i:v«>i\\^\iS^^v^5i'^Ni>.S 4 = ^^ 6 S ^^= ^ ^^= -^ 4 = ■"^^ j> 5 m C ) 2 = THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES .^0- VERSES ©. B. m. ~0>=-- DUBLIN: E. PONSOXBV, ii6, GRAFTON-STREET. 1876. DUBLIN : PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, HY PONSOXBY AND MURPHY. CONTENTS. SONNETS : PEACE, UNCERTAINTY, TRUST, PRAYER, faith's gain, aTfapv-qcraddw eavrov, THE " HIGHER RULE,' THE MELANCHOLY OF GEORGE ELIOT A SEPTEMBER MORNING, COLOUR MUSIC, TO R. BRO\\'NING, BROWNING AND SHELLEY, FEAR, . . WHAT THE HEATHER SAID, THE NIGHT COMETH, ETC., I'ERSONALITY, A QUESTION, . . A SEQUENCE OF SONNETS, '• I BELIEVE IN THE RESURRECTION OF THE BODY, P.\ GE. 1 2 3 4 •5 6 7 8* 9 10 11 12 13 U 15 If) 17 18 19 24 941971 ( iv ) REST, . . . . . » eakth's useless placer, " the mount that is called olivet," by the sea, TO C. D. U , LINES, AND THE SEA RETURNED UNTO HIS STRENGTH, PROGRESSION, A "truce of god," THE RIVER AND THE TIDE, A RETROSPECT, LINES, IN SEPTEMBER, SONNET, PAGE. 25 28 32 34 37 39 42 43 45 48 50 53 56 60 PEACE. T T TE are as -wanderers on the pebbly shore, Beside the margin of an unknown sea Horizonless in haze of mystery, Whose waves come lapping as they lapped before JFe watched their motion, — now as evermore Kecurrent in their calm persistency. No ocean laughter, but serenity That hushes all vain wishes' to explore The silent spaces of the far-oif deep. All time, or long or short, forgetting there, We look and listen only till we fill Out eyes and ears with peace. Then if a sleep Comes o'er our senses, — sleep, — nor greatly care ; Feeling the unheard waves will murmur still. March, 1872. 2 ) TJI^CERTAINTY. TF of our seeming knowledge aught were sure, — If of the formless moods that hurry past We might seize only one and hold it fast ; (Were it of all the mood most cold and poor), It would be easy bravely to endure The sight of what our fate was at its worst. No tear from eye, nor wail from lip need burst. Our souls, possessed in patience, might inure Our lives to sober action. But our strength Is wasted in this long uncertainty. Our creeds elude our moods, — our moods our creeds, In ever-baffled chase, until at length We find that "v\ e have spent our energy, And that our toil hath small result in deeds. March, 1872. ( 3 ) yy TRUST. -n^RIIST — thou whosoe'er for truth hast sought, With mind's toil and with long drawn-out unrest. And sinkings of all hope that by thy quest Thou mightst to any goal of peace be brouglit, Or, ever learning, might' st some good be taught ; And bitter questionings if good be best, — Or reckless pleasure — and all men for nought. One day it may be thou shalt find faith's test And trial season o'er. Then quietly, Without the weary effort of the brain, Thy heart's eyes shall the near-far tilings behold; And That thou couldst not find shall find out thee Truth will not wait aloof for thee to attain. But its great certitude shall thee enfold. April, 1872. B 2 .( -1 ) PRAYEK. Tn\EAYIXG to Thee our wills do not require That Thou, the Lord who doest all things well, Guiding thy world by laws immutable, Shouldst, when some wishes of our hearts' suspire Thee- ward in faith, grant unto the desire Of each man that which suits his own small need, (Lest others' wishes fail if Ju's succeed. Being contrary) : but lower will to higher Can, in proud meekness and strong helplessness, Yield, and own Law as girdling Destiny. Thou, setting us within fixed bounds, didst give Great passive strength to human littleness — Only we cry to Thee for si/D/jMithi/ ; If Thou wilt love us, we can bear and live. Mill/, 1872. ( -^ ) PAITH'S GAIX. '"T^E.TJLY our hearts are strangely fashioned : Strange mood is ours which follows long suspense 'Twixt two beliefs, and agony intense To know if men and all their love be led, By passage forth among the things called dead, To death indeed, — or truest permanence : Just when our faint hope grows to confidence, A new sense comes that we could now instead Accept the hopeless creed without despair, Let go our certainties' most precious joys — Wherefore ? Is it that, tired, we cease to care For that our faith hath won in sorest strife ? Kay — but because a strength iio creed destroys Grows in us through that wrestling for Heaven's life. ( 6 ) EYFE. 'HP^HIjS'K you that he who in that far-off day, "Whereto he reacheth through all days of life Of feeble labour and of passion's strife, Shall hear Christ's voice, what time that voice shall say The promised ivye, — and the crown shall lay Of that great guerdon- word upon his heart ; Would not forthwith in peace and strength depart, Hearing but that alone, and go his way Eack to the same old toil or toil more stern ? What were Christ's "enter joy" without "well done!"? Is not the first word better than the rest That follow after? — Then if man's love yearn To give all gifts — and yet must give but ojic — Let it give eSye, — Christ's first gift and best. uWff/, 1872. AnAPNH2A20O 'EAYTON. "T T THEaS" Christ hatli spoken to a hixman hffirt, " Tulce up thy cross — and follow after Me Renouncing self^'' (whether its will be free To yield up things possessed, or, harder part. It feel it hath no choice but take pain's smart All unassuaged by sense of power : ) then he Whose will gives gladly or bears patiently Would fi-om the thought of restitution start Grieved and indignant, — he who once hath poured His free-will or liis patience foi'th, (and meant His gift should be accepted, though in worth It were so poor,) — he would not see restored Things he renounced in true abandonment ; Would not choose Heaven to give j oys missed on earth. May, 1872. ( 8 ) THE "HIGHEE EriE." ^^ AY not that joy is lost for men whose fate, Or men whose calling by some voice of right. Is to forego for ever some delight Of earth's dear happiness — to watch and wait, Seeing unseen things' substance by a great Faith's evidence, — to walk by faith not sight — (Yea, find even faith fail almost, though not quite :) These are the souls elect to high estate. Unworthy they, yet counted through God's grace "VYorthy to share in the deep mystery Of Eucharistic joy that conquers pain. Therefore exultant let them take their place "Where they may touch Christ's cross by sympathy, And in self -losing find life's truest gain. Week before Easter, 1872. ( 9 ) THE MELANCHOLY OF GEOEGE ELIOT. r^ TREXGTH won by conquest over strength is ^ thine, Thou woman who with resolute manly will, Hast wrestled down thy heart's desires until They owned thy stern creed's «tvay. Thou lett'st no sign Of ' natural tears ' bedim the steadfast shine Of thy Athene-soul's eyes : but with still Keen gaze of hopelessness confront' st all ill Of Destiny. Erom thee no bnite-likc whine Escapes — of terror, pain, or thirst for joy, Nor devil's irony. Thou dost remain Conscious of sad high human victory. What though no hope of retribution buoy Thy purpose above earthly fate, — one gain Of faith that right is right suffices thee. Juhj^ 1872. ( 10 ) A SEPTEMBER MORNING. T N presence of the furze and heatlier glow, And of the brightness that went everywhere, Mystic, intangible, throughout the air, I sat. And did that outer light bestow Some inward light on me ? I only know That I beheld against the morning sky How the low hills rose strangely large and high, Transfigured in the glory of the show ; And Beauty seemed not hiding Truth, but trac, Its substance tilling all. (He found no place The Demon-Lie'''' that JS^o to all things saith.) And I, believing, wrote glad words to you — (You heard them) how your calling by God's grace \Vas to a poet's work through life or death. JTarch, 1872. * Mepliistopheles, ' der Geist der stets verneiut. ' ( 11 ) COLOUR-MUSIC. ''npHERE is rich gladness in the fresh leaved trees, And in the daily-deepening grass of May, Wherein the ninsic of the sunbeams' play Goes ringing on in iniinite melodies, Not loud, but passing with a tender ease From the sweet primrose to the cowslip's tone On where from many-mingled flowers are thrown Joyous, confused, all colour harmonies. There is deep pleasure here wherein may lie Man's heart awhile to hear the loveliness, — Yet can this summer beauty wake no thrill Like his respondent rapture strange and high, When sunset clouds some bare moor's dreariness Seem with great solemn organ-tones to fill. May, 1872. ( li^ ) TO R. BROWMXG. 'T^RXJE-HEARTED seer, whose keen and steady eye, Keeping a view point on an eminence That reacheth Aitlier o'er the world of sense, Doth, as from prophet's watch-tower, thence descry Proportions of the things of earth and sky, — Toll us thy vision when our sight is hound Where little swellings of the lower ground Seem our life's only truths because they lie Betwixt the soul and things whereof it saith ' This I believe,'' (which meaneth, '' this I let Please vacant fancy on one day in seven.") Strengthen thy brethren by thy strength of faith, And teach our human love in trust to set Its continuity 'twixt Earth and Heaven. August, 1872. ( 13 ) EEOWNING A^S'D SHELLEY. ^ TEOXG poet soul, thou y earnest to thy fiiend That other poet soul elect by thee For worship, in that deep affinity Wherein two human natures seek to blend, And set their opposite forces to one end. It had been surely good for earth if he, AVhile dwelling in that flesh thou ne'er didst see, Had in his need had help thy strength could lend, (Help better far than that wild deaf " west wind " Whereto in agony went out his cry That meant a seeking for his God unknown — ) Good will it be for heaven when thou shalt hud Thy Shelley there, — and two souls, di-awing nigh, Perfect together things each wrought alone. Auyaist, 1872. ( H ) EEAH. AJf EXPERIENCE OX THE WESTEEN COAST OF SCOTLANH. ''npHEY lay there undemeatli the noonday sky, The shining islands on the shining sea. They had lain there as heautifiil ere we, Passing, heheld them, and they still would lie In brightness there when we had long passed by. And when I felt their gleaming, suddenly A spell of nameless ten'or compassed me With closer coils than midnight fear. Then I Sought with strained eyes for some minutest spot TJnheautiful, that there my human soul Might break the mystic bladings of that sight. But, finding nowhere where that light was not. The self of me seemed pressed within a whole Of mindless beauty — and it perished qxiito. ( 15 ) WHAT THE HEATHER SAID. 'T~^HE heather looked at me : it looked and smiled : I know its soul saw mine, there on the green And purple mountain slopes. What did it mean When with a gaze as innocently wild As the glad open countenance of a child It met my human eyes ? First spoke to me A quivering light of tender mockery From the hill's face : " Ha, traitor, you beguiled The heather's soul to give its best in vaia ! It gave you its own joy — free, strong, pure-hued. Wliy bring you not due payment back again To it of fair fresh verse ?" Then, changing mood, It said, " man, gifts worthier than all art You bring to-day, large silence from your heart. " August, 1872. ( 16 ) "THE NIGHT COMETH WHEREIN XO MAN CAN WOEK." "T ET not our human immortality -^^ Be a perpetual vision in our sight ; Lest we, too soon beholding infinite Spaces of time our own, grow icily free Erom urgenee to completing aught, — lest we, Viewing our life stretched beyond bounds of earth, Deem it of small account if time 'twixt birth Of each man and his death, should only be A school-time for his soul, (no earthly deeds' Achievement being end whereto had served Soid's schooling). Show us only in some needs The light eternal ; let our wills be nerved Hourly to strenuous toil by sense that all Work of life's day must close ere death's night fall. Juhj, 1872. ( 17 ) PERSONALITY. ^^ HE is a little child whose life hath known Only the gladdening play of nine sweet years. Why did there rise those vague and shuddering fears In her young soul — that bright soul of her ow n Which in the sunshine of home love had grown From baby-hood ? Because the mystery That girdeth round all personality, And setteth each man utterly alone, Came to her then. She said " I am an /." Why am I 7.!^ " "I wish it was not so." Why are i's in the world ?" That self same sj)eech Rising from myriad hearts, is one great crv, To what ? ay, whither doth that utterance go ? Doth it the Void, ... or answering I Soul reach ? ( 18 ) A. QUESTIOJS'. "T "T THxiT is for man the ultimate use and worth Of that sweet herbage he calls poetry, Which, ever deepening, spreadeth wide and free Throughout the grounds of habitable earth, Primeval, and yet daily new in birth, AVhose roots of life must darkly hidden be Far down from sight of his philosophy ? — -Is this but pasture for his heart in dearth Of human nature's daily needful food Of joy ? all the rich growth of rhythm and rhyme And beauty's imageiy, . . . just a deep Lush clover meadow, where in oxlike mood Souls, starved elsewhere, may, for a little time, Feed on delight, till, satiate, they sleep. ( 19 ) A SEQUENCE or SONT^ETS. T T THAT shall we take as comfort for the paiu Felt by our human spirits when they view The little done of all they dreamed to do ; The impulses that ever urge in vain Large longings met by incommensurate gain, And dull decay of ardour to pursue Ideal hopes that prove themselves untrue ? — Is this the comfort we may then attain, Calmly to see the utter littleness Of all within the individual soul, And merge our restless care for our own lot In a deep faith that in the large success And grand sure tendings of the human whole, Failure and loss of one life matters not. c 2 20 A SEQ UENCE OF SONNETS. II. 1 ) UT is there consciousness within that whole ? And will the thing we call Humanity Know of our love or care at all that we For its great sake our murmuring thoughts control ; Finding a joy in its joy to console Our selfish griefs ? Or may it only he We give our yearnings to a mockery, A bare abstraction that outside each soul Exists not ? When beneath the surface show We seek to reach some ultimate certitude !N'ought else but this one substant truth we find " Thought is, " (of knowledge this our one ttov (ttw) Nor with this primal essence find endued Aught manifest except as personal mind. A SEQ UEXCE OF SONNETS. 2 1 III. ^ T "T TE could unlearn desire for happiness, If in some way our own loss were a gain To some existence that might still remain Nor perish out in ultimate aimlessness. We could rejoice to feel that we had less That it might have the more — that so our pain Were saerijiee, and therefore not in vain ; Could gladly die for some one lastingncss. — But what is this thing that it hath a claim ? For if each man be only made for nought, Of what account is all Humanity? "What value can there be in the mere name By which the image to our minds is brought Of mpiad worthless things' totality ? 22 A SEQ VENCE OF SONNETS. IV. r^ THOIJ abiding Personality, (If that old creed wliich says thou art, he right). Only in Thy light shall our hearts see light To read a little of the mystery That holdeth us and all the things that be. Love of God we ask Thee for a sight Of Thee Thyself, — we need not the delight Of promised joys throughout Eternity. If we can only find some stable thing Existent on throughout the ceaseless flow Of Being passing into Nothingness — Some one substantial Good to which to bring Our love, we can our selfish hopes forego, In trust our failure may be its success. A SEQUENCE OF SONNETS. 23 T T is enough if we can find out Thee, And know our work and we are Thine, Lord. Do thou with us according to Thy word — - Our lips spake truly when they said that we Beholding Thee, could gladly cease to be, And let our work fail ; if this faith were sure That Thy work would for evermore endure, Could well forget our instability. Do Thou with us according to Thy word — Yet what that word of Thine ? not death but life Thou givest — death for Thee were all we need — Yet not to death Thou call'st us — we have heard A voice that bids us rise to joyous strife To labour, sure that our true selves succeed. February, 1872. ( 24 ) "I BELIEVE IX THE RESUERECTIOX OF THE BODY." " I" X ^^^ ^ ^^® t»o(ly, emptied of the breath Of vital force that while it therein dwelt Kept it coherent, in corriiption melt Slowly from semblance left unharmed by death, By law which human atoms scattereth Forth through the soil or air to be anew Made parts of lives — how shall these words be true Which, over graves of human love, faith saith, " That this, the thing committed to the earth Shall, risen, live with soul'''? Yea, though earth's wind Disperse man's show of matter, this may be ; Form may return to its own world of birth. There, with Real Essences the soul may find Substance of old corporeal entity. Auffust, 1872. ( 2-5 ) REST. "X "T THEN there have been within a human heart Wrestlings with doiibt or sin ; "When Thou has granted to its better part Strength, a great strength to win ; II. Keep Thou that heart at rest a little while, By Thy near grace subdued ; In Thy felt love, as in a mother's smile, Let it find certitude. ni. Healer ! it needeth tending from Thee now, Limbs ache, and wounds are deep ; Set Thy great kiss upon the throbbing brow ; Soothe thought to quiet sleep. 26 REST, IV. Souls that to live by their own strength had tried Are by Thy love brought low, Feeling their weakness, emptied of their pride, By Thee who all dost know. Y. Yet let them not too long a space abide In that strange peace of Thine ; Break their repose, and send them from Thy side Filled with new strength divine. VI. Father, Great Mother, to Thy love they yearn, Meekly would stay with Thee ; Yet must Thou bid them to the world return, Thy witnesses to be. VII. Souls that through joy or grief some blest new birtli Into Thy kingdom gain ; Growing, as children in the life of earth, Full manhood must attain. REST. 27 viir. ]iid them go forth from out Thy home of grace, Tender Thou art, yet stern ; Choose Thou in Thy great outer world their place Till Thy large truth they learn, June, 1872. ( 28 ) EARTH'S USELESS PLACES. HE knoweth peace who to some mountain height Hath climbed, and in the stillness waiteth there, To rest awhile tired limbs and panting breath, And brain sun-fevered in the steep ascent. — He lieth in the purple fragrant heath, And feels so near to the great hollow sky, That circleth over, round and under him ; Yet hath no fear of it ; it is not like The sky that fi-om the plains seems oftentimes A brazen surface, hard, flat, beautiful. He lets the pure stern wind sweep over him, Wind the life-giver, breathed forth from God. — Peace of the mountains is not like the peace Wherewith the sad sea-murmurs fill the mind, A strange sweet lethargy, wherein the will EARTH'S USELESS PLACES. i>9 That struggled yields itself at last to fate, And wild desires for knowledge sink to sleep — Yet sleep unresting, hearing restless waves. — There is strong calmness in the mountain mood ; No outer sound o'ennasters there the mind With influences irresistible, As doth the soft voice of the inhuman sea. Man feels among the hills enduringness, His own enduringness not less but more — Bounded by boundless sky his will seems free Although the ocean's vastness crushed it in. Surely it is most good for us to be Sometimes at rest upon these grounds which earth Keepeth apart above her cultured fields Sanctified to the use of usclessness, (If usefulness mean clothing, house, or food, To satisfy the needs of human brutes). In uselessness the hills are consecrate, Themselves the consccrators of all earth, Revealers of her lowly common truths. 30 EARTirs USELESS PLACES, They manifest the glory of her plains. For from the heights alone the eye can see The level land in true proportion spread, And judge what tracts of it be large, what small ; * And trace the windings of the streams and roads, And the fair colours of the low extent Of fields of pasture, corn and meadow land ; Those very fields that seem so commonplace When we have sight of them and them alone. He who at any time hath known the joy Of resting thus within the mountain's calm. Will sometimes, after, on the common roads, If his glance meet with, unexpectedly, A pine tree, larch, or even one bright bush Of furze in blossom, or some bracken fern, Or any thing that serves to link his thought To the far beauty of the holy heights, Feel a deep sudden thrill shoot through his sense ; As if an entrance to a real world Again were broken frona a world of dreams EARTH'S USELESS PLACES. 31 And with a shock of change he passed therein. Truly I know not huw this is, nor why. Yet am I sure the mountain peace is good And there are mountain lands in some men's lives. June, 1872. ( 32 ) ''THE MOUNT THAT IS CALLED OLIVET." I. "T T THY stand ye gazing, men of Galilee, Into the deep sky arching overhead, As though ye waited there some proof to see That there was truth in words the Master said ? 11. Hath He not spoken " I will come again," And " Where I am, there shall ye also be " ? Need ye some vision to make this more plain ? Must ye have sight to give faith certainty ? m. Rather go back to your Jerusalem, Unto what work ye find before you set, These things are safe, with all the love of them ; Need ye delay upon Mount Olivet ? THE MOUNT THAT IS CALLED OLIVET. So ly. Why stand ye gazing, men of Galilee, Ye who have watched God's cloud from sight receive Blessings of earth ? Tea, though most good they be, Better it is if thus ye see them leave. V. Have ye not faith in all the words ye said ? Why need ye linger here to test your creed? Doubt ye at all the " rising of the dead " — Or that its First-fruits Christ, is risen indeed ? VI. Unto your life's Jerusalem return Gladly, for if ye take " great joy" with you, Joy of a confidence most calm and stern. Old ways and common will seem high and new. June, 1872. ( 34 ) ^T^^HEEE urged me a vacant longing : I came to the jubilant gca : To watch how its white waves were thronging Eound the rocks tumultuously, n. Within me there had been no motion Of joy or of sorrow that day ; A rainbow-light over the ocean Was chasing the driving spray, III, And in impulse of strong young madness Sea shouted its laugh to the sun : Then I yearned towards its mighty gladness. To be with that great life, one. ( 35 ) IV. Eut its joy and my dull vague sorrow Divided remained that day ; They were two for many a morrow, Till desire almost died away. T. When suddenly (was I waking ? Or was it an inland dream ?) Somewhere the waves were breaking, From theii' foamed crests flashed a gleam. VI. And somehow no longer divided Was I from the joy of the sea : Do I know if my life was tided Into its life ? or its into me ? VII. Can I tell if this strange new seeming — This flooding of glad surprise, Will vanish, like joys of dreaming, From the vision of waking eyes ? D 2 ( 36 ) Tin. I know not ; but waves are rushing ; Wind-di'iven spray to the sun Answers, in rainbow hues flushing ; And I and that ocean ai-e one. June, 1872. ( 37 ) TO C. D. E. I. ~V 7'OU tell me the mists of the morning will close o'er the sky again, That the clouds will thicken and darken, dropping their chilling rain. n. Long had the mists of the morning hidden the infinite hlue, Grey was the vapour, yet sometimes, flushed with faint reddening hue. m. Hours passed, and then near the noonday, woke there a hrecze in the air, Breaking the mists, and they vanished, lea\'ing the heavens' truth bare. 38 TO a I). li. - And the great depth like an ocean, meeting all things with its tide, Looked into eyes that looked upward, and they were satisfied. V. Now if old mists gather, stealing, up through the air once more — And the shrouded sky look leaden, just as it looked before ; Still safe and supreme that one vision wiH— be- which our noon-tide knew !N'o gloom of the afternoon, closing, could make its brightness untrue. VII. And may not the wind in the evening freshen again, and the light Of a great deep sunset glory, stream through rent clouds on our si2:ht. *&^ June. 1872. ( 39 ) I. TP^OET whose own soul Knoweth of no goal Whither it and its wild hopes are tending ; Floating as amid Seas whose shores are hid, Or down river without source or ending. rr. Surely thou may'st well Of thine own heart tell, Of its fulness or its restless longing ; Toothing hast thou known But this truth alone. That within thyself vague thoughts are thronging. ni. All outside must seem Like a deep soft cb'cam, Thine own life and all men's lives enclasping. ( 40 ) Let thy song's words catch "With convulsive snatch Any substance that will meet their gTasping. rv. Tell thy mood's employ, -Whether grief or joy, Tenderly bedeck thy own emotion. Utter all its tale, "With a laugh or wail, Infant-like to deaf old mother ocean. Larger theme for art Poet, choose, whose heart Outside self hath found secure abiding ; For thy fellows' needs Chant thou forth as creeds Fair truths rescued fi-om their wonted hiding. VI. In the great wide earth There is more of worth For thy song than one man's pain or pleasure ( 41 ) TJnderneatli the sun There have deeds been done Fitter far to be high verse's treasure. vn. Bind the workl's great Past To its Present, fast, Let the strong men, dead, join strong men living ; Let thy earnest speech To earth's Future reach : Miads unborn may take what thine is giving. vrrr. No man can forget Things that deep are set In the life that his is and none other's ; Yet these should but serve Heart and brain to nerve For glad helpful work for men his brothers. June, 1872. ( 42 ) N' " AND THE SEA EETITRNED UNTO HIS STRENGTH WHEN THE MORNING APPEARED." (Exodus, xiv. 27.) I. ' W let the sea come closing Once more over the place ; Let its fair surface, reposing, Wear an unseamed face. n. Wind — God's spirit, came sweeping Rolling Time's waters aside, One narrow pathway keeping Dry 'mid their mighty tide. ni. Now let the world's waves cover Safely again that track; Truths of the soul have passed over, Nothing can bring them back. May, 1872. ( 43 ) PEOGEESSION. I. /"~^ LADLY they let the di'eam fi-om out their lives depart : Henceforth they need it not — its perfect work is wrought. It was the TratSaywyos whereby souls were brought Into the great earth-school where heart doth learn from heart. n. And that school's entrance, found, needs nevermoi-o be sought : What though in seeking it with wistful life's desire, There was a strange high joy. They enter into higher Joy, who pass in where Love's abiding truths uro taught. 44 PTIOGRESSIOX. in. lu lessons rising through the changing earthly years ; Reaching through faith, through knowledge, through self-rctinence Deep patience, true fraternity, till, lastly, thence Unto the deatliless aydir-t] each spii'it ncars. ( 45 ) T~) EST — nor send back a -wish To the glow of sunshine that lay Steeping the rippled sea, And the bright cliffs yesterday. II. Eest — nor send forth a fear To the morrow's stonn or its rain, Stir not a thought to guess What presage those clouds contain, m. Edging the far horizon "With a long low dark streak. Wait till the Futiure cometh Vex not thy mood to seek. ( 46 ) IV. Surely it is enough In the infinite Present to be, Yea to be closed therein From thy hope and thy memory. V. Closed in the circling good Of the stillness that is spread, All through the monotone Of the grey-blue sky over-head. TI. All through the monotone Of the grey-blue sea beneath, All through the monotone Of the solemn sunless heath. vn. From the dark purple heath Gone is the life-light of red : Beautiful is it still ; Calm, like a face that is dead. ( -17 ) Tcn. This is a "truce of God " Por the earth and the sky and the sea ; A day that is, 'twixt the days That were and the days that will be. rx. Deep is earth's calm to-day Unbroken by sun or by wind, Rest therein and respond With the joyless calm of a mind. Atigust, 1872. ( 48 ) THE RIVEE AND THE TIDE. I. C">OMETH joy — but joy must, like the sea, -^ Ebb and flow : What doth keep man's heart abidingly "When the tide is low ? n. Inland gusheth from the mountain side Love's fresh rill ; Flows to where the risings of joy's tide Come the stream to fill- in. Gladly takes the river from the sea That great gift ; Lets the tide-waves, flooding mightily, Jts own waves uplift. THE RIVEE AND THE TIDE. 49 IV. AYith a rush and swell the waters run Till they seem As were thus for ever mixed in oue, Floods of sea and stream, • V. Sinks the tide, and back to whence it came Ebbing goes. Yet the river onward with the same Impulse ever flows. VI. It can let the sea-waves come and go As they will ; For a soui'ce that has no tidal flow Feeds its current still. VII. Out of Life's hard rock that spring hath birth, None knows why ; And can, flowing, keep that place of earth, Joy's ebbs would leave dry. September, 1872. ( 50 ) T A RETEOSPECT. I. HEN was it, after all, mere human dreaming, — Fancies thrown outward by an o'erwrouglit brain, Fevered- with minglings of strong joy and pain ? Did not the heaven unclose, and Truth forth stream- in*'' Like Pentecostal fire, or dovelike wings, Bear to us God's free gifts of holy things ? II. What did our hearts behold ? — Earth's light seemed blended With the pure light of Light invisible, In one great radiancy that waxed to fill TJs and all space with love ; and doubt was ended ; And our dim faith was lost in blessed sight ; Merged in clear hope of life the infinite. A RETROSPECT. 51 III. Must our eyes, opening now in sober waking, Find that the world is as it was before ; Feel its old darkness pressing evermore. Darkness of That wliich still no answer making To sad men's questionings of ''what" and "why" — Doth o'er the chaos of our being lie ? IV. Or are we dreaming noiv ? and was that vision Something that through long-tranced senses broke, And in each spirit its Pure-Reason woke, Teaching 'twixt true and false to make decision ? — Ah ! — who can tell us what these things may mean ? We only know that joy in us hath been. V. Know we indeed this ? then through years rcmain- Now since a light hath shinod once, although, E 2 52 A RETROSPECT. "Waning:, that glory fled ere we could know Its source, our souls can «ease from tlieir vague straining, Their wail of " who will show us any good?" We can accept all things not understood. VI. For, whether di'eam or truth, Joy's touch brought healing, Strengthening faint hearts with utmost fate to cope, Giving stern vigour that needs neither hope Nor faith, but waiteth till God's great revealing End with a deeper joy our life-long test — Or till Death's answer come — the dreamless rest. March, 1873- ( 53 ) T DID not care to write to you, My Friend, this many a day — Why ? just because two whole weeks through, Upon the hills — upon the bay. Beneath the sky's September blue. The tender brooding sunshine lay From morn till eve. I think you knew All I could wish to say. n. Was not all well with us while each Day met the same bright sea That swelled or rippled up the beach 1 let the golden moments be : What need had we for words to reach From me to you, from you to me ? Is not this silence fittest speech For best reality ? ( 54 ) in. What could my letters give you ? Xouglit But just the same old aid — A few poor scraps of broken thought (Perchance in some new phrase arrayed), A little learned, a little taught, In idle game so often played, Searchings of matters vainly sought, Ycxed questions re-essayed. IT. Or trivial household gossipings Of who has come, who gone. Whence, whither, — little gatherings From what was said and what was done, And talk of sequences chance brings From day to day. You needed none Of matters such-like. Larger things Are here ! the sun hath shone ! V. And shincth on — a fair wide pall Of light essential, lent ( 55 ) From upper air serene, doth fall, Seeming in infinite content To fold our lives phenomenal, And merge each little accident — Earth's Many lies within this All In glad abandonment. rr. Let us be silent ! lest we break This peace, not knowing whence It came. "We can but let it make Life lai'ge awhile. The hush intense Of the great present calm doth take A pathos from our half-felt sense That the old winds and waves will wake, This radiance vanish hence. September, 1875. ( 56 ; I^" SEPTEMBER. I. "T T TAS it but yesterday, or long ago ; That mystic autumn day ? Time's gliding flow Is hard to mark and mete ; we cannot know, bought else beholding, whether swift or slow Its movement is the while it onward tends. II. Again the lucid deep September haze Trembles in morning hours : around me plays (Intangible as half-felt dream that weighs In coming sleep), the memory of a blaze That somewhere on a far off hill-side blends III. Its purple reds with flakes of green and gold Prom a deep furze and heather sea, out rolled Ji\r SEPTEMBER. .57 I n radiant calm amid soft mists that fold Its limits round, aglow as if no cold Or darkness ever had been, nor could be. IV. 1 shut my eyes ; and as I feel the flame Of sunshine, red, through closed lids — the same Strange light which on that morning somehow came (From soul or sense, I know not, nor its name,) Streams in unbroken continuity. Till time and space seem words as idle air, For all the jS^ow seems Then, and Here seems There, And I am loath to stir a thought, nor care To i[uestion whether months and years it were Since then — orbutoneslumbrousmomcnt'sla])sc. VI. One moment ? — or long years ? I cannot say — What matters it how seasons luaik their way. F 58 IN SEPTE3IBER. Perhaps 'twas tlirice since that September day The autumn-gorse and mingled heather lay Fresh-blossomed on the fields — perhaps — VII. Nay I will wake — nor let the spell of this Sweet trance enfold me longer ; lest the kiss Of one vague hour's remembrance make me miss, In lulled delight, the stern essential bliss Of the things manifold that intervene. VIII. I may not lose the years whose months, days, hours, Have passed since then. (Earth beareth other flowers And herbs for beauty, food, and wholesome powers, That bloom when heather fades.) In souls of ours A growth of other varied joys hath been. IX. Of larger worth than that one mystic mood ( )f (beamy brightness of incertitude — It passed away. Came there not firmer good Through sense of true things seen and understood, Well measured out in all their loss and gain? IN SEPTE3IBER. 5 9 Came there not, after, a great Eastertide; When the young gladness born on that hill-side Was pierced through by sharp hard truth, and died, Then rose again, to strong life glorified, Made wise and pure though victory over pain? , XI. Come there not now, although that ecstasy Was transient likewise, gracious years when we May find our portion 'mid the things that be !No loans from joy, but perpetuity Of fair sad happiness, grave equal faith ? XII. In surest comi-adeship of heart and mind. That needs not memory's sweetnesses to bind Its constancies — enough one tie to find — Brave human help exchanged, to face with blind Stern hopefulness all mysteries of death. September, 1875. ( 60 ) SOI^KET. "ly yf' Y verses' worth and wortUessness I know. -^^-*~ Haply while on the beach there lie amassed Brown tangled wrack and drift-wood, lately cast Further than wont by wind and tidal flow Up from the sea (that sea which still with slow And lulled strength endurcth, guarding fast The coast's low-water mark), you may have passed, Upon the sands, strewn clots of foam. They show How high erewhile the ocean's surge hath come, Which, ebbing, leaveth symbols to attest Its upper reach, else doubted. Import more Lies in the dwindled morsels of sea-scum Than their own worth — each signifies a crest "Which some deep-breasted wave here jubilant bore. Novemher, 1875. THE END. VERSES. PART II. §. i. m. -c«c<^(»>>o- DUBLIN: E. PONSONBY, ii6, GRAFTON-STREET. 1883. DUBLIN : PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, BY PONSONBY AND WELDRICK. CONTENTS, fr'c PEGASUS, SONNET, FIRST CONVERSION, DIRGE, SUGGESTED BY CHOPIn's FUNERAL MARCH, . . dirge, suggested by the funeral march in Beethoven's twelfth sonata, another version of the foregoing dirge, " OU SONT LES NEIGES d'ANTAN ? " SONNET (sympathy), SONNET (intercessory PRAYEK), god's messages (from THE GERMAN), . . to robert browning (on re-reading some poems long unread, DOWRIES, I., II., III. (from THE GERMAN), "there SHALL BE NO MORE SEA," SONNET ("love YOUR ENEMIES "), ACQUIESCENCE, PAGE 1 3 4 6 9 11 13 15 16 18 20 21-23 24 27 28 ( iv ) PAGE 29 DOUBT, " CUI HONO ?" 31 POPPIES (an idyll fragment), . . . . . . 34 THE RIVER OF TIME, . . . . '. . . . . . 37 TWO SONNETS, " ART AND POPULARITY" (tO K. browning), .. .. ..'" .. .. 39,41 from the german of johann salis seewis, . . 42 ADRIFT, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 PEGASUS. T T THAT is my Pegasus ? A fiery horse Bearing the rider in its curbless course He recks not where — by swift - winged fancy's force ? II. Nay mine (I love him, he my needs doth suit The better) is a wingless, slow-paced brute, Patient, stout-built, in temper resolute. in. A steed that never may through Ether dart ; He serves me well enough to draw my cart, Laden with moods and thoughts from brain and heart. 2 PEGASUS. IV. He drew my loads in years long, long ago ; Yet now no sign of age the beast doth show : Perhaps by use his muscles stronger grow. V. Gee ho ! good ass of mine ! The roads are rough- A few years longer pull your master's stuff : For him and you the grave has rest enough ! 1882. ( 3 SONNET. T F suddenly the darkness closed, while light Present to sense at height of fulness lay, No need were there for hope that dawn of day Would break anew ; for, came it so, the Night Would seem to give Noon's sweetness infinite And timeless being ; and, lest twilight's grey Might touch the sunshine with a chill decay, Enfold it safe Ah! //Death's dark aright Would fall on us in earthly life (like veil On Moses' face while still irradiate With God-lit glory), in our hour supreme Of joy or ardour, ere its glow in pale, Slow wanings sink : then were men's souls good fate Complete without the Eesurrection Dream. 1876, ( 4 ) FIRST CONVEESION. (OE ANYTHING SIMILAR THERETO. ) I. '"T^HEY sang a song of exultation, When joy that worketh strong salvation Rushed, like the wind of God— and cleft Earth's level sea of commonplace, And parted it, to right, to left- Leaving hetween a sacred space. A moment's pathway for the pilgrim band Of hopes that sought the Resurrection land. II. Too soon they sang that strain victorious, Not counting how the Country glorious Lay far— beyond Life's wilderness. They saw not the long stretch of years. FIRST CONVERSION. 5 Not blank, but filled with new access Each day, of pleasures, toils, or fears. They knew not — Ah! — that ere their love should gain Its goal, the wish that made it Faith would wane. 1881. ( 6 ) DIEGE. (suggested by Chopin's funeral march.) 1~\ IG her grave, and lay her deep : Let the clay her beauty cover, Hiding her from friend and lover ; All her sweetness, all her mirth Now for evermore is over. Sleepeth she the dreamless sleep. Dust to dust, and earth to earth ! Yain is weeping ; yet men weep. Ah, the beauty of the sunlit world ! Ah, the greenness of Spring's leaves unfurled ! Ah, the birds' song, and their swift wings' motion I Ah, the laughter of the rippled ocean ! DIRGE. 1 Ah, the winds with scent of hawthorn laden ! Ah, the strength and grace of youth and maiden I Ah, man's desire of life, so deep, so vain ; He goeth hence, and cometh not again. Yet, her life had richest joy ; Her's it was while it she tasted. Death perchance hath kindly hasted To the maiden, ere the years Vigour of her life had wasted, Dimming it with pain's alloy. Therefore triumph with our tears Mingle. Death doth death destroy ! Never shall her heauty know decay ! Never fade to twilight's cold her day ! Life for her within its bliss is rounded ; Knoweth she that death that bliss hath bounded ? We, the living, praise the Dead, whose spirit Doth the lot of God's most loved inherit : We, too, that our best joy might never wane, Would die with her, and count life's loss a gain. 8 DIRGE. Triumph we for her ! yet weep ; Weep because the grave must cover, Hidden from her friend and lover, All her sweetness and her mirth. All is ended ! all is over ! Bear her gently, lay her deep. Dust in dust, and earth in earth ! Let her sleep her dreamless sleep ! April, 1880. The feeling atout death in Chopin's "Marche Funebre" seems to me to be essentially Pagan. To others the music may be suggestive of other moods, very possibly. ( 9 ) DIRGE. (suggested by the funeral march in Beethoven's twelfth sonata.) I. T T THEN man's breatli doth fail Let no useless wail With the mourners' funeral strain be blended. Bear we on our Dead, With firm, silent tread, To the grave where all his hopes are ended. II. All things ebb and flow ; Life must come and'go. Men must bow in sternest adoration Of the mighty Fate That unmoved doth wait Eor their worship of Renunciation. 10 DIRGE. III. Mortals though we be, Yet may dignity- Be of man's frail being proud distinction : Let it cloak us round Till Earth's burial ground Hide in Nature's life our life's extinction. IV. Bear we on our Dead ; Leave vain words unsaid : Silent honour is his best ovation. He hath lived. His deeds Shall not miss their meeds, Though his own be but annihilation. V. Resteth he in peace ; Pain with joy doth cease. He sleeps well who sleeps to waken never. We will evermore, Though our hearts be sore. Praise the Earth, whose glory liveth ever. April, 1880. ( 11 ) ANOTHER VERSION OF THE FOREGOING DIRGE. I. ^T THEN our joy doth fail, Let no idle wail With its requiem in our hearts be blended : But with steadfast tread Let us bear Hope, dead, Onward to that grave where pain is ended. II. All things ebb and flow ; Joy must come and go : Let us bow in sternest adoration Of the unmoved Fate That doth round us wait To receive our hearts' renunciation. 12 DIRGE. III. Yanquished though we be, Yet, let dignity- Be of human sadness' proud distinction ; Let it cloak us round, Till Earth's burial ground Hide in Nature's joy our joy's extinction. IV. Bliss, if dead, is dead ; Words were idle said ; Sorrow's clamour brings not restoration : Little profiteth Human yearnings' breath In the rigid corpse to wake sensation. V. Requiescat ! Peace Comes when hope doth cease, "When some good hath been renounced for ever. Men may evermore. Though each heart be sore, Feel Man's jubilance that faileth never. April, 1880. ( l'-5 ) "OU SONT LES NEIGES D'ANTAN?" I. ^ AY ye that as transient as the snow Human hearts' pure joy doth come and go ? Fall as Heaven's resistless grace, Eest unchanged for one brief space, Perfected upon earth's face : Vanish then, and leave no trace, Fading with a waning sure and slow. As the passing of the winter's snow ? II. Yea, but if indeed as winter's snow Joy hath come — I answer : Be it so. Fear not, lest of its dear grace Aught should perish from that place Where, transfiguring life's face, It hath shone one blessed space : All its essence they shall find, who know How to seek it, as they seek the snow. 14 " O^ SO^'T LES NEIGES D' A NT AN?" III. Seek ye the lost beauty of the snow ? Ye shall find it where the Spring's herbs grow Strong and tender on its place ; Find it wheresoe'er the race Of swift brooks hath o'er the face Of the green land borne its grace ; See in clouds above, or grass below, Transmutations of earth's vanished snow. IV. Find the substance of past joy e'en so : Living on in all the thoughts that grow Out of hearts where for a space Once it rested. Seek and trace In new deeds and words its grace, Keeping evermore that place Where, to eyes unheeding, it as snow, Dreamlike, only seemed to come and go. April, 1881. ( 15 ) SO:f^NET. (sympathy.) T WILL not question of your words to me ; I will not ask myself how much I heard : It is enough for me to know they stirred Some part of that great circumambient sea Wherein the speech of all Humanity Vibrates for evermore in waves of sound — Enough to feel that in the air around Unseen your utterance moveth ceaselessly. You need not hear the answer that went out When thought grew vocal, and with motion swift Passed from my soul. Enough ! I let it go, Where, in the same air-ocean rolled about, Your words and my words, somehow as they drift. May meet — though we who sent them, do not know. 1872. ( 16 ) SONNET. (tnteecessoky peayer.) "He shall purify the sons of I,evi." T~^ ID ye with vigils, and with tears that fall As drops of the heart's hlood, the Lord im- plore To succour in some need your loved, and pour On their souls light and peace, nor heed at all Your own ? God, hearkening to your prayer, may call Its truth to trial. From His blessings' store, If He but grant the boon ye asked — no more — Can ye rejoice ? Ah ! though to you befall To see glad hands of others give that gift Ye won from Heaven? . . . When human love's desire SONNET. 17 This test can bear, which parts from dross its gold, Christ counts it worthy to His love to lift True intercession. . . . Purified by fire Are they who are among His priests enrolled. August, 1881. ( 18 ) GOD'S MESSAGES (feom the gekman.) GOD sent a human soul as messenger 10 mine, "When He would first a precious gift confer, The wine He blesseth — earthly love's glad draught, which sent Into the heart of Man, is sacrament Of Heaven's love pledge and sign. II. God chose that self-same soul as messenger Again, When He on me would nobler gift confer, Of pain — GOD'S 3IES SAGES. 