I know, divinest Joy:

But they who build thy towers fair and strong,

Of all that toil, feel most of care and wrong.

Sense is so tender, O and hope so high,

That common pleasures mock their hope and sense;

And swifter than doth lightning from the sky

The ecstasy they pine for flashes hence,

Leaving the darkness and the woe immense,

Wherewith it seems no thread of light was woven,

Nor doth the track remain where once ’twas cloven.

And heaven and all the stable elements

That guard God’s purpose mock us, though the mind

Be spent in searching: for his old intents

We see were never for our joy designed:

They shine as doth the bright sun on the blind,

Or like his pensioned stars, that hymn above

His praise, but not toward us, that God is Love.

For who so well hath wooed the maiden hours

As quite to have won the worth of their rich show,

To rob the night of mystery, or the flowers

Of their sweet delicacy ere they go?

Nay, even the dear occasion when we know

We miss the joy, and on the gliding day

The special glories float and pass away,

Only life’s common plod: still to repair

The body and the thing which perisheth:

The soil, the smutch, the toil and ache and wear,

The grinding enginry of blood and breath,

Pain’s random darts, the heartless spade of death:

All is but grief, and heavily we call

On the last terror for the end of all.

41Then comes the happy moment: not a stir

In any tree, no portent in the sky:

The morn doth neither hasten nor defer,

The morrow hath no name to call it by,

But life and joy are one,—we know not why,—

As though our very blood long breathless lain

Had tasted of the breath of God again.

And having tasted it I speak of it,

And praise him telling how I trembled then

When his touch strengthened me, as now I sit

In wonder, reaching out beyond my ken,

Reaching to turn the day back, and my pen

Urging to tell a tale which told would seem

The witless phantasy of them that dream.

But O most blessèd truth, for truth thou art,

Abide thou with me till my life shall end.

Divinity hath surely touched my heart;

I have possessed more joy than earth can lend:

I may attain what time shall never spend.

Only let not my duller days destroy

The memory of thy witness and my joy.

O my vague desires!

Ye lambent flames of the soul, her offspring fires:

That are my soul herself in pangs sublime

Rising and flying to heaven before her time:

What doth tempt you forth

To drown in the south or shiver in the frosty north?

What seek ye or find ye in your random flying,

Ever soaring aloft, soaring and dying?

Joy, the joy of flight!

They hide in the sun, they flare and dance in the night;

Gone up, gone out of sight: and ever again

Follow fresh tongues of fire, fresh pangs of pain.

Ah! they burn my soul,

The fires, devour my soul that once was whole:

She is scattered in fiery phantoms day by day,

But whither, whither? ay whither? away, away!

Could I but control

These vague desires, these leaping flames of the soul:

Could I but quench the fire: ah! could I stay

My soul that flieth, alas, and dieth away!

The full moon from her cloudless skies

Turneth her face, I think, on me;

And from the hour when she doth rise

Till when she sets, none else will see.

One only other ray she hath,

That makes an angle close with mine,

And glancing down its happy path

Upon another spot doth shine.

But that ray too is sent to me,

For where it lights there dwells my heart:

And if I were where I would be,

Both rays would shine, love, where thou art.

I praise the tender flower,

That on a mournful day

Bloomed in my garden bower

And made the winter gay.

Its loveliness contented

My heart tormented.

I praise the gentle maid

Whose happy voice and smile

To confidence betrayed

My doleful heart awhile:

And gave my spirit deploring

Fresh wings for soaring.

The maid for very fear

Of love I durst not tell:

The rose could never hear,

Though I bespake her well:

So in my song I bind them

For all to find them.

Awake my heart to be loved, awake, awake!

The darkness silvers away, the morn doth break,

It leaps in the sky: unrisen lustres slake

The o’ertaken moon. Awake, O heart, awake!

She too that loveth awaketh and hopes for thee:

Her eyes already have sped the shades that flee,

Already they watch the path thy feet shall take:

Awake, O heart, to be loved, awake, awake!

And if thou tarry from her,—if this could be,—

She cometh herself, O heart, to be loved, to thee;

For thee would unashamèd herself forsake:

Awake to be loved, my heart, awake, awake!

Awake, the land is scattered with light, and see,

Uncanopied sleep is flying from field and tree:

And blossoming boughs of April in laughter shake;

Awake, O heart, to be loved, awake, awake!

Lo all things wake and tarry and look for thee:

She looketh and saith, “O sun now bring him to me.

Come more adored, O adored, for his coming’s sake,

And awake my heart to be loved: awake, awake!”

Who that hath ever shot a shaft at heaven

Whether of wonder, praise or humble prayer,

But hath not straight received his answer given,

And been made strong with comforting, aware

Of strength and beauty for his purpose meant,

Whether it were a lark’s song or a scent

That wanders on the quavering paths of the air?

The sweetest of all birds, that fed my slumber

With music through the thought-exalting night,

Among forgotten fancies without number

Transfigured sorrow to a heart’s delight.

And uninvited memories, that stole

With haunting trouble to their slavèd soul

Were turned to wondrous joys and aspects bright.

So intimate a part are we of Nature

That even to call us best part doth us wrong,

Being her mind, the meaning of her feature,

To whom her varied forms wholly belong.

So that what were not ours were worthless quite,

And thus to me it happened on that night

To be the love and joy of this bird’s song.

