?;<5752 ,8 c.l A^ = IIBKAKY UNIYERSilY OF CALIFORNIA aiVEKSlDE rm^ "WORD^WORTH'-S j& GRAVE. and other Poems' IN SAME SERIES. 1. THE LADY FROM THE SEA By Henrik Ibsen. 2. A LONDON PLANE-TREE. By Amy Levy. c < D W u a! <: OS and other Poems WILLIAM WATSON CAMEO SE,KIE.S 1.0NZ>0N' r. FIsSHER UNWW PATERNOSTER SQ, iS90 W2' C.I Prefatory Note. rj^OR kind permission to reprint "Words- worth's Grave," " Ver Tenebrosum,'' and " England to Ireland," my thanks are due to the Editors of the National Review and the Spectator. I have omitted from " Ver Tenebrosum " one sonnet which seemed coloured by party passion to its distinct detriment as poetry. There may possibly be others which lay them- selves open to the same charge, but I have found it difficult to exclude them without dis- turbing the general coherence of the body of verse to which they belong. Twenty "Epigrams" are transferred to these pages from a former volume of mine, which, from the circumstance of its merely provincial publication, and the fact of its having found few readers, I have thought a legitimate source to lay under contribution. W. W. TO JAMES BROMLEY, OF Lathotn^ Lancashire. pRE vandal lords with lust of gold accurst Deface each hallowed hillside we revere — Ere cities in their million-throated thirst Menace each sacred mere — Let us give thanks because one nook hath been Unflooded yet by desecration's wave, The little churchyard in the valley green That holds our Wordsworth's grave. 'Twas there I plucked these elegiac blooms, There where he rests 'mid comrades fit and few, And thence I bring this growth of classic tombs. An offering, friend, to you — You who have loved like me his simple themes, Loved his sincere large accent nobly plain, And loved the land whose mountains and whose streams Are lovelier for his strain. 8 Dedication. It may be that his manly chant, beside More dainty numbers, seems a rustic tune ; It may be, thought has broadened since he died Upon the century's noon ; It may be that we can no longer share The faith which from his fathers he re- ceived ; It may be that our doom Is to despair Where he with joy believed ; — Enough that there is none since risen who sings A song so gotten of the immediate soul. So instant from the vital fount of things Which is our source and goal ; And though at touch of later hands there float More artful tones than from his lyre he drew. Ages may pass ere trills another note So sweet, so great, so true. Contents, PAGE Wordsworth's Grave II Yer Tenebrosum 23 77ie SoiiJancse . 25 Hashecn .... 26 The English Dead . 27 Gordon .... 2S The True Patn'olisiii 30 Restored Allegiance . 31 7he Political Luminary . 32 Foreign Menace 33 Home-Rootedmss 34 Our Eastern Treasure 35 Reported Concessions 36 Nightmare 37 Last Word: to the Colonics • 3S Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. 39 Mensii l.airiiiiat uin 41 k To John of Ihantwood . 42 lO Contents. PAGE The Mock Self 45 Life without Health , , . . .46 On Exaggerated Deference to Foreign Literary Opinion ....... 47 The lAite-Player ,.,... 48 The Flight of Youth 49 IVorld-Stiattgeness ...... 50 When Birds zuere Songless . . . • 5* On Lajidors ^'' Hellenics''^ , . . • 5^ To a Friend . . . . . . -53 Fngland to Ireland ...... 54 The Raver^s Shadoiv . . . . -57 V Verses to Mr. Alfred Austin .... 60 Epigrams 63 0)1 I^ongfelloiv' s Death 69 Byron the Voluptuary . . . . .69 Antony at Actiutn . . . . • '70 Art 70 Keats 71 After rtading " 'Taviburlaine the Great'''' . 71 Shelley and Harriet Westbrook . . -72 The Play of '' King Lear." .... 72 To Professor Dowden 73 Wordsworth's Grave, 1 1 WordswortK s Grave. ^ T^HE old rude church, with bare, bald tower, * is here ; Beneath its shadow high-born Rotha flows ; Rotha, remembering well who slumbers near, And with cool murmur lulling his repose. Rotha, remembering well who slumbers near. His hills, his lakes, his streams are with him yet. Surely the heart that read her own heart clear Nature forgets not soon : 'tis we forget. We that with vagrant soul his fixity Have slighted ; faithless, done his deep faith wrong ; Left him for poorer loves, and bowed the knee To misbegotten strange new gods of song. 12 Wordsworth's Grave. Yet, led by hollow ghost or beckoning elf Far from her homestead to the desert bourn, The vagrant soul returning to herself Wearily wise, must needs to him return. To him and to the powers that with him dwell :— Inflowings that divulged not whence they came ; And that secluded spirit unknowable. The mystery we make darker with a name ; The Somewhat which wc name but cannot know, Ev'n as we name a star and only see His quenchless flashings forth, which ever show And ever hide him, and which are not he. II. Poet, who sleepest by this wandering wave !• When thou wast born, what birth-gift hadst thou then ? ■- To thee what wealth was that the Immortals gave, The wealth thou gavest in thy turn to men ? Wordsworth's Grave. 