19 A cup whose drauglit with some few drops is fraught Of the deep bitterness He drank who wrought For Man salvation's gain. m. And will God make that soul His messenger Once more ? Hath He a gift yet higher to confer In store For me ? Will Christ, unworthy though I be. Give me of His new wine of victory, Love's joy, whose pain is o'er ? IV. Amen. I would not that the Lord confer That joy On me — on him He may as messenger Employ — Too soon. Nay, let JLim first by sterner grace Make pure our hcarts -te^wc His face, Ere gladness pain destroy. c 2 ( 20 ) F TO ROBEET BROWNING. (on ke-eeading some poems long ttnkead.) RIEND, " strong since joyful" — guide upon the heights Of life's best blessedness and life's best pain, Awhile I left thee ; now I come again, Urged by thy vigour lent of old, which fights Within my soul, and there makes good its rights Over the sloths and languors of the plain. Lead me ! I, if I follow thee, am sane From sad, sick dreams and lotus flower delights. That o'er the indolence of heart's despair Shed charm of Art. Thy nobler Art doth cope With doubts and ills ; and they who with thee dare Thought's strenuous climb on rugged mountain slope, Eind vision purged like thine, by that keen air, To catch dear glimpses of a far-off hope. Auffust ZOth, 1881. ( 21 ) DOWRIES. (feom the geeman.) I. T ET not woman empty-handed Go to liearth of whom she weds with. Let her bring him wealth to make her Welcomed to his life as equal, Not as beggar, whom for pity It should shelter, clothe, and nourish. Maiden, spin beside your mother By her cottage door in sunshine, By the fire in winter's evenings; Spin and weave much goodly raiment. Goodly store of household linen : Fit provision for the comfort Of his home whose heart elects you In that home to rule as mistress Of your own, your husband's substance Through the many years and happy. 22 DOWRIES. II. T~A AMSEL fair, in higher station, Born to wealth that others toiled for ; With a father's gold for portion : You must also bring your bridegroom Dowry wrought by your own spinning ; Goodly stuff that hath been woven By yourself in years of girlhood, In the years before he loved you. Bring him all their cherished fancies, Bright, or grey with morning sadness ; All the dreaming, all the thinking ( )f a young, fresh brain (unwearied By cold weight of custom's pressure) ; All your school-taught arts and learnings ; All your ardours for the larger Knowledge life spreads out before you. DOWRIES. 23 III. T T TOMAiS' old, whom earth's strange chances Parted here from friend your dearest ; If, indeed, in God's Hereafter Men may meet : then richer dowry You may bring than if in byegone Tears your life with his were mingled. In the freshness of its guihood, Ere love's work in it were finished. Ampler store of goodly substance, By a heart's experience woven ; Beautiful with all the varied Faith and glatlness, doubt and sorrow, Pathos of dear joys' renouncements, Gains of tender force for pity : All the things that love, enduring Through the long years, wrought within you. August, 1881. ( 24 ) ''THERE SHALL BE NO MORE SEA." [Written after reading, at the sea- side, a volume of Roman Catholic Sermons, vividly depicting Hell.] ( ( HERE shall be no more Sea." Ah! surely T this Doth only mean for souls who reach the bliss Of Paradise. Tliey need no more the kiss Of Earth's great mother Sea; they will not miss Whose pulses with new-risen life beat high, Soothings from this aeonian lullaby, Which winneth now men's weariness to lie Within its sound, and be content to die. II. Hearts, strong in vigour of their fresh great joy. Shall need no leap of laughing waves to buoy " THERE SHALL BE NO MORE SEA^ 25 Them with an alien gladness, and destroy A little Avhile their human cares' annoy ; And eyes, whereon the light of Heaven doth break, Need nevermore pathetic pleasure take In ocean gleams, whose beauty here can make Dim lives worth living, if but for its sake. m. Yet, though the Blessed need no more the Sea, Will not God leave her to the Lost ? That she Who could not save them from their woe, may be Their nurse to comfort, ever tenderly With vast low hushabies to still The restlessness of pain incurable ; And with a sense of vague, fair sadness fill Their hunger for lost good adorable. IT. Men love her. Earth's old sea — she loves them well ; If she may be their mother, too, in Hell, WiU she not rock them there with lulling swell Of all her waters ? TiU (Ah, who can tell ?) 26 " THERE SHALL BE NO 3I0RE SEA." Her constancy shall not have wrought in. vain, And souls, who nevermore God's grace could gain, May to the peace of dreamless sleep attain — Lost to all gladness, lost alike to pain. 1881. ( 27 ) so:n"xet. "love YOUE ElfEMIES." A Y, love them, Christian, since thou dost believe That they who harmed thee could not touch thine all, Or put thy joy's dear life beyond recall. AVhy shouklst thou grudge their finite gain? or grieve ? Thy loss amends unmeasured shall receive. Harder his task, upon whose heart doth fall Some chill renunciation, as a pall Final in its own blankncss, which doth leave No hope of clearer dawn, or gladder spring. If this man love his brother who hath wrought By luck or will his damage, he doth bring A sacrifice, with rarer incense fraught From Godless creed, to God (if God there be), Than thine, in thy sweet, easy charity. 1880. ( 28 ) ACQUIESCENCE. ' I '^HET tell me that from one dear hill-side spot The furze and heather hath been swept away, And herbs for household use, in garden clay, Grow trimly now within its cultured plot, Where nevermore upon September day Shall purpled gold respond to snidight's ray. II. And do I wish it otherwise ? Ah, no ! That blessed acre's beauty was as bread Of sacrament, whereby my heart was fed One bye-gone morn. Unwistful I let go The outer symbol, for the grace is fled That sanctified the moorland's gold and red. August, 1880, ( 29 ) DOUBT. '^7' OH say that Doubt doth as a vapour chill Creep o'er the soul, and all its vigour kill, By Fear, that, numbing energies of will, Folds it with presence irresistible. I tell you, Doubt can other semblance take : To me it seems, as sunbeam burst, to make In a grey sky of certitude a break Of gleam and glow that bid the heart awake. To you and me it cometh ; yet the same Which xjou call Fear, for me hath other name ; / call it Hope — the precious doubt that came With dove-winged darts, as Pentecostal flame — The blessed chance that not yet proven true Might be Renunciation's creed, whereto I lent sad faith ; its touch doth still endue Again 1 again ! my soul with impulse new ! 30 DOUBT. Methinketh. that if no belief secui'e In certitude may be, we bold most sure Life's gladness (whence flows force), who thus inure Our hearts to live by creed most sternly poor : For thus, if daily wont that faith attain Which needs not promised Heaven, then this dear gain Is ours : that to our mood austerely sane Doubt, when it cometh, bringeth joy, not pain. September, 1882. ( 31 ) "GUI BONO?" A T 7ITH a chance friend of mine I walked to-day A mile or two. "We talked along tlie way Of many things — the weather, the concerns I Of folk we knew, until by devious turns We found ourselves on graver matters' ground, And there at variance. "Words of her's ai'ound A creed she " Christian" called, set narrow bound. Essayed to measure out by petty rule Of some small shibboleth of her own school, The heights, and breadths, and depths of Heaven and earth, The grace of God, and human actions' worth. (I fancy her own life could speak in deeds Language of larger doctrine than her creeds' !) I might have waived reply with courteous guile, Or given response of many-mcaninged smile ; 32 " CUI BONO?" But someliow then a passing impulse stirred Desire in me to demonstrate absurd The logic of the cant's plain import (bare From texts that wrapped it from life's open air). Her doctrine reckoned for the sole elect To grace of Heaven, a blessed phrase-bound sect. I took for mine, what liker seemed to me Christ's Gospel, not some devil's parody. How God in all His earth were source of good, Whence floweth every noble act or mood Of souls that know Him, or that know Him not : Who leaves uncared by love no human lot : Who freely gifts of grace divine hath laid In gift of life, on all the hearts he made ; Who sees with mercy's justice infinite The utmost, inmost of our wrong and right. (I write some few of many things I said : You guess, of course, the track discourse was led.) With need to utter thoughts, my thoughts grew clear ; '' CUI BONO?" 33 And my belief in them awhile sincere ; A flash of faith struck from my heart cast out That heart's own haunting presences of doubt. Our contest ended soon. I had the best Of it, I fancied ; and we both sought rest In change of theme. But when the little heat Of speech was past, I felt as if defeat Or victory had been worth about the same To me. A swift collapse of interest came Across my mood — the feeling "need I care To win in strife so idle ? What if fair Appear this creed, while that repulsive seems ; Matters it much, when both alike are dreams ? What profits it/except for bare delight In jousts of words,] in shadows' cause to fight?" October, 1881. ( 34 ) POPPIES. (ax idyl fragment.) I. A TROTH they plighted on that August day, When chance had bid them meet upon the way That goes hard by the wind-swept corn fields, down Prom the fresh moorland towards the fishing town. II. Encompassed them the sea and the deep sky As witnesses. Within them seemed to lie A love like sea and sky — in certitude. To last through every varying light and mood. III. Alack ! "What evil Fate this omen planned, That she that hour should hold in heedless hand POPPIES. 