As it came leaping on the dark unguarded

Silence of midnight to the door of the ear:

And finding the warm passages unwarded

Sped up the spiral stair, and mounted near

To where in unseen rooms the delicate sprite

That never sleeps sat watching through the night

Weaving the time in fancies strange and drear.

Nor was it that the heavenly music fluttered

The quick electric atoms; rarer far,

The melody this bird of passion uttered

Coloured the firmament where all thoughts are:

As in the characters a poet’s hand

Has traced, there lie—for poets understand—

Heart-thrills that shoot through blackness like a star.

And so, as summer eve will sweetly soften

The wayward thoughts of all who forth may fare,

To me there came the spirit who haunts not often

My heart for sorrow of the sadness there:

But now her face was lit with joy, her eyes

Were eager messengers of her surprise

That she was quit of her profound despair.

48Clothed was she like a nun, and yet her vesture

Did sad despite unto her merry grace,

As gaily she came forward with a gesture

As gamesome as the childhood in her face,

That I had seen so long downcast and sad,

Robbed of the happy birthright which she had,

Which earth may steal away but not replace.

There is no sorrow like the slow heart-searing,

When phantoms bred of earth spring up between

Two loving hearts, who grew to their endearing,

When all their pushing tendrils yet were green:

No time-struck ruin is so sad to see

As youth’s disease: than thus, O Love, to be,

’Twere better for thy honour not to have been.

Had I not seen the servitude of folly,

The mínute-measuring of days and nights,

With superstition preaching melancholy

And pleasure counterfeiting her own rights;

Afraid to turn again and look behind,

Lest truth should flame and overwhelm the mind,

Fanning her red regret of old delights.

The mimicry of woe that is a trouble

To them that practise it, but which to those

To whom the joy is owed makes sorrow double

Seeing the debtor destitute that owes.

The tinselling of cruel bars, to blind

The cagèd bird to think the hand is kind

Which liberty denies and food bestows.

From which I hurried as a beast from burning,

Nor cared in flying where my terror led;

Only beyond recall and past returning,

Nor now repent if then too far I fled.—

So long, dear life, as in my flesh thou reign’st

I will sin with thee rather than against,

Let me die living rather than live dead.

But neither is there human pleasure rarer

Than love’s renewal after long disdain,

Nor any touching tale for telling fairer

Than that wherein lost lovers meet again:

Such joy must happy souls beyond the grave,

If once again they meet, in Heaven have,

Without which all the joys of Heaven were vain.

’Twas even thus she came and in my dreaming,

My pleasure was not less than Heaven’s may be:

The spiritual and unearthly seeming

So far outdid a touched reality:

As glances sent in love do more than tell

What words can never phrase or utter well,

And which ’tis shame and blindness not to see.

But now the joy was mine, for gentle pity

Of her who wearily lived long alone

With mopes and mummers in a sensuous city

That held no passion equal to her own,

For gentle pity, I say, constrained me well,

As pains those separated souls they tell

Prepare for Heaven, and mould their hearts of stone.

But their sweet ecstasy is all abiding

And cannot pall with time nor tire nor fade,

Nor any more can day of death, dividing

Their earthborn loves, those happy haunts invade.

But joy for ever—if that joy compare

With my best joy on earth, may I be there!

Though even from that I shrink and am afraid.

Now when I woke and thought upon this vision,

Wherein she smiled on me and I on her,

I could not quite be clear of all misprision

Who of us most was changed: or if it were

The song I heard not—sleeping as I heard—

That shaped our empty dream, while sang the bird

Regardless of his fond interpreter.

O youth whose hope is high,

Who dost to Truth aspire,

Whether thou live or die,

O look not back nor tire.

Thou that art bold to fly

Through tempest, flood and fire,

Nor dost not shrink to try

Thy heart in torments dire:

If thou canst Death defy,

If thy Faith is entire,

Press onward, for thine eye

Shall see thy heart’s desire.

Beauty and love are nigh,

And with their deathless quire

Soon shall their eager cry

Be numbered and expire.

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FROM FIRST SERIES PUBLISHED 1873
1	Clear and gentle stream	page 1
2	Dear lady when thou frownest	4
3	Poor withered rose and dry	5
4	I found to-day out walking	7
FROM SECOND SERIES PUBLISHED 1879
5	Will Love again awake	8
6	Whither, O splendid ship	10
7	I saw the Virgin-mother clad in green	12
8	I know not how I came	14
9	There is a hill	17
10	Again with pleasant green	21
11	Behold! the radiant Spring	25
12	I have loved flowers that fade	29
13	Wherefore to-night so full of care	30
FROM THIRD SERIES PUBLISHED 1880
14	Thou didst delight my eyes	32
15	When men were all asleep	33
16	I stand on the cliff	35
17	Perfect little body	37
FOURTH SERIES, 1882. NOT PUBLISHED BEFORE
18	Joy, sweetest lifeborn joy	39
19	O my vague desires (from Prometheus)	42
20	The full moon from her cloudless skies	43
21	I praise the tender flower	44
22	Awake my heart to be loved	45
23	Who that hath ever shot a shaft	46
24	O youth whose hope is high	52

The Project Gutenberg eBook of Poems

POEMS

CONTENTS

ELEGY

A PASSER BY

LATE SPRING EVENING

WOOING

SPRING
INVITATION TO THE COUNTRY

SPRING
REPLY

Transcriber’s Note

THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE