THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS COVENTRY PATMORE ■ FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS EDITED BY RICHARD GARNETT Thou Primal Love, who grantest wings And voices to the woodland birds, Grant me the power of saying things Too simple and too sweet for words ! LONDON GEORGE BELL & SONS, YORK STREET COVENT GARDEN Printed by R. & R. Clark, Edinburgh. PR k: 1 4 Y CONTENTS. PAGE In a Wood .... I First Love .... 3 The Heathen Land 4 The Kiss .... 5 The Revelation 6 A Child's Love 7 Love and Duty II The Prism .... 12 The Lover .... 13 Hope against Hope 15 Amelia .... i6 The Spirit's Epochs 23 L'Allegro .... 24 The Cathedral Close 28 "If I were dead" . 33 " My Memory of Heaven awakes " 34 Olympus .... 36 The Rosy-Bosom'd Hours . 39 The After-Glow . 42 The Rainbow 44 824034 VI CONTENTS. The Circles The Paradox A Farewell Night and Sleep . The Morning Call . Saint Valentine's Day The Storm . A Dream ^tna and the Moon The Year . The Tribute The Day after To-Morrow The Joyful Wisdom Back to England The Chase . A Thunder Shower Love justified Winter Love serviceable Ma Belle A Warning . Sarum Plain Wind and Wave Dawn Rejected Mignonne . The Foreign Land The Toys . CONTENTS. vii PAGE The Violets . . . , 103 HONORIA 107 The Rose of the World . 108 Alexander and Lycon III Rachel 112 The Opportunity . "3 Auras of Delight . "5 In Love 118 The Queen's Room , 121 Felicity 125 Evening Peace 126 Love-Sick . 127 The Changed Allegiance 128 Outward Bound 132 "Let Be !" . 134 The Friends 136 A Portrait . 139 The Amaranth 140 Semele 141 The Married Lover 142 The Wife's Tragedy 144 The Ministers of Love 146 A Demonstration . 150 The Worst . 151 After Bad Weather 153 Departure . 157 "She was Mine" . 159 Finis coronat Opus 160 viii CONTENTS. The Azalea . . . . . PAGE 162 Love's Immortality 164 "Love IS Enough" . 165 Pain ...... 167 Felix to Honoria . . . . 170 Magna est Veritas 179 Life of Life . . . . 180 To the Unknown Eros 181 Love thinking . . . . 185 To THE Body . . . . 187 The Obscure Hope . 190 Delici^ Sapienti.^ de Amore 192 Love's Reality 198 A Wedding Sermon 199 The Nursling OF Civility. 218 Sponsa Dei .... 219 Aurea Dicta 222 Arbor Vit^ 225 Lady Clitheroe to Emily Graham 227 IN A WOOD. "npWAS when the spousal time of May ■*- Hangs all the hedge with bridal wreaths, And air 's so sweet the bosom gay Gives thanks for every breath it breathes, When like to like is gladly moved, And each thing joins in Spring's refrain, " Let those love now who never loved ; Let those who have loved love again ;'" That I, in whom the sweet time wrought, Lay stretch'd within a lonely glade, Abandon'd to delicious thought Beneath the softly twinkling shade. The leaves, all stirring, mimick'd well A neighbouring rush of rivers cold, And, as the sun or shadow fell, So these were green and those were gold ; B FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. In dim recesses hyacinths droop'd, And breadths of primrose lit the air, Which, wandering through the woodland, stoop'd And gather'd perfumes here and there ; Upon the spray the squirrel swung, And careless songsters, six or seven, Sang lofty songs the leaves among, Fit for their only Hstener, Heaven. FIRST LOVE. FIRST LOVE. "D RIGHT thro' the valley gallops the brooklet ; Over the clear sky travels the cloud ; Touch'd by the zephyr, dances the harebell ; Cuckoo sits somewhere, singing so loud ; Two little children, seeing and hearing. Hand in hand wander, shout, laugh, and sing : Lo, in their bosoms, wild with the marvel, Love, like the crocus, is come ere the Spring. Young men and women, noble and tender. Yearn for each other, faith truly plight. Promise to cherish, comfort, and honour ; ' Vow that makes duty one with delight. Oh, but the glory, found in no story, Radiance of Eden unquench'd by the Fall ; Few may remember, none may reveal it, This the first first-love, the first love of all ! FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE HEATHEN LAND. ^ I " H E richest realm of all the earth -*- Is counted still a heathen land ; Lo, I, like Joshua, now go forth To give it into Israel's hand. I will not hearken blame or praise ; For so should I dishonour do To that sweet Power by which these Lays Alone are lovely, good, and true ; Nor credence to the world's cries give, Which ever preach and still prevent Pure passion's high prerogative To make not follow precedent. From love's abysmal ether rare If I to men have here made known New truths, they, like new stars, were there Before, though not yet written down. Moving but as the feelings move, I run, or loiter with delight. Or stop to mark where gentle Love Persuades the soul from height to height. Yet know ye, though my words are gay As David's dance, which Michol scorn'd, If kindly you receive the Lay, You shall be sweetly help'd and warn'd. THE KISS. THE KISS. T N arms and policy and books Prince Victor was a Prince indeed. Amanda, Princess of sweet looks, Of such things had no heed. But once, both acting in a Play, Victor, who found it in his Part, Gave the cold Maid, with all his heart, A kiss which took her breath away ; And, thenceforth, they were hand and glove, He, Prince in arms, books, policy. Prince of Amanda too, and she A little, laughing flame of love. " Arms, policy, and books must go," He sigh'd, "since she loves kisses so !" But she, his bee by honey caught, Would only now her sweetness yield For meed of arduous honour, sought In Study, Parliament, or Field. And ever thus from kisses grow The thoughts that soar 'bove kisses so ! FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE REVELATION. A N idle poet, here and there, ^^^ Looks round him ; but, for all the rest, The world, unfathomably fair, Is duller than a witling's jest. Love wakes men, once a lifetime each ; They lift their heavy lids, and look ; And, lo, what one sweet page can teach They read with joy, then shut the book. And some give thanks, and some blaspheme, And most forget ; but, either way, That and the Child's unheeded dream Is all the light of all their day. A CHILD'S LOVE. A CHILD'S LOVE. AS, ere the Spring has any power, The almond branch all turns to flower, Though not a leaf is out, so she The bloom of hfe provoked in me ; And, hard till then and selfish, I Was thenceforth nought but sanctity And service : life was mere delight In being wholly good and right, As she was ; just, without a slur ; Honouring myself no less than her ; Obeying, in the loneliest place, Ev'n to the slightest gesture, grace ; Assured that one so fair, so true. He only served that was so too. For me, hence weak towards the weak. No more the unnested blackbird's shriek Startled the light-leaved wood ; on high Wander'd the gadding butterfly, Unscared by my flung cap ; the bee. Rifling the hollyhock in glee. Was no more trapp'd with his own flower, And for his honey slain. Her power. 8 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. From great things even to the grass Through which the unfenced footways pass, Was law, and that which keeps the law, Cherubic gaiety and awe ; Day was her doing, and the lark Had reason for his song ; the dark In anagram innumerous spelt Her name with stars that throbb'd and felt ; 'Twas the sad summit of delight To wake and weep for her at night ; She turn'd to triumph or to shame The strife of every childish game ; The heart would come into my throat At rosebuds ; howsoe'er remote. In opposition or consent. Each thing, or person, or event, Or seeming neutral howsoe'er, All, in the live, electric air, Awoke, took aspect, and confess'd In her a centre of unrest. Yea, stocks and stones within me bred Anxieties of joy and dread. O bright apocalyptic sky O'erarching childhood ! Far and nigh Mystery and obscuration none, Yet nowhere any moon or sun ! What reason for these sighs ? What hope. Daunting with its audacious scope A CHILD'S LOVE. 9 The disconcerted heart, affects These ceremonies and respects ? Why stratagems in everything ? Why, why not kiss her in the ring? 'Tis nothing strange that warriors bold, Whose fierce, forecasting eyes behold The city they desire to sack. Humbly begin their proud attack By delving ditches two miles off, Aware how the fair place would scoff At hasty wooing ; but, O child, Why thus approach thy playmate mild ? One morning, when it flush'd my thought That, what in me such wonder wrought Was call'd, in men and women, love, And, sick with vanity thereof, I, saying loud, " I love her," told My secret to myself, behold, A crisis in my mystery ! For, suddenly, I seem'd to be Whirl'd round, and bound with showers of threads As when the furious spider sheds Captivity upon the fly, To still his buzzing till he die ; Only, with me, the bonds that flew. Enfolding, thrill'd me through and through With all the bliss that heaven can have. And pride to dream myself her slave. lo FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. A long, green slip of wilder'd land, With Knatchley Wood on either hand, Sunder'd our home from hers. This day Glad was I as I went her way. I stretch'd my arms to the sky, and sprang O'er the elastic sod, and sang " I love her, love her ! " to an air Which with the words came then and there ; And even now, when I would know All was not always dull and low, I mind me awhile of the sweet strain Love taught me in that lonely lane. Such glories fade, with no more mark Than when the sunset dies to dark. They pass, the rapture and the grace Ineffable, their only trace A heart which, having felt no less Than pure and perfect happiness, Is duly dainty of delight ; A patient, poignant appetite For pleasures that exceed so much The poor things which the world calls such. That, when these tempt it, then you may The lion with a wisp of hay. LOVE AND DUTY. ii LOVE AND DUTY. ANNE lived so truly from above, She was so gentle and so good, That duty bade me fall in love, And "but for that," thought I, " I should !" I worshipp'd Kate with all my will. In idle moods you seem to see A noble spirit in a hill, A human touch about a tree. 12 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE PRISM. /^F infinite Heaven the rays, Piercing some eyelet in our cavern black, Ended their viewless track On thee to smite Solely, as on a diamond stalactite, And in mid-darkness lit a rainbow's blaze, Wherein the absolute Reason, Power, and Love, That erst could move Mainly in me but toil and weariness, Renounced their deadening might. Renounced their undistinguishable stress Of withering white, And did with gladdest hues my spirit caress, Nothing of Heaven in thee showing infinite, Save the delight. THE LOVER. 13 THE LOVER. TjrE meets, by heavenly chance express, The destined maid ; some hidden hand Unveils to him that loveliness Which others cannot understand. His merits in her presence grow, To match the promise in her eyes, And round her happy footsteps blow The authentic airs of Paradise. For joy of her he cannot sleep ; Her beauty haunts him all the night ; It melts his heart, it makes him weep For wonder, worship, and delight. O paradox of love, he longs. Most humble when he most aspires, To suffer scorn and cruel wrongs From her he honours and desires. Her graces make him rich, and ask No guerdon ; this imperial style Affronts him ; he disdains to bask The pensioner of her priceless smile. 14 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. He prays for some hard thing to do, Some work of fame and labour immense, To stretch the languid bulk and thew Of love's fresh-born magnipotence. No smallest boon were bought too dear, Though barter'd for his love-sick life ; Yet trusts he, with undaunted cheer, To vanquish heaven, and call her Wife. He notes how queens of sweetness still Neglect their crowns, and stoop to mate ; How, self-consign'd with lavish will, They ask but love proportionate ; How swift pursuit by small degrees. Love's tactic, works like miracle ; How valour, clothed in courtesies, Brings down the haughtiest citadel ; And therefore, though he merits not To kiss the braid upon her skirt, His hope, discouraged ne'er a jot. Out-soars all possible desert. HOPE AGAINST HOPE. 15 HOPE AGAINST HOPE. ' I "HE waves, this morning, sped to land, -'- And shouted hoarse to touch the strand, Where Spring, that goes not out to sea, Lay laughing in her lovely glee ; And, so, my life was sunlit spray And tumult, as, once more to-day, For long farewell did I draw near My Cousin, desperately dear. Faint, fierce, the truth that hope was none Gleam'd like the lightning in the sun ; Yet hope I had, and joy thereof. The father of love is hope (though love Lives orphan'd on, when hope is dead), And, out of my immediate dread And crisis of the coming hour. Did hope itself draw sudden power. So the still brooding storm, in Spring, Makes all the birds begin to sing. l6 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. AMELIA. "\ 1 7HENE'ER mine eyes do my Amelia greet '^ • It is with such emotion As when, in childhood, turning a dim street, I first beheld the ocean. There, where the little, bright, surf-breathing town, That show'd me first her beauty and the sea, Gathers its skirts against the gorse-gilt down And scatters gardens o'er the southern lea. Abides this Maid Within a kind, yet sombre Mother's shade. Who of her daughter's graces seems almost afraid, Viewing them ofttimes with a scared forecast, Caught, haply, from obscure love-peril past. Howe'er that be. She scants m.e of my right. Is cunning careful evermore to balk Sweet separate talk, And fevers my delight By frets, if, on Amelia's cheek of peach, I touch the notes which music cannot reach, Bidding " Good-night ! " AMELIA. 17 Wherefore it came that, till to-day's dear date, I curs'd the weary months which yet I have to wait Ere I find heaven, one-nested with my mate. To-day, the Mother gave, To urgent pleas and promise to behave As she were there, her long-besought consent To trust Amelia with me to the grave Where lay my once-betrothed, Millicent : "For," said she, hiding ill a moistening eye, " Though, Sir, the word sounds hard, God makes as if He least knew how to guard The treasure He loves best, simplicity." And there Amelia stood, for fairness shown Like a young apple-tree, in flush'd array Of white and ruddy flow'r, auroral, gay, With chilly blue the maiden branch between ; And yet to look on her moved less the mind To say " How beauteous ! " than " How good and kind ! " And so we went alone By walls o'er which the lilac's numerous plume Shook down perfume ; Trim plots close blown With daisies, in conspicuous myriads seen, Engross'd each one With single ardour for her spouse, the sun ; Garths in their glad array Of white and ruddy branch, auroral, gay, c i8 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. With azure chill the maiden flow'r between ; Meadows of fervid green, With sometime sudden prospect of untold Cowslips, like chance-found gold ; And broadcast buttercups at joyful gaze, Rending the air with praise. Like the six-hundred-thousand-voiced shout Of Jacob camp'd in Midian put to rout ; Then through the Park, Where Spring to livelier gloom Quicken'd the cedars dark, And, 'gainst the clear sky cold^ Which shone afar Crowded with sunny alps oracular, Great chestnuts raised themselves abroad like cliffs of bloom ; And everywhere, Amid the ceaseless rapture of the lark, With wonder new We caught the solemn voice of single air, "Cuckoo!" And when Amelia, 'bolden'd, saw and heard How bravely sang the bird. And all things in God's bounty did rejoice. She who, her Mother by, spake seldom word, Did her charm'd silence doff, And, to my happy marvel, her dear voice Went as a clock does, when the pendulum's off. AMELIA. Ill Monarch of man's heart the Maiden who Does not aspire to be High-Pontiff too ! So she repeated soft her Poet's line, " By grace divine, Not otherwise, O Nature, are we thine !" And I, up the bright steep she led me, trod, And the like thought pursued With, " What is gladness without gratitude. And where is gratitude without a God ? " And of delight, the guerdon of His laws, She spake, in learned mood ; And I, of Him loved reverently, as Cause, Her sweetly, as Occasion of all good. Nor were we shy. For souls in heaven that be May talk of heaven without hypocrisy. And now, when we drew near The low, grey church, in its sequester'd dell, A shade upon me fell. Dead Millicent indeed had been most sweet, But I how little meet To call such graces in a Maiden mine ! A boy's proud passion free affection blunts ; His well-meant flatteries oft are blind affronts And many a tear Was Millicent's before I, manlier, knew That maidens shine As diamonds do, 19 20 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Which, though most clear, Are not to be seen through ; And, if she put her virgin self aside And sate her, crownlcss, at my conquering feet, It should have bred in me humility, not pride. Amelia had more luck than Millicent : Secure she smiled and warm from all mischance Or from my knowledge or my ignorance, And glow'd content With my — some might have thought too much- superior age, Which seem'd the gage Of steady kindness all on her intent. Tlius nought forbade us to be fully blent. While, therefore, now Her pensive footstep stirr'd The darnell'd garden of unheedful death, She ask'd what Millicent was like, and heard Of eyes like hers, and honeysuckle breath, And of a wiser than a woman's brow. Yet fiU'd with only woman's love, and how An incidental greatness character'd Her unconsider'd ways. But all my praise Amelia thought too slight for Millicent, And on my lovelier-freighted arm she leant, For more attent ; And the tea-rose I gave, AMELIA. 21 To deck her breast, she dropp'd upon the grave. " And this was hers," said I, decoring with a band Of mildest pearls Amelia's milder hand. " Nay, I will wear it for her sake," she said : For dear to maidens are their rivals dead. And so. She seated on the black yew's tortured root, I on the carpet of sere shreds below. And nigh the little mound where lay that other, I kiss'd her lips three times without dispute, And, with bold worship suddenly aglow, I lifted to my lips a sandall'd foot, And kiss'd it three times thrice without dispute. Upon my head her fingers fell like snow. Her lamb-like hands about my neck she wreathed. Her arms like slumber o'er my shoulders crept. And with her bosom, whence the azalea breathed, She did my face full favourably smother, To hide the heaving secret that she wept ! Now would I keep my promise to her jNIother ; Now I arose, and raised her to her feet. My best Amelia, fresh-born from a kiss. Moth-like, full-blown in birthdew shuddering sweet. With great, kind eyes, in whose brown shade Bright Venus and her Baby play'd ! At inmost heart well pleased with one another, What time the slant sun low 22 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Through the plough'd field does each clod sharply show, And softly fills With shade the dimples of our homeward hills, With little said, We left the 'wilder'd garden of the dead, And gain'd the gorse-lit shoulder of the down That keeps the north-wind from the nesthng town, And caught, once more, the vision of the wave. Where, on the horizon's dip, A many- sailed ship Pursued alone her distant purpose grave ; And, by steep steps rock-hewn, to the dim street I led her sacred feet ; And so the Daughter gave, Soft, moth-like, sweet. Showy as damask-rose and shy as musk. Back to her Mother, anxious in the dusk. And now " Good-night !" Me shall the phantom months no more affright. For heaven's gates to open well waits he Who keeps himself the key. THE SPIRIT'S EPOCHS. 23 THE SPIRIT'S EPOCHS. "\ T OT in the crises of events, -'- ^ Of compass'd hopes, or fears fulfill'd, Or acts of gravest consequence, Are life's delight and depth reveal'd. The day of days was not the day ; That went before, or was postponed ; The night Death took our lamp away Was not the night on which we groan'd. I drew my bride, beneath the moon, Across my threshold ; happy hour ! But, ah, the walk that afternoon We saw the water-flags in flower ! 24 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. L'ALLEGRO. "CELICITY, ■*■ Who ope'st to none that knocks, yet, laughing weak, Yield'st all to Love that will not seek, And who, though won, wilt droop and die, Unless wide doors bespeak thee free. How safe's the bond of thee and me. Since thee I cherish and defy ! Is't Love or Friendship, Dearest, we obey? Ah, thou art young, and I am grey ; But happy man is he who knows How well time goes, With no unkind intruder by, Between such friends as thou and I ! 'Twould wrong thy favour. Sweet, were I to say, 'Tis best by far. When best things are not possible, To make the best of those that are ; For, though it be not May, Sure, few delights of Spring excel The beauty of this mild September day ! L' ALLEGRO. 25 So with me walk, And view the dreaming field and bossy Autumn wood, And how in humble russet goes The Spouse of Honour, fair Repose, Far from a world whence love is fled And truth is dying because joy is dead ; And, if we hear the roaring wheel Of God's remoter service, public zeal, Let us to stiller place retire And glad admire How, near Him, sounds of working cease In little fervour and much peace ; And let us talk Of holy things in happy mood, Learnt of thy blest twin-sister. Certitude ; Or let's about our neighbours chat. Well praising this, less praising that. And judging outer strangers by Those gentle and unsanction'd lines To which remorse of equity Of old hath moved the School divines. Or linger where this willow bends, And let us, till the melody be caught, Harken that sudden, singing thought. On which unguess'd increase to life perchance depends. He ne'er hears twice the same who hears 26 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. The songs of heaven's unanimous spheres, And this may be the song to make, at last, amends For many sighs and boons in vain long sought ! Now, careless, let us stray, or stop To see the partridge from the covey drop, Or, while the evening air's like yellow wine, From the pure stream take out The playful trout. That jerks with rasping check the struggled line ; Or to the Farm, where, high on trampled stacks, The labourers stir themselves amain To feed with hasty sheaves of grain The deafning engine's boisterous maw. And snatch again. From to-and-fro tormenting racks, The toss'd and hustled straw ; Whilst others tend the shedded wheat That fills yon row of shuddering sacks, Or shift them quick, and bind them neat, And dogs and boys with sticks Wait, murderous, for the rats that leave the ruin'd ricks ; And, all the bags being fill'd and rank'd fivefold, they pour The treasure on the barn's clean floor, And take them back for more. Until the whole bared harvest beauteous lies Under our pleased and prosperous eyes. L'ALLEGRO. 27 Then let us give our idlest hour To the world's wisdom and its power ; Hear famous Golden-Tongue refuse To gander sauce that's good for goose, Or the great Clever Party con How many grains of sifted sand, Heap'd, make a likely house to stand, How many fools one Solomon. Science, beyond all other lust Endow'd with appetite for dust, We glance at where it grunts, well-sty'd, And pass upon the other side. Pass also by, in pensive mood. Taught by thy kind twin-sister. Certitude, Yon puzzled crowd, whose tired intent Hunts like a pack without a scent. And now come home. Where none of our mild days Can fail, though simple, to confess The magic of mysteriousness ; For there 'bide charming Wonders three, Besides, Sweet, thee. To comprehend whose commonest ways, Ev'n could that be, Were coward's 'vantage and no true man's praise. 28 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE CATHEDRAL CLOSE. /^NCE more I came to Sarum Close, ^-^^ With joy half memory, half desire. And breathed the sunny wind that rose And blew the shadows o'er the Spire, And toss'd the lilac's scented plumes, And sway'd the chestnut's thousand cones, And fill'd my nostrils with perfumes, And shaped the clouds in waifs and zones. And wafted down the serious strain Of Sarum bells, when, true to time, I reach'd the Dean's, with heart and brain That trembled to the trembling chime. 'Twas half my home, six years ago. The six years had not alter'd it : Red-brick and ashlar, long and low, With dormers and with oriels lit. Geranium, lychnis, rose array'd The windows, all wide open thrown ; And some one in the Study play'd The Wedding March of Mendelssohn. THE CATHEDRAL CLOSE. 29 And there it was I last took leave : 'Twas Christmas : I remember'd now The cruel girls, who feigned to grieve, Took down the evergreens ; and how The holly into blazes woke The fire, lighting the large, low room, A dim, rich lustre of old oak And crimson velvet's glowing gloom. 3- No change had touch'd Dean Churchill : kind. By widowhood more than winters bent. And settled in a cheerful mind, As still forecasting heaven's content. Well might his thoughts be fix'd on high. Now she was there ! Within her face Humility and dignity Were met in a most sweet embrace. She seem'd expressly sent below To teach our erring minds to see The rhythmic change of time's swift flow As part of still eternity. Her life, all honour, observed, with awe Which cross experience could not mar, The fiction of the Christian law That all men honourable are ; And so her smile at once conferr'd High flattery and benign reproof; 30 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. And I, a rude boy, strangely stirr'd, Grew courtly in my own behoof. The years, so far from doing her wrong, Anointed her with gracious balm, And made her brows more and more young With wreaths of amaranth and palm. 4- Was this her eldest. Honor ; prude. Who would not let me pull the swing ; Who, kiss'd at Christmas, call'd me rude, And, sobbing low, refused to sing ? How changed ! In shape no slender Grace, But Venus ; milder than the dove ; Her mother's air : her Norman face ; Her large sweet eyes, clear lakes of love. Mary I knew. In former time Ailing and pale, she thought that bliss Was only for a better clime. And, heavenly overmuch, scorn'd this. I, rash with theories of the right. Which stretch'd the tether of my Creed, But did not break it, held delight Half discipline. We disagreed. She told the Dean I wanted grace. Now she was kindest of the three, And soft wild roses deck'd her face. And, what, was this my Mildred, she THE CATHEDRAL CLOSE. 31 To herself and all a sweet surprise ? My Pet, who romp'd and roll'd a hoop ? I wonder'd where those daisy eyes Had found their touching curve and droop. 5- Unmannerly times ! But now we sat Stranger than strangers ; till I caught And answer'd Mildred's smile ; and that Spread to the rest, and freedom brought. The Dean talk'd little, looking on. Of three such daughters justly vain. What letters they had had from Bonn, Said Mildred, and what plums from Spain ! By Honor I was kindly task'd To excuse my never coming down From Cambridge ; Mary smiled and ask'd Were Kant and Goethe yet outgrown ? And, pleased, we talk'd the old days o'er ; And, parting, I for pleasure sigh'd. To be there as a friend (since more) Seem'd then, seems still, excuse for pride ; For something that abode endued With temple-like repose, an air Of life's kind purposes pursued With order'd freedom sweet and fair. A tent pitch'd in a world not right It seem'd, whose inmates, every one, FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. On tranquil faces bore the light Of duties beautifully done, And humbly, though they had few peers, Kept their own laws, which seem'd to be The fair sum of six thousand years' Traditions of civility. " IF I WERE DEAD." 33 "IF I WERE DEAD." "TF I were dead, you'd sometimes say, Poor ^ Child!" The dear lips quiver'd as they spake, And the tears brake From eyes which, not to grieve me, brightly smiled. Poor Child, poor Child ! I seem to hear your laugh, your talk, your song. It is not true that Love will do no wrong. Poor Child ! And did you think, when so you cried and smiled, How I, in lonely nights, should lie awake. And of those words your full avengers make ? Poor Child, poor Child ! And now, unless it be That sweet amends thrice told are come to thee, O God, have thou no mercy upon me ! Poor Child ! 34 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. " MY MEMORY OF HEAVEN AWAKES." 1\ /TY memory of Heaven awakes ! ■^ -*■ She's not of the earth, although her light, As lantern'd by her body, makes A piece of it past bearing bright. So innocently proud and fair She is, that Wisdom sings for glee And Folly dies, breathing one air With such a bright-cheek'd chastity ; And though her charms are a strong law Compelling all men to admire, They go so clad with lovely awe None but the noble dares desire. He who would seek to make her his Will comprehend that souls of grace Own sweet repulsion, and that 'tis The quality of their embrace To be like the majestic reach Of coupled suns, that, from afar, Mingle their mutual spheres, while each Circles the twin obsequious star ; "MY MEMORY OF HEAVEN AWAKES." 35 And, in the warmth of hand to hand, Of heart to heart, he'll vow to note And reverently understand How the two spirits shine remote ; And ne'er to numb fine honour's nerve, Nor let sweet awe in passion melt, Nor fail by courtesies to observe The space which makes attraction felt ; Nor cease to guard like life the sense Which tells him that the embrace of love Is o'er a gulf of difference Love cannot sound, nor death remove. 36 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. OLYMPUS. '^T^H ROUGH female subtlety intense, -*- Or the good luck of innocence, Or both, my Wife, with whom I plan To pass calm evenings when I can, After the chattering girls and boys Are gone, or the less grateful noise Is over, of grown tongues that chime Untruly, once upon a time Prevail'd with me to change my mind Of reading out how Rosalind In Arden jested, and to go Where people whom I ought to know, She said, would meet that night. And 1, Who inly murmur'd, " I will try Some dish more sharply spiced than this Milk-soup men call domestic bliss," Took, as she, laughing, bade me take, Our eldest boy's brown wide-awake And straw box of cigars, and went W^here, like a careless parliament Of gods Olympic, six or eight Authors and else, reputed great, OLYMPUS. 37 Were met in council jocular On many things, pursuing far Truth, only for the chase's glow, Quick as they caught her letting go, Or, when at fault the view-halloo, Playing about the missing clue. And coarse jests came ; " But gods are coarse," Thought I, yet not without remorse. While memory of the gentle words, Wife, Mother, Sister, flash'd like swords. And so, after two hours of wit, That burnt a hole where'er it hit, I said I would not stay to sup. Because my Wife was sitting up ; And walk'd home with a sense that 1 Was no match for that company. Smelling of smoke, which, always kind, Amelia said she did not mind, I sipp'd her tea, saw Baby scold And finger at the muslin fold. Through which he push'd his nose at last, And choked and chuckled, feeding fast ; And, he asleep and sent upstairs, She rang the servants in to prayers ; And after heard what men of fame Had urged 'gainst this and that. " For shame ! " She said, but argument show'd not. " If I had answer'd thus," I thought. 38 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. " 'Twould not have pass'd for very wise. But I have not her voice and eyes ! Howe'er it be, I'm glad of home, Yea, very glad at heart to come, And lay a happy head to rest On her unreasonable breast." THE ROSY BOSOM'D HOURS. 39 THE ROSY BOSOM'D HOURS. A FLORIN to the willing Guard Secured, for half the way, (He lock'd us in, ah, lucky-starr'd), A curtain'd, front coupe. The sparkling sun of August shone ; The wind was in the West ; Your gown and all that you had on Was what became you best ; And we were in that seldom mood When soul with soul agrees. Mingling, like flood with equal flood, In agitated ease. Far round, each blade of harvest bare Its little load of bread ; Each furlong of that journey fair With separate sweetness sped. The calm of use was coming o'er The wonder of our wealth, And now, maybe, 'twas not much more Than Eden's common health. 40 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. We paced the sunny platform, while The train at Havant changed : What made the people kindly smile, Or stare with looks estranged ? Too radiant for a wife you seem'd, Serener than a bride ; Me happiest born of men I deem'd, And show'd perchance my pride. 1 loved that girl, so gaunt and tall, Who whisper'd loud, " Sweet Thing !" Scanning your figure, slight yet all Round as your own gold ring. At Salisbury you stray'd alone Within the shafted glooms. Whilst I was by the Verger shown The brasses and the tombs. At tea we talk'd of matters deep, Of joy that never dies ; We laugh'd, till love was mix'd with sleep Within your great sweet eyes. The next day, sweet with luck no less And sense of sweetness past, The full tide of our happiness Rose higher than the last. At Dawlish, 'mid the pools of brine, You stepp'd from rock to rock. One hand quick tightening upon mine. One holding up your frock. THE ROSY BOSOM'D HOURS. 41 On starfish and on weeds alone You seem'd intent to be : Flash'd those great gleams of hope unknown From you, or from the sea ? Ne'er came before, ah, when again Shall come two days like these : Such quick delight within the brain, Within the heart such peace ? I thought, indeed, by magic chance, A third from Heaven to win. But as, at dusk, we reach'd Penzance, A drizzling rain set in. 42 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE AFTER-GLOW. O USPICION'S playful counterfeit ^^ Begot your question strange : The only thing that I forget Is that there's any change. Did that long blight which fell on you My zeal of heart assuage ? Less willing shall I watch you through The milder illness, age ? To my monopoly first blind When risks no longer live, And careless of the hand so kind That has no more to give. Shall I forget Spring like a tree, Nor boast, " Her honied cup Of beauty to his lips save me No man has lifted up ! " Mine are not memories that come Of joys that could not last : They arcy and you, Dear, are the sum Of all your lovely past. THE AFTER-GLOW, 43 Yet if, with all this conscious weal, I still should covet more, The joy behind me shall reveal The joy that waits before : I'll mind from sickness how to life You came, by tardy stealth, Till, one spring day, I clasp'd my wife Abloom with blandest health. 44 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE RAINBOW. A STATELY rainbow came and stood, ^ ^ When I was young, in High-Hurst Park ; Its bright feet lit the hill and wood Beyond, and cloud and sward were dark ; And I, who thought the splendour ours Because the place was, t'wards it flew, And there, amidst the glittering showers. Gazed vainly for the glorious view. With whatsoever's lovely, know It is not ours ; stand off to see ; Or beauty's apparition so Puts on invisibility. THE CIRCLES. 45 THE CIRCLES. WITHIN yon world-wide cirque of war What's hidden which they fight so for?" My guide made answer, " Rich increase Of virtue and use, which are by peace, And peace by war. That inner ring Are craftsmen, working many a thing For use, and, these within, the wise Explore the grass and read the skies." " Can the stars' motions give me peace. Or the herbs' virtues mine increase ? Of all this triple shell," said I, " Would that I might the kernel spy ! " A narrower circle then I reach'd, Where sang a few and many preach'd Of life immortal. " But," I said, " The riddle yet I have not read. Life I must know, that care I may For life in me to last for aye." Then he, " Those voices are a charm To keep yon dove-cot out of harm." 46 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. In the centre, then, he show'd a tent Where, laughing safe, a woman bent Over her babe, and, her above, Lean'd in his turn a graver love. " Behold the two idolatries By which," cried he, " the world defies Chaos and death, and for whose sake All else must war and work and wake." THE PARADOX. 47 H THE PARADOX. OW strange a thing a lover seems To animals that do not love ! Lo, where he walks and talks in dreams, And flouts us with his Lady's glove ; How foreign is the garb he wears ; And how his great devotion mocks Our poor propriety, and scares The undevout with paradox ! His soul, through scorn of worldly care. And great extremes of sweet and gall. And musing much on all that's fair. Grows witty and fantastical ; He sobs his joy and sings his grief, And evermore finds such delight In simply picturing his relief, That 'plaining seems to cure his plight ; He makes his sorrow, when there's none ; His fancy blows both cold and hot ; Next to the wish that she'll be won. His first hope is that she may not ; 48 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. He sues, yet deprecates consent ; Would she be captured she must fly ; She looks too happy and content, For whose least pleasure he would die ; Oh, cruelty, she cannot care For one to whom she's always kind ! He says he's nought, but, oh, despair, If he's not Jove to her fond mind ! He's jealous if she pets a dove. She must be his with all her soul ; Yet 'tis a postulate in love That part is greater than the whole ; And all his apprehension's stress, When he's with her, regards her hair, Her hand, a ribbon of her dress. As if his life were only there ; Because she's constant, he will change, And kindest glances coldly meet. And, all the time he seems so strange, His soul is fawning at her feet ; Of smiles and simple heaven grown tired, He wickedly provokes her tears, And when she weeps, as he desired. Falls slain with ecstasies of fears ; He blames her, though she has no fault, Except the folly to be his ; He worships her, the more to exalt The profanation of a kiss ; THE PARADOX. 49 Health's his disease ; he's never well But when his paleness shames her rose ; His faith's a rock-built citadel, Its sign a flag that each way blows ; His o'erfed fancy frets and fumes ; And Love, in him, is fierce, like Hate, And ruffles his ambrosial plumes Against the bars of time and fate. 50 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. A FAREWELL. "X "\ HTH all my will, but much against my heart, We two now part. My Very Dear, Our solace is, the sad road lies so clear. It needs no art, With faint, averted feet And many a tear, In our opposed paths to persevere. Go thou to East, I West. We will not say There's any hope, it is so far away. But, O, my Best, When the one darling of our widowhead, The nursling Grief, Is dead. And no dews blur our eyes To see the peach-bloom come in evening skies, Perchance we may, Where now this night is day, A FAREWELL. And even through faith of still averted feet, Making full circle of our banishment, Amazed meet ; The bitter journey to the bourne so sweet Seasoning the termless feast of our content With tears of recognition never dry. SI 52 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. NIGHT AND SLEEP. HOW strange at night to wake And watch, while others sleep, Till sight and hearing ache For objects that may keep The awful inner sense Unroused, lest it should mark The life that haunts the emptiness And horror of the dark ! How strange at night the bay Of dogs, how wild the note Of cocks that scream for day, In homesteads far remote ; How strange and wild to hear The old and crumbling tower, Amid the darkness, suddenly Take tongue and speak the hour ! NIGHT AND SLEEP. 53 3 Albeit the love-sick brain Affects the dreary moon, 111 things alone refrain From life's nocturnal swoon : Men melancholy mad, Beasts ravenous and sly, The robber, and the murderer. Remorse, with lidless eye. The nightingale is gay. For she can vanquish night ; Dreaming, she sings of day. Notes that make darkness bright ; But when the refluent gloom Saddens the gaps of song. Men charge on her the dolefulness, And call her crazed with wrong. 54 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE MORNING CALL. I '• T) Y meekness charm'd, or proud to allow -^ A queenly claim to live admired, Full many a lady has ere now My apprehensive fancy fired, And woven many a transient chain ; But never lady like to this, Who holds me as the weather-vane Is held by yonder clematis. She seems the life of nature's powers ; Her beauty is the genial thought Which makes the sunshine bright ; the flowers, But for their hint of her, were nought." 2 A voice, the sweeter for the grace Of suddenness, while thus I dream'd, " Good morning !" said or sang. Her face The mirror of the morning seem'd. Her sisters in the garden walk'd. And would I come? Across the Hall She led me ; and we laugh'd and talk'd. And praised the Flower-show and the Ball ; THE MORNING CALL. 55 And Mildred's pinks had gain'd the Prize ; And, stepping like the light-foot fawn, She brought me "Wiltshire Butterflies," The Prize-book ; then we paced the lawn, Close-cut, and, with geranium-plots, A rival glow of green and red ; Then counted sixty apricots On one small tree ; the gold-fish fed ; And watch'd where, black with scarlet tans. Proud Psyche stood and flash'd like flame, Showing and shutting splendid fans ; And in the prize we found its name. The sweet hour lapsed, and left my breast A load of joy and tender care ; And this delight, which life oppress'd. To fix'd aims grew, that ask'd for pray'r. I rode home slowly ; whip-in-hand And soil'd bank-notes all ready, stood The Farmer who farm'd all my land, Except the little Park and Wood ; And, with the accustom'd compliment Of talk, and beef, and frothing beer, I, my own steward, took my rent. Three hundred pounds for half the year. 56 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Our witnesses the Cook and Groom, We sign'd the lease for seven years more, And bade Good-day ; then to my room I went, and closed and lock'd the door, And cast myself down on my bed, And there, with many a blissful tear, I vow'd to love and pray'd to wed The maiden who had grown so dear ; Thank'd God who had set her in my path ; And promised, as I hoped to win, That I would never dim my faith By the least selfishness or sin ; Whatever in her sight I'd seem I'd truly be ; I'd never blend With my delight in her a dream 'Twould change her cheek to comprehend ; And, if she wish'd it, I'd prefer Another's to my own success ; And always seek the best for her. With unofficious tenderness. 4 Rising, I breathed a brighter clime. And found myself all self above, And, with a charity sublime, Contemn'd not those who did not love. SAINT VALENTINE'S DAY. 57 SAINT VALENTINE'S DAY. WELL dost thou, Love, thy solemn Feast to hold In vestal February, Not rather choosing out some rosy day From the rich coronet of the coming May, When all things meet to marry ! O quick, prsevernal Pow^er That signall'st punctual through the sleepy mould The Snowdrop's time to flower, Fair as the rash oath of virginity Which is first-love's first cry ; O Baby Spring, That flutter'st sudden 'neath the breast of Earth A month before the birth ; Whence is the peaceful poignancy, The joy contrite. Sadder than sorrow, sweeter than delight, That burthens now the breath of everything, Though each one sighs as if to each alone The cherish'd pang were known ? At dusk of dawn, on his dark spray apart, With it the Blackbird breaks the young Day's heart ; 58 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. In evening's hush About it talks the heavenly-minded Thrush ; The hill with like remorse Smiles to the Sun's smile in his westering course ; The fisher's drooping skiff In yonder sheltering bay ; The choughs that call about the shining cliff ; The children, noisy in the setting ray, Own the sweet season, each thing as it may ; Thoughts of strange kindness and forgotten peace In me increase ; And tears arise Within my happy, happy Mistress' eyes. And, lo, her lips, averted from my kiss. Ask from Love's bounty, ah, much more than bliss. Is't the sequester'd and exceeding sweet Of dear Desire electing his defeat ? Is't the waked Earth now to yon purpling cope Uttering first-love's first cry. Vainly renouncing, with a Seraph's sigh. Love's natural hope? Fair-meaning earth, foredoom'd to perjury ! Behold, all-amorous May, With roses heap'd upon her laughing brows, Avoids thee of thy vows ! Were it for thee, with her warm bosom near. To abide the sharpness of the Seraph's sphere ? Forget thy foolish words ; SAINT VALENTINE'S DAY. 59 Go to her summons gay, Thy heart with dead, wing'd Innocencies fiU'd, Ev'n as a nest with birds After the old ones by the hawk are kill'd. Well dost thou, Love, to celebrate The noon of thy soft ecstasy Or e'er it be too late. Or e'er the Snowdrop die ! €o FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE STORM. ^T 7" I THIN the pale blue haze above, * * Some pitchy shreds took size and form, And, like a madman's wrath or love, From nothing rose a sudden stonn. The blossom'd limes, which seem'd to exhale Her breath, were swept with one strong sweep, And up the dusty road the hail Came like a flock of hasty sheep, Driving me under a cottage-porch, Whence I could see the distant Spire, Which, in the darkness, seem'd a torch Touch'd with the sun's retreating fire. A voice, so sweet that even her voice, I thought, could scarcely be more sweet. As thus I stay'd against my choice, Did mine attracted hearing greet ; And presently I turn'd my head Where the kind music seem'd to be, And where, to an old blind man, she read The words that teach the blind to see. THE STORM. 6i She did not mark me ; swift I went, Thro' the fierce shower's whistle and smoke, To her home, and thence her woman sent Back with umbrella, shoes, and cloak. The storm soon pass'd ; the sun's quick glare Lay quench'd in vapour fleecy, fray'd ; And all the moist, delicious air Was fill'd with shine that cast no shade ; And, when she came, forth the sun gleam'd, And clash'd the trembling Minster chimes ; And the breath with which she thank'd me seem'd Brought thither from the blossom'd limes. 62 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. A DREAM. A MID the mystic fields of Love ■^ ^ I wander'd, and beheld a grove. Breathlessly still was part, and part Was breathing with an easy heart ; And there below, in lamblike game, Were virgins, all so much the same. That each was all. A youth drew nigh, And on them gazed with wandering eye, And would have pass'd, but that a maid, Clapping her hands above her, said, " My time is now !" and laughing ran After the dull and strange young man, And bade him stop and look at her. And so he call'd her lovelier Than any else, only because She only then before him was. And, while they stood and gazed, a change Was seen in both, diversely strange : The youth was ever more and more That good which he had been before ; But the glad maiden grew and grew Such that the rest no longer knew A DREAM. 63 Their sister, who was now to sight The young man's self, yet opposite. As the outer rainbow is the first. But weaker, and the hues reversed. And whereas, in the abandon'd grove. The virgin round the Central Love Had blindly circled in her play, Now danced she round her partner's way ; And, as the earth the moon's, so he Had the responsibility Of her diviner motion. " Lo," He sang, and the heavens began to glow, " The pride of personality. Seeking its highest, aspires to die, And in unspeakably profound Humiliation Love is crown'd ! And from his exaltation still Into his ocean of good-will He curiously casts the lead To find strange depths of lowlihead." To one same tune, but higher, " Bold," The maiden sang, " is Love ! For cold On Earth are blushes, and for shame Of such an ineffectual flame As ill consumes the sacrifice !" 64 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. ^TNA AND THE MOON. 'T^O ease my heart I, feigning, seized -^ A pen, and, showering tears, declared My unfeign'd passion ; sadly pleased Only to dream that so I dared. Thus was the fervid truth confess'd, But wild with paradox ran the plea, As wilfully in hope depress'd, Yet bold beyond hope's warranty : " O, more than dear, be more than just, And do not deafly shut the door ! I claim no right to speak ; I trust Mercy, not right ; yet who has more ? For, if more love makes not more fit, Of claimants here none's more nor less, Since your great worth does not permit Degrees in our unworthiness. ^TNA AND THE MOON. 65 Yet, if there's aught that can be done With arduous labour of long years, By which you'll say that you'll be won, O tell me, and I'll dry my tears. Ah, no ; if loving cannot move. How fooHshly must labour fail ! The use of deeds is to show love ; If signs suffice let these avail : Your name pronounced brings to my heart A feeling like the violet's breath, Which does so much of heaven impart It makes me yearn with tears for death ; The winds that in the garden toss The Guelder-roses give me pain. Alarm me with the dread of loss, Exhaust me with the dream of gain ; I'm troubled by the clouds that move ; Thrill'd by the breath which I respire ; And ever, like a torch, my love. Thus agitated, flames the higher ; All's hard that has not you for goal ; I scarce can move my hand to write. For love engages all my soul. And leaves the body void of might ; The wings of will spread idly, as do The bird's that in a vacuum lies ; My breast, asleep with dreams of you. Forgets to breathe, and bursts in sighs ; F 66 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. I see no rest this side the grave, No rest or hope from you apart ; Your life is in the rose you gave, It's perfume suffocates my heart ; There's no refreshment in the breeze ; The heaven o'erwhehns me with its blue : I faint beside the dancing seas ; Winds, skies, and waves are only you ; The thought or act which not intends You service, seems a sin and shame ; In that one only object ends Conscience, religion, honour, fame. Ah, could I put off love ! Could we Never have met ! What calm, what ease ! Nay, but, alas, this remedy Were ten times worse than the disease ! For when, indifferent, I pursue The world's best pleasures for relief. My heart, still sickening back to you. Finds none like memory of its grief : And, though 'twere very hell to hear You felt such misery as I, All good, save you, were far less dear Than is that ill with which I die ! Where'er I go, wandering forlorn, You are the world's love, life, and glee : Oh, wretchedness not to be borne If she that's Love should not love me !" ^TNA AND THE MOON. 67 3 I could not write another word, Through pity for my own distress ; And forth I went, untimely stirr'd To make my misery more or less. I went, beneath the heated noon, To where, in her simplicity, She sat at work ; and, as the Moon On ^tna smiles, she smiled on me ; But, now and then, in cheek and eyes, I saw, or fancied, such a glow As when, in summer-evening skies, Some say ' It lightens,' some say ' No. * Honoria,' I began No more. The Dean, by ill or happy hap, Came home ; and Wolf burst in before. And put his nose upon her lap. 68 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE YEAR. 'T^HE crocus, while the days are dark. ^ Unfolds its saffron sheen ; At April's touch, the crudest bark Discovers gems of green. Then sleep the seasons, full of might ; While slowly swells the pod And rounds the peach, and in the night The mushroom bursts the sod. The Winter falls ; the frozen rut Is bound with silver bars ; The snow-drift heaps against the hut, And night is pierc'd with stars. THE TRIBUTE. 69 THE TRIBUTE. "DOON Nature to the woman bows ; She walks in all its glory clad, And, chief herself of earthly shows, Each other helps her, and is glad : No splendour 'neath the sky's proud dome But serves for her familiar wear ; The far-fetch'd diamond finds its home Flashing and smouldering in her hair ; For her the seas their pearls reveal ; Art and strange lands her pomp supply With purple, chrome, and cochineal. Ochre, and lapis lazuli ; The worm its golden woof presents ; Whatever runs, flies, dives, or delves, All doff for her their ornaments, Which suit her better than themselves ; And all, by this their power to give, Proving her right to take, proclaim Her beauty's clear prerogative To profit so by Eden's blame. 70 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE DAY AFTER TO-MORROW. PERCHANCE she droops within the hollow gulf Which the great wave of coming pleasure draws, Not guessing the glad cause ! Ye Clouds that on your endless journey go, Ye Winds that westward flow, Thou heaving Sea That heav'st 'twixt her and me, Tell her I come ; Then only sigh your pleasure, and be dumb ; For the sweet secret of our either self We know. Tell her I come, And let her heart be still'd. One day's controlled hope, and then one more, And on the third our lives shall be fulfill' d ! Yet all has been before. Palm placed in palm, twin smiles, and words astray. What other should we say ? But shall I not, with ne'er a sign, perceive, Whilst her sweet hands I hold, The myriad threads and meshes manifold Which Love shall round her weave : THE DAY AFTER TO-MORROW. 71 The pulse in that vein making aUen pause And varying beats from this ; Down each long finger felt, a differing strand Of silver}' welcome bland ; And in her breezy palm And silken wrist, Beneath the touch of my like numerous bliss Complexly kiss'd, A diverse and distinguishable calm ? What should we say ! It all has been before ; And yet our lives shall now be first fulfill'd, And into their summ'd sweetness fall distill'd One sweet drop more ; One sweet drop more, in absolute increase Of unrelapsing peace. O heaving Sea, That heav'st as if for bliss of her and me, And separates! not dear heart from heart, Though each 'gainst other beats too far apart. For yet awhile Let it not seem that I behold her smile. O weary Love, O, folded to her breast, Love in each moment years and years of rest, Be calm, as being not. Ye oceans of intolerable delight, The blazing photosphere of central Night, Be ye forgot. 72 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Terror, thou swarthy Groom of Bride-bUss coy, Let me not see thee toy. O Death, too tardy with thy hope intense Of kisses close beyond conceit of sense ; O Life, too hberal, while to take her hand Is more of hope than heait can understand ; Perturb my golden patience not with joy. Nor, through a wish, profane The peace that should pertain To him who does by her attraction move. Has all not been before ? One day's controlled hope, and one again, And then the third, and ye shall have the rein, O Life, Death, Terror, Love ! But soon let your unrestful rapture cease, Ye flaming Ethers thin, Condensing till the abiding sweetness win One sweet drop more ; One sweet drop more in the measureless increase Of honied peace. THE JOYFUL WISDOM. THE JOYFUL WISDOM. T T fOULD Wisdom for herself be woo'd, * ^ And wake the foohsh from his dream, She must be glad as well as good, And must not only be, but seem. Beauty and joy are hers by right ; And, knowing this, I wonder less That she's so scorn'd when falsely dight In misery and ugliness. What's that which Heaven to man endears, And that which eyes no sooner see Than the heart says, with floods of tears, " Ah, that's the thing which I would be ! " Not childhood, full of frown and fret ; Not youth, impatient to disown Those visions high, which to forget Were worse than never to have known ; Not worldlings, in whose fair outside Nor courtesy nor justice fails, Thanks to cross-pulling vices tied. Like Samson's foxes, by the tails ; Not poets : real things are dreams, When dreams are as realities. And boasters of celestial gleams Go stumbling aye for want of eyes ; 74 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. ' Not patriots or people's men, In whom two worse-match'd evils meet Than ever sought Adullam's den, Base conscience and a high conceit ; Not new-made saints, their feelings iced, Their joy in man and nature gone, Who sing " O easy yoke of Christ !" But find 'tis hard to get it on ; Not great men, even when they're good ; The good man whom the time makes great. By some disgrace of chance or blood, God fails not to humiliate ; Not these : but souls, found here and there. Oases in our waste of sin, Where everything is well and fair. And Heav'n remits its discipline ; Whose sweet subdual of the world The worldling scarce can recognise, And ridicule, against it hurl'd. Drops with a broken sting and dies ; Who nobly, if they cannot know Whether a 'scutcheon's dubious field Carries a falcon or a crow. Fancy a falcon on the shield ; Yet, ever careful not to hurt God's honour, who creates success. Their praise of even the best desert Is but to have presumed no less ; THE JOYFUL WISDOM. 75 Who, should their own life plaudits bring, Are simply vex'd at heart that such An easy, yea, delightful thing Should move the minds of men so much. They live by law^, not like the fool, But like the bard, who freely sings In strictest bonds of rhyme and rule. And finds in them, not bonds, but wings. Postponing still their private ease To courtly custom, appetite, Subjected to observances, To banquet goes with full delight ; Nay, continence and gratitude So cleanse their lives from earth's alloy, They taste, in nature's common food. Nothing but spiritual joy. They shine like Moses in the face. And teach our hearts, without the rod, That God's grace is the only grace. And all grace is the grace of God. 76 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. BACK TO ENGLAND. "W'ONDER, at last, the glad sea roars -*- Along the sacred English shores ! There lies the lovely land I know, Where men and women lordliest grow ; There peep the roofs where more than kings Postpone state cares to country things, And many a gay queen simply tends The babes on whom the world depends ; There curls the wanton cottage smoke Of him that drives but bears no yoke ; There laughs the realm where low and high Are lieges to society, And life has all too wide a scope, Too free a prospect for its hope, For any private gopd or ill, Except dishonour, quite to fill ! 1856. THE CHASE. 77 THE CHASE. O HE wearies with an ill unknown ; "^ In sleep she sobs and seems to float, A water-lily, all alone Within a lonely castle-moat ; And as the full-moon, spectral, lies Within the crescent's gleaming arms, The present shows her heedless eyes A future dim with vague alarms. She sees, and yet she scarcely sees, For, life-in-life not yet begun. Too many are its mysteries For thought to fix on any one. She's told that maidens are by youths Extremely honour'd and desired ; And sighs, " If those sweet tales be truths, What bliss to be so much admired ! " The suitors come ; she sees them grieve ; Her coldness fills them with despair ; She'd pity if she could believe ; She's sorry that she cannot care. 78 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