3.J The way-side flowers she plucked her gown to dress — Poppies, the symbol of forgetfulness ? IV. The flower that to men's joy or pain brings sleep, Lay in the hands that then in vow to keep The hearts' clasp whole and true eternally, Were clasped in presence of God's sky and sea. The years went by. No hour of parting set Its breach between their lives, and they are yet Each the same man or woman, with the gain Of strength matured by use of heart or brain. VI. But when they meet and talk — a half-felt sense Is in their eyes, of some deep difference (Some change more truly felt, because untold), 'Twixt what is now, and what was once of old. 36 POPPIES. VII. And why ? Ah, from the poppies' touch then laid On the fair purposed promise that they made, (Beside those corn-fields reaped long years ago,) Some potent bale that mom did haply flow, Tin. Which with its working slow and sure doth creep Into the soul, and dull its love to sleep, Leaving all other forces in it free From subtle influence of the lethargy. IX. Who knows if t'was the poppies harmed their lot ? She only knows that him she blameth not. And yet, and yet, the wish will come that luck Had not, ill-omened, bid her stoop and pluck Those scarlet blossoms, glowing by the way Just ere they met, that old bright August day. 1881. ( 37 ) THE EIVER OF TIME. (written at the age of eofeteen.) T DREAMED a dream ; 'twas a half waking di'eam : This is my dream : I stood upon the shore Of a great river, whose strong waves did seem To roll on ceaselessly for evermore. n. I looked. Upon its current strong afloat Were many vessels, hurrying toward the sea ; One living soul there sat in each fi'ail boat, And they must onward go unceasingly. 38 THE RIVER OF TUIE. III. And yet methought that towards the river's shore Some souls their eyes with lingering looks did turn ; But while they gazed the stream them onward bore, And to that spot they never might return. IV. Then thought I, " what may that Great Eiver be Which ever beareth swift and sure along Unto the great immeasurable sea, Those vessels frail upon its current strong ?" V. Straightway I heard a voice sound in mine ears That said: " That Eiver rolling toward the sea Is Time ; and all its ceaseless waves are years That bear men onward toward Eternity." ( -39 ) AET AJTD POPULARITY. TO E. BEOWNING. ["No man having drunk old wine straightway desireth new, for he saith the old is hetter."] T T APLY thy life were harmed if earth her fame Had proffered ere years proved thou didst not need Drink of applause Arts' daily force to feed ; Ere the HoiTjrrj's — God — deep source whence came Thy poet's impulse, bade thee^rs^ to claim Reward like to His own — true artists' meed Of joy that flows in esseucc of the deed, Unreached by accident of laud or blame. But now, since thou through long uncrowned days Didst draw soul's strength from draughts of that old wine 40 ART AND POPULARITY. Of gladness, which doth evermore sustain All Nature's working, human or divine : No fear for thee, lest thou that first good gain Shouldst quit, to thirst for new wine of men's praise. 1882. ( 41 ) ART AND POPULARITY. (a COUIfTEEPABT TETJIH TO THE rOEEGOING.) O AID I thou didst not need to feed thy Art ^^"'^ From daily draughts of wine of human praise, While God sustained thee in unlauded days With Earth's old gladness, which makes yigour dart Through the soul's pulses ? Ay, but yet my heart Saith that this thought of thee is but a phase Of truth concerning thee ; and on me lays Urgence to speak the half truth's counterpart. For thou hadst need of us. Pure artists' joy Could not suffice thy soul's whole thirst to slake. Tasted alone, God's precious wine would cloy. Thy manhood needed men, thy gains to share. Thy brethren's sympathy, not praise, can make Thy life complete that else imperfect were. 1882. E ( 42 ) PEOM THE GEEMAN OE JOHANN SALIS SEEWIS. [On the thirtieth anniversary of his mother's death.] "|\ l\ OTHER, my mother here, and mother there, There where Death is not, where no tears shall flow, I am thy son ; this head, with its gray hair. Is thine own child's thou leftst so long ago. Life's evening falls; and, through the darkening air, Star-like the long-lost angel faces show. Thine bids me come — my mortal flesh to share Thy tomb — my soul, through thine, new birth to know. FROM THE GERMAN OF J. S. SEE WIS. 43 Once, bom to earth, upon thy arm I lay, "Whilst thou in pain and bliss didst bend o'er me, The smile of hope and love no tongue can say. So, when I, issuing from Death's dark, shall see First the effulgence of Heaven's perfect day. Let me again awhile thy baby be. 1881. ( 44 ) ADEIFT. I. T T NTO my Faith, as to a spar, I bind ^^^ My Love — and Faith and Love adrift I cast On a dim sea. I know not if at last They the eternal shore of God shall find. II. I only know that neither waves nor wind Can sunder them ; the cords are tied so fast That Faith shall never — doubts and dangers past — Come safe to land, and Love be left behind. 1881. ,; 45 ) APOLOGIA. (to s. l. t.) I. T S there the " Rising from the Dead" — then we, Careless through faith, may bury utterly, Dear things that die — desires that may not be. II. There is no need to raise upon the plot "Wherein they rest, a stone to mark the spot : Its place may be by all the world forgot ; III. And over it green grass or corn may grow ; Or feet of busy men pass to and fro — Of men who ask not what there lies below. F 46 APOLOGIA. IV. It is enough tliat He who gives Death's sleep To joys beloved — evermore doth keep His record of where each lies buried deep. V. No shrine for their sweet memory need we make, For they themselves, when Easter-morn shall break, Shall hear His voice — and to new life awake. But if for Man one life — no more — there be ; Then lay wc our lost blessings tenderly In some fair sepulchre that eyes may see. VII. Since all must crumble to the common dust ; One fate befall the just and the unjust : To graven words of monument we trust VIII. To win for our best gladnesses the grace Of life prolonged on sunlit earth a space, Finding in minds of living men a place. APOLOGIA. 47 IX. [And when this book's vague rhyming uttereth Dear thoughts safe hid, if sure were earlier faith — What means this but a heart's recoil from death ? X. What means it but that Love, since Seaveti's hopes wane. Takes as its portion Art's good lesser gain On Earth — to prove itself not spent in vain ?] April ith, 1883. ^ (? This book is DUE on the last date stamped below. REMINGTON RAND INC. 20 213 (533) UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY [ACl^ AA 000 364 645 2