13 Not Milton's keen, translunar music thine ; Not Shakspere's cloudless, boundless human view ; Not Shelley's flush of rose on peaks divine ; Nor yet the wizard twilight Coleridge knew. What hadst thou that could make so large amends For all thou hadst not and thy peers pos- sessed. Motion and fire, swift means to radiant ends ? — Thou hadst, for weary feet, the gift of rest. From Shelley's dazzling glow or thunderous haze. From Byron's tempest-anger, tempest-mirth, Men turned to thee and found — not blast and blaze, Tumult of tottering heavens, but peace on earth. Nor peace that grows by Lethe, scentless flower, There in white languors to decline and cease; But peace whose names are also rapture, power. Clear sight, and love : for these are parts of peace. 14 Wordsworth's Grave. III. I hear it vouched the Muse is with us still ; — If less divinely frenzied than of yore, In lieu of feelings she has wondrous skill To simulate emotion felt no more. Not such the authentic Presence pure, that made This valley vocal in the great days gone ! — In his great days, while yet the spring-time played About him, and the mighty morning shone. No word-mosaic artificer, he sang A lofty song of lowly weal and dole. Right from the heart, right to the heart it sprang, Or from the soul leapt instant to the soul. He felt the charm of childhood, grace of youth, Grandeur of age, insisting to be sung. The impassioned argument was simple truth Half-wondering at its own melodious tongue. Impassioned ? ay, to the song's ecstatic core ! But far removed were clangour, storm and feud; For plenteous health was his, exceeding store Of joy, and an impassioned quietude. Wordsworth's Grave. I 5 IV. A hundred years ere he to manhood came, Song from celestial heights had wandered down, Put off her robe of sunlight, dew and flame, And donned a modish dress to charm the Town. Thenceforth she but festooned the porch of things ; Apt at life's lore, incurious what life meant. Dextrous of hand, she struck her lute's few strings. Ignobly perfect, barrenly content. Unflushcd with ardour and unblanched with awe, Her lips in profitless derision curled, She saw with dull emotion — if she saw — The vision of the glory of the world. The human masque she watched, with dream- less eyes In whose clear shallows lurked no trembling shade : The stars, unkenned by her, might set and rise, Unmarked by her, the daisies bloom and fade. 1 6 Wordsworth's Grave. The age grew sated with her sterile wit. Herself waxed weary on her loveless throne. Men felt life's tide, the sweep and surge of it, And craved a living voice, a natural tone. For none the less, though song was but half true, The world lay common, one abounding theme. Man joyed and wept, and fate was ever new. And love was sweet, life real, death no dream. In sad stern verse the rugged scholar-sage Bemoaned his toil unvalued, youth un- cheered. His numbers wore the vesture of the age. But, 'neath it beating, the great heart was heard. From dewy pastures, uplands sweet with thyme, A virgin breeze freshened the jaded day. It wafted Collins' lonely vesper-chime, It breathed abroad the frugal note of Gray. Wordsworth's Grave. 17 It fluttered here and there, nor swept in vain The dusty haunts where futile echoes dwell, — Then, in a cadence soft as summer rain, And sad from Auburn voiceless, drooped and fell. It drooped and fell, and one 'ncath northern skies. With southern heart, who tilled his father's field, Found Poesy a-dying, bade her rise And touch quick nature's hem and go forth healed. On life's broad plain the ploughman's con- quering share Upturned the fallow lands of truth anew. And o'er the formal garden's trim parterre The peasant's team a ruthless furrow drew. Bright was his going forth, but clouds erelong Whelmed him ; in gloom his radiance set, and those Twin morning stars of the new century's song, Those morning stars that sang together, rose. 1 8 Wordsworth's Grave. In elfish speech the Dreamer told his tale Of marvellous oceans swept by fateful wings. — The Seer strayed not from earth's human pale, But the mysterious face of common things He mirrored as the moon in Rydal Mere Is mirrored, when the breathless night hangs blue : Strangely remote she seems and wondrous near, And by some nameless difference born anew. V. Peace — peace — and rest ! Ah, how the lyre is loth, Or powerless now, to give what all men seek ! Either it deadens with ignoble sloth Or deafens with shrill tumult, loudly weak. Where is the singer whose large notes and clear Can heal and arm and plenish and sustain ? Lo, one with empty music floods the ear, And one, the heart refreshing, tires the brain. Wordsworth's Grave. 19 And idly tuneful, the loquacious throng Flutter and twitter, prodigal of time, And little masters make a toy of song Till grave men weary of the sound of rhyme. And some go prankt in faded antique dress, Abhorring to be hale and glad and free ; And some parade a conscious naturalness, The scholar's not the child's simplicity. Enough ; — and wisest who from words for- bear. The kindly river rails not as it glides ; And suave and charitable, the winning air Chides not at all, or only him who chides. VI. Nature ! we storm thine car with choric notes. Thou answerest through I he calm great nights and days, " Laud me who will : not tuneless arc your throats ; Yet if ye paused I should not miss the praise." 20 Wordsworth's Grave, We falter, half-rebuked, and sing again. We chant thy desertness and haggard gloom, Or with thy splendid wrath inflate the strain. Or touch it with thy colour and perfume. One, his melodious blood aflame for thee, Wooed with fierce lust, his hot heart world- defiled. One, with the upward eye of infancy. Looked in thy face, and felt himself thy child. Thee he approached without distrust or dread — Beheld thee throned, an awful queen, above — Climbed to thy lap and merely laid his head Against thy warm wild heart of mother- love. He heard that vast heart beating — thou didst press Thy child so close, and lov'dst him un- aware. Thy beauty gladdened him ; yet he scarce less Had loved thee, had he never found thee fair! Wordsworth's Grave. 21 For thou wast not as legendary lands To which with curious eyes and ears we roam. Nor wast thou as a fane mid solemn sands, Where palmer^ halt at evening. Thou wast home. And here, at home, still bides he ; but he sleeps ; Not to be wakened even at thy word ; Though we, vague dreamers, dream he some- where keeps An ear still open to thy voice still heard, — Thy voice, as heretofore, about him blown. For ever blown about his silence now ; Thy voice, though deeper, yet so like his own That almost, when he sang, we deemed 'twas thou ! VII. Behind Helm Crag and Silver Howe the sheen Of the retreating day is less and less. Soon will the lordlier summits, here unseen, Gather the night about their nakedness. 22 Wordsworth's Grave. The half-heard bleat of sheep comes from the hill. Faint sounds of childish play are in the air. The river murmurs past. All else is still. The very graves seem stiller than they were. Afar though nation be on nation hurled, And life with toil and ancient pain de- pressed, Here one may scarce believe the whole wide world Is not at peace, and all man's heart at rest. Rest ! 'twas the gift he gave ; and peace ! the shade He spread, for spirits fevered with the sun. To him his bounties are come back — here laid In rest, in peace, his labour nobly done. Ver Tenebrosum. Ver Tenebrosum. 25 Ver T^enehrosum : SONNETS OF MARCH AND APRIL, 1885. I. The Soudanese. TpHEY wrong'd not us, nor sought 'gainst us *■ to wage The bitter battle. On their God they cried For succour, deeming justice to abide In heaven, if banish'd from earth's vicinage. And when they rose with a gall'd lion's rage, We, on the captor's, keeper's, tamer's side, We, with the alien tyranny allied, We bade them back to their Egyptian cage. Scarce knew they who we were ! A wind of blight From the mysterious far norlh-wcst we came. Our greatness now their veriest babes have learn'd, Where, in wild desert homes, by day, by night. Thousands that weep their warriors unreturn'd, O England, O my country, curse thy name ! zS Ver. Tenebrosu M. II. Hasheen. " Of British arms, another victory ! " Triumphant Avords, through all the land's length sped. Triumphant words, but, being interpreted. Words of ill sound, woful as words can be. Another carnage by the drear Red Sea — Another efflux of a sea more red ! Another bruising of the hapless head Of a wrong'd people yearning to be free. Another blot on her great name, who stands Confounded, left intolerably alone With the dilating spectre of her own Dark sin, uprisen from yonder spectral sands : Penitent more than to herself is known ; England, appall'd by her own crimson hands. Ver Tenebrosum, 27 III. The English Dead. Give honour to our heroes fall'n, how ill Soe'er the cause that bade them forth to die. Honour to him, the untimely struck, whom high In place, more high in hope, 'twas fate's harsh will With tedious pain unsplendidly to kill. Honour to him, doom'd splendidly to die, Child of the city whose foster-child am I, Who, hotly leading up the ensanguin'd hill His charging thousand, fell without a word — Fell, but shall fall not from our memory. Also for them let honour's voice be heard Who nameless sleep, while dull time covereth With no illustrious shade of laurel tree, But with the poppy alone, their deeds and death. 28 Ver Tenebrosum. IV. Gordon. Idle although our homage be and vain, Who loudly through the door of silence press And vie in zeal to crown death's nakedness, Not therefore shall melodious lips refrain Thy praises, gentlest warrior without stain, Denied the happy garland of success, Foil'd by dark fate, but glorious none the less, Greatest of losers, on the lone peak slain Of Alp-like virtue. Not to-day, and not To-morrow, shall thy spirit's splendour be Oblivion's victim ; but when God shall find All human grandeur among men forgot, Then only shall the world, grown old and blind. Cease, in her dotage, to remember Thee. Ver Tenebrosum. 29 V. Gordon {concluded). Arab, Egyptian, English — by the sword Cloven, or pierced with spears, or bullet- mown — In equal fate they sleep : their dust is grown A portion of the fiery sands abhorred. And thou, what hast thou, hero, for reward, Thou, England's glory and her shame ? O'er- thrown Thou liest, unburicd, or with grave unknown As his to whom on Nebo's height the Lord Showed all the land of Gilead, unto Dan ; Judah sea-fringed ; Manasseh and Ephraim ; And Jericho palmy, to where Zoar lay ; And in a valley of Moab buried him, Over against Bcth-Peor, but no man Knows of his sepulchre unto this day. 3© Ver Tenebrosum. VI. The True Patriotism. The ever-lustrous name of patriot To no man be denied because he saw Where in his country's wholeness lay the flaw, Where, on her whiteness, the unseemly blot. England ! thy loyal sons condemn thee. — What ! Shall we be meek who from thine own breasts draw Our fierceness ? Not ev'n thoiL shalt overawe Us thy proud children nowise basely got. Be this the measure of our loyalty — To feel thee noble and weep thy lapse the more. This truth by thy true servants is confess'd — Thy sins, who love thee most, do most deplore. Know thou thy faithful ! Best they honour thee Who honour in thee only what is best. Ver Tenebrosum. 31 VII. Restored Allegiance. Dark is thy trespass, deep be thy remorse, O England ! Fittingly thine own feet bleed, Submissive to the purblind guides that lead Thy weary steps along this rugged course. Yet . . . when I glance abroad, and track the source More selfish far, of other nations' deed, And mark their tortuous craft, their jealous greed, Their serpent-wisdom or mere soulless force. Homeward returns my vagrant fealty, Crying, "O England, shouldst thou one day fall, Shartcr'd in ruins by some Titan foe, Justice were thenceforth weaker throughout all The world, and Truth less passionately free, And God the poorer for thine overthrow." 32 Ver Tenebrosum. VIII. The Political Luminary. A skilful leech, so long as we were whole : Who scann'd the nation's every outward part, But ah ! misheard the beating of its heart. Sire of huge sorrows, yet erect of soul. Swift rider with calamity for goal, Who, overtasking his equestrian art, Unstall'd a steed full willing for the start, But wondrous hard to curb or to control. Sometimes we thought he led the people forth : Anon he seemed to follow where they flew ; Lord of the golden tongue and smiting eyes ; Great out of season, and untimely wise : A man whose virtue, genius, grandeur, worth, Wrought deadlier ill than ages can undo. Ver Tenebrosum. 33 IX. Foreign Menace. I MARVEL that this land, whereof I claim The glory of sonship — for it 7C'as erewhile A glory to be sprung of Britain's isle, Though now it well-nigh more resembles shame — I marvel that this land with heart so tame Can brook the northern insolence and guile. But most it angers me, to think how vile Art thou, how base, from whom the insult came, Unwieldy laggard, many an age behind Thy sister Powers, in brain and conscience both ; In recognition of man's widening mind And flexile adaptation to its growth : Brute bulk, that bcarcst on thy back, half loth, One wretched man, most pitied of mankind. B 2 34 Ver Tenebrosum. X. HOME-ROOTEDNESS. I CANNOT boast myself cosmopolite : I own to " insularity," although 'Tis fall'n from fashion, as full well I know. For somehow, being a plain and simple wight, I am skin-deep a child of the new light, But chiefly am mere Englishman below, Of island-fostering ; and can hate a foe. And trust my kin before the Muscovite. Whom shall I trust if not my kin ? And whom Account so near in natural bonds as these Born of my mother England's mighty womb. Nursed on my mother England's mighty knees, And lull'd as I was lull'd in glory and gloom With cradle-song of her protecting seas ? ^'^ER Tenebrosum. 35 XI. Our Eastern Treasure. In cobwebb'd corners dusty and dim I hear A thin voice pipingly revived of late, Which saith our India is a cumbrous weight, An idle decoration, bought too dear. The wiser world contemns not gorgeous gear ; Just pride is no mean factor in a State ; The sense of greatness keeps a nation great ; And mighty they who mighty can appear. It may be that if hands of greed could steal From England's grasp the envied orient prize, This tide of gold would flood her still as now : But were she the same England, made to feel A brightness gone from out those starry eyes, A splendour from that constellated brow ? 36 Ver Tenebrosum. XII. Reported Concessions. So we must palter, falter, cringe, and shrink And when the bully threatens, crouch or fly.- There are who tell me with a shuddering eye That war's red cup is Satan's chosen drink. Who shall gainsay them ? Verily I do think War is as hateful almost, and well-nigh As ghastly, as this terrible Peace whereby We halt for ever on the crater's brink And feed the wind with phrases, while we know ^ There gapes at hand the infernal precipice O'er which a gossamer bridge of words we throw. Yet cannot choose but hear from the abyss The sulphurous gloom's unfathomable hiss And simmering lava's subterranean flow. Ver Tenebrosum. 37 XIII. Nightmare. ( IVritten during apparent imminence of luar .'^ In a false dream I saw the Foe prevail. The war was ended ; the last smoke had rolled Away : and we, erewhile the strong and bold, Stood broken, humbled, withered, weak and pale, And moan'd, " Our greatness is become a tale To tell our children's babes when we are old. They shall put by their playthings to be told How England once, before the years of bale. Throned above trembling, puissant, gran- diose, calm, Held Asia's richest jewel in her palm ; And with unnumbered isles barbaric she The broad hem of her glistering robe im- pcarl'd ; Then when she wound her arms about the world, And had for vassal the obsequious sea." 38 Ver Tenebrosum. XIV. Last Word : to the Colonies. Brothers beyond the Atlantic's loud expanse ; And you that rear the innumerable fleece Far southward 'mid the ocean named of peace ; Britons that past the Indian wave advance Our name and spirit and world-predominance ; And you our kin that reap the earth's increase Where crawls that long-back'd mountain till it cease Crown'd with the headland of bright esper- ance : — Remote compatriots wheresoe'er ye dwell, By your prompt voices ringing clear and true We know that with our England all is well : Young is she yet, her world-task but begun ; By you we know her safe, and know by y^ Her veins are million but her heart is one. Miscellaneous Sonnets^ Lyrics^ ^c. Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. 41 Mens is Lacrimarum, (MARCH, 1885.) !^ K/ ARCH, that comes roaring, maned, with rampant paws, And bleatingly withdraws ; March, — 'tis the year's fantastic nondescript, That, born when frost hath nipped The shivering fields, or tempest scarred the hills. Dies crowned with daffodils. The month of the renewal of the earth By mingled death and birth : But, England ! in this latest of thy years Call it— the Month of Tears. 42 Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. To yohn of Br ant wood. After reading a Letter {"Pall Mall Gazette,^'' February 15, 1886), WES, you have carried, we are well aware, Up to its highest point of cultivation. The art of talking nonsense with an air Of inspiration. But how if people merely laugh to read Your studies in reviling and abusing ? If, with intent to teach, you but succeed In being amusing ? The comfort is, your wild words cannot kill, And the undying dead are past your reaching. Great is the modest Kentish savant still, For all your screeching. He never railed, but bore the general sneer. Lived his grand life and lit the world from Beckenham. Amongst earth's noblest sons he stands a peer, Howe'er we reckon 'em. Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, Sec. 43 As for St. Austin — well, we give you /n'm. On saints at all we set no monstrous value. But Darwin's lamp can you avail to dim ? Nay, never shall you ! Think you we care, that one sour sage decries George Eliot, whom immortal glory covers ? Whilst you are prating, in the hearts she lies Of us her lovers. And Mill and Grote and Gibbon and Voltaire Are noxious trash, we learn. — Oh, how this cant would Be pitied, if it came from anywhere But holy Brantwood ! Yet, as to Gibbon, whom you bid us shun. The principle* whereby you have attacked his Imperial story, I myself for one Shall put in practice, • ♦' None but the malignant or the weak study the decline and fall either of state or organism. Good men study, ami wise men describe, only the growth and standing of things — not their decay." — Mr. Rusiin on Gibbon. 44 Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. And shall eschew, from this day forward, all Your later writing, biting, growling, grum- bling — One long crude history of decline and fall, Sad as Rome crumbling. Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. 45 The Mock Self. rp EW friends are mine, though many wights * there be Who, meeting oft a phantasm that makes claim To be myself, and hath my face and name, And whose thin fraud I wink at privily. Account this light impostor very me. What boots it undeceive them, and proclaim Myself myself, and whelm this cheat with shame ? I care not, so he leave my true self free, Impose not on me also ; but alas ! I too, at fault, bewildered, sometimes take Him for myself, and far from mine own sight, Torpid, indifTcrent, doth mine own self pass ; And yet anon leaps suddenly awake. And spurns the gibbering mime into the night. 46 Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. Life without Health, a. OEHOLD life builded as a goodly house And grown a mansion ruinous With winter blowing through its crumbling walls ! The master paceth up and down his halls, And in the empty hours Can hear the tottering of his towers And tremor of their bases underground. And oft he starts and looks around At creaking of a distant door Or echo of his footfall on the floor, Thinking it may be one whom he awaits And hath for many days awaited, Coming to lead him through the mouldering gates Out somewhere, from his home dilapidated. Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. 47 On Exaggerated Deference to Foreign Literary Opinion, W HAT ! and shall we. with such submissive airs As age demands in reverence from the young, Await these crumbs of praise from Europe flung. And doubt of our own greatness till it bears The signet of your Goethes or Voltaires ? We who alone in latter times have sung With scarce less power than Arno's exiled tongue — We who are Milton's kindred, Shakspere's heirs. The prize of lyric victory who shall gain If ours be not the laurel, ours the palm ? More than the froth and flotsam of the Seine, More than your Hugo-flare against the night. And more than Weimar's proud elaborate calm. One flash of Byron's lightning, Wordsworth's light. 48 Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. The Lute-Player, QHE was a lady great and splendid, ^ I was a minstrel in her halls. A warrior like a prince attended Stayed his steed by the castle walls. Far had he fared to gaze upon her. " O rest thee now. Sir Knight," she said. The warrior wooed, the warrior won her, In time of snowdrops they were wed. I made sweet music in his honour. And lonjied to strike him dead. '£3^ I passed at midnight from her portal. Throughout the world till death I rove Ah, let me make this lute immortal With rapture of my hate and love ! Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. 49 The Flight of Youth, WOUTH ! ere thou be flown away, ^ Surely one last boon to-day Thou'lt bestow — One last light of rapture give, Rich and lordly fugitive ! Ere thou go. What, thou canst not ? What, all spent ? All thy spells of ravishment Pow'rless now ? Gone thy magic out of date ? Gone, all gone that made thee great ? — Follow thou ! 50 Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. IV rid- St ran genes s . QTRANGE the world about me lies. ^ Never yet familiar grown — Still disturbs me with surprise, Haunts me like a face half known. In this house with starry dome, Floored with gemlike plains and seas, Shall I never feel at home, Never wholly be at ease ? On from room to room I stray, Yet my Host can ne'er espy, And I know not to this day Whether guest or captive I. So, between the starry dome And the floor of plains and seas, I have never felt at home. Never wholly been at ease. Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. 51 Whe7t Birds were Songless, T Jl /HEN birds were songless on the bough I heard thee sing. The world was full of winter, thou Wert full of spring. To-day the world's heart feels anew The vernal thrill. And thine beneath the rueful yew Is wintry chill. 52 Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. On Landor s ^^ Hellenic s^ # /^OME hither, who grow cloyed to surfeiting ^ With lyric draughts o'ersweet, from rills that rise On Hybla not Parnassus mountain : come With beakers rinsed of the dulcifluous wave Hither, and see a magic miracle Of happiest science, the bland Attic skies True-mirrored by an English well ; — no stream Whose heaven-belying surface makes the stars Reel, with its restless idiosyncrasy ; But well unstirred, save when at times it takes Tribute of lovers' eyelids, and at times Bubbles with laughter of some sprite below. Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. 53 To a Friend Chafing at the enforced Idleness of Interrupted Health. OOON may the edict lapse, that on you lays This dire compulsion of infertile days. This hardest penal toil, reluctant rest ! Meanwhile I count you eminently blest, Happy from labours heretofore well done, Happy in tasks auspiciously begun. For they are blest that have not much to rue — That have not oft mis-heard the prompter's cue, Stammered and stumbled and the wrong parts played, And life a Tragedy of Errors made. 54 Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. England to Ireland, (FEBRUARY, 1888.) QPOUSE whom my sword in the olden time won me, Winning me hatred more sharp than a sword — Mother of children who hiss at or shun me, Curse or revile me, and hold me abhorred — Heiress of anger that nothing assuages, Mad for the future, and mad from the past — Daughter of all the implacable ages, Lo, let us turn and be lovers at last ! Lovers whom tragical sin hath made equal, One in transgression and one in remorse. Bonds may be severed, but what were the sequel ? Hardly shall amity come of divorce. Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c Let the dead Past have a royal entombing. O'er it the Future built white for a fane .' I that am haughty from much overcoming Sue to thee, supplicate — nay, is it vain ? Hate and mistrust are the children of blind< ness, — Could we but see one another, 'twere well ! Knowledge is sympathy, charity, kindness, Ignorance only is feeder of hell. Could we but gaze for an hour, for a minute, Deep in each other's unfaltering eyes, Love were begun — .for that look would begin it- Born in the flash of a mighty surprise. Then should the ominous night-bird of Error, Scared by a sudden irruption of day. Flap his maleficent wings, and in terror Flit to the wilderness, dropping his prey. Than should we, growing in strength and in sweetness. Fusing to one indivisible soul. Dazzle the world witli a splendid complete- ncss. Mightily single, immovably whole. 56 Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. Thou, like a flame when the stormy winds fan it, I, like a rock to the elements bare, — Mixed by love's magic, the fire and the granite, • Who should compete with us, what should compare ? Strong with a strength that no fate might dis- sever. One with a oneness no force could divide, So were we married and mingled for ever, Lover with lover, and bridegroom with bride. Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. 57 The Raven s Shadow, QEABIRD, elemental sprite, ^ Moulded of the sun and spray — Raven, dreary flake of night Drifting in the eye of day — What in common have ye two Meeting 'twixt the blue and blue ? Thou to eastward carriest The keen savour of the foam, — Thou dost bear unto the west Fragrance from thy woody home, Where perchance a house is thine Odorous of the oozy pine. Eastward thee thy proper cares, Things of mighty moment, call ; Thee to westward thine alTairs Summon, weighty matters all : I, where land and sea contest, Watch you eastward, watch you west, c 2 58 Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. Till, in snares of fancy caught, Mystically changed ye seem. And the bird becomes a thought. And the thought becomes a dream, And the dream, outspread on high, Lords it o'er the abject sky. Surely I have known before Phantoms of the shapes ye be — Haunters of another shore 'Leaguered by another sea. There my wanderings night and morn Reconcile me to the bourn. There the bird of happy wings Wafts the ocean-news I crave ; Rumours of an isle he brings Gemlike on the golden wave : But the baleful beak and plume Scatter immelodious gloom. Though the flowers be faultless made. Perfectly to live and die — Though the bright clouds bloom and fade Flowerlike 'midst a meadowy sky — Where this raven roams forlorn Veins of midnight flaw the morn. Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. 59 He not less will croak and croak As he ever caws and caws, Till the starry dance be broke, Till the sphery psean pause, And the universal chime Falter out of tune and time. Coils the labyrinthine sea Duteous to the lunar will, But some discord stealthily Vexes the world-ditty still, And the bird that caws and caws Clasps creation with his claws. 6o Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. Ferses to Mr, Alfred Austin on reading ^^ Prince Lucifer J* rjEYOND the chalet perched far up ^ In haunts where you espy The gentian proffering its cup Full of its own pure sky — Beyond the glimpses of the lake And voices of the kine, Beyond the path where round you shake The dark plumes of the pine — I reach the solemn eminence Where human footprints end, I cross the virgin precinct whence The cold grey streams descend, And treading the weird world of ice Where ghostlike summits tower, I pluck this lonely edelweiss Your Muse's mountain-flower. Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. 6i Here, at your thought's adventurous height, In this enfranchised air, Somewhat of Nature's reckless might My spirits seem to share. I skirt the chasm and do not blanch, And hardly turn I pale When the long-thundering avalanche Tears past me to the vale. My vision from its large embrace Omits the dwarfed and mean : Though hamlets at the mountain's base Lie hid, far lands are seen. I look o'er life till it appears Purged of its fume and fret, Unclouded by ignoble fears And hopes ignoblcr yet. Its trivial tempests, as I climb, Beneath my feet I leave ; Above me the white brows of lime Wear the red rose of eve. I thrill with earth's emotion— catch The rapture of the sky — And from reluctant nature snatch A force that cannot die. 62 Miscellaneous Sonnets, Lyrics, &c. And though some chartless iner de glace At length must give me pause, Or some unbridged, unplumbed crevasse Daunt me with monstrous jaws ; Though the unconquered lone aiguille Guards its inviolate snow ; Though the last peaks defy me still And bid me backward go ; I have seen the rocks in tumult hurled, I have caught the torrent's joy, And felt the ferment of the world Which makes and can destroy. Epigrams. Epigrams. 65 Epigrams, "FIS human fortune's happiest height to be *■ A spirit melodious, lucid, poised, and whole ; Second in order of felicity I hold it, to have walk'd with such a soul. The statue — Buonarroti said — doth wait, Thrall'd in the block, for me to emancipate. The poem — saith the poet — wanders free Till I betray it to captivity. To keep in sight Perfection, and adore The vision, is the artist's best delight ; His bitterest pang, that he can ne'er do more Than keep her long'd-for loveliness in sight. 66 Epigrams. If Nature be a phantasm as thou say'st, A splendid fiction and prodigious dream, To reach the real and true I'll make no haste, More than content with worlds that only seem. The Poet gathers fruit from every tree, Yea, grapes from thorns and figs from thistles he. Pluck'd by his hand, the basest weed that grows Towers to a lily, reddens to a rose. Brook, from whose bridge the wandering idler peers To watch thy small fish dart or cool floor shine, I would that bridge whose arches all are years Spann'd not a less transparent wave than thine ! Epigrams. 67 To Art we go as to a well, athirst, And see our shadow 'gainst its mimic skies, But in its depth must plunge and be im- mersed To clasp the naiad Truth where low she lies. In youth the artist voweth lover's vows To Art, in manhood maketh her his spouse. Well if her charms yet hold for him such joy As when he craved some boon and she was coy ! Immured in sense, with fivefold bonds con- fined, Rest we content if whispers from the stars In waftings of the incalculable wind Come blown at midnight through our prison-bara. 68 Epigrams. Love, like a bird, hath perch'd upon a spray For thee and me to hearken what he sings. Contented, he forgets to fly away ; But hush ! . . . remind not Eros of his wings. Think not thy wisdom can illume away The ancient tanglement of night and day. Enough, to acknowledge both, and both revere : They see not clearliest who see all things clear. In mid whirl of the dance of Time ye start, Start at the cold touch of Eternity, And cast your cloaks about you, and depart : The minstrels pause not in their minstrelsy. Epigrams. 69 On Longfellow's Death. No puissant singer he, whose silence grieves To-day the great West's tender heart and strong ; No singer vast of voice : yet one who leaves His native air the sweeter for his song. BvRON THE Voluptuary. Too avid of earth's bliss, he was of those Whom Delight flies because they give her chase. Only the odour of her wild hair blows Back in their faces hungering for her face. 70 Epigrams. Antony at Actium. He holds a dubious balance : — yet that scale, Whose freight the world is, surely shall pre- vail ? No ; Cleopatra droppeth into this One counterpoising orient sultry kiss. Art. The thousand painful steps at last are trod, At last the temple's difficult door we win ; But perfect on his pedestal, the god Freezes us hopeless when we enter in. Epigrams. 71 Keats. He dwelt with the bright gods of elder time, On earth and in their cloudy haunts above. He loved them : and in recompense sublime, The gods, alas ! gave him their fatal love. After reading " Tamiiurlaine the Great." Your Marlowe's page I close, my Shaksperc's ope. How welcome — after drum and trumpet's din — The continuity, the long slow slope And vast curves of the gradual violin ! 72 Epigrams. Shelley and Harriet Westbrook. A STAR look'd down from heaven and loved a flower Grown in earth's garden — loved it for an hour : Let eyes which trace his orbit in the spheres Refuse not, to a ruin'd rosebud, tears. The Play of " King Lear." Here Love the slain with Love the slayer lies ; Deep drown'd are both in the same sunless pool. Up from its depths that mirror thundering skies Bubbles the wan mirth of the mirthless Fool. 73 To Professor Dowden^ ON RECEIVING FROM IIIM "THE LIFE OF SHELLEY." rpiRST, ere I slake my hunger, let me thank The giver of the feast. For feast it is, Though of ethereal, translunary fare — His story who pre-eminently of men Seemed nourished upon starbcams and the stuff Of rainbows, and the tempest, and the foam ; Who hardly brooked on his impatient soul The fleshly trammels ; whom at last the sea Gave to the fire, from whose wild arms the winds Took him, and shook him broadcast to the world. In my young days of fervid poesy He drew me to him with his strange far light,— He held me in a world all clouds and gleams. And vasty phantoms, where ev'n Man himself Moved like a phantom 'mid the clouds and gleams. D 74 To Professor Dowden. Anon the Earth recalled me, and a voice Murmurmg of dethroned divinities And dead times deathless upon sculptured urn — And maidens of romance to whom asleep At mid of night St. Agnes' love-dreams come — And world-old passion of Philomela — Awhile constrained me to a sweet duresse And thraldom, lapping me in high content, Soft as the bondage of white amorous arms. And then a third voice, long unheeded — held Claustral and cold, and dissonant and tame — Found me at last with ears to hear. It sang Of lowly sorrows and familiar joys. Of simple manhood, artless womanhood. And childhood fragrant as the limpid morn ; And from the homely matter nigh at hand. Rising and radiating, it disclosed Spaces and avenues, calm heights and breadths Of vision, whence I saw each blade of grass With roots that groped about eternity. And in each drop of dew upon each blade The mirror of the inseparable All. The first voice, then the second, in their turns Had sung me captive. This voice sang me free. To Professor Dowden. 75 Therefore, above all vocal sons of men, Since him whose sightless eyes saw hell and heaven, To Wordsworth be my homage, thanks, and love. Yet dear is Keats, a lucid presence, great With somewhat of a glorious soullessness. And dear, and great with an excess of soul, Shelley, the hectic flamclike rose of verse. All colour, and all odour, and all bloom. Steeped in the noonlight, glutted with the sun. But somewhat lacking root in homely earth. Lacking such human moisture as bedews His not less starward stem of song, who, rapt Not less in glowing vision, yet retained His clasp of the prehensible, retained The warm touch of the world that lies to hand, Not in vague dreams of man forgetting men. Nor in vast morrows losing the to-day ; Who trusted nature, trusted fate, nor found An Ogre, sovereign 011 the throne of things ; Who felt the incuniDence of the unknown, yet bore Without resentment the Divine reserve ; 76 To Professor Dowden. Who suffered not his spirit to dash itself Against the crags and wavelike break in spray, But 'midst the infinite tranquillities Moved tranquil, and henceforth, by Rotha stream And Rydal's mountain-mirror, and where flows Yarrow thrice sung or Duddon to the sea, And wheresoe'er man's heart is thrilled by tones Struck from man's lyric heartstrings, shall survive. DATE DUE 1 CAYLORD PRINTED IN U S A. UC SnuTHERN REGIONAL I iPRARv f ACILIT AA 000 602 846 8 uNivERSiTv OF pr nivp^'PE y^Bwni 3 1210 01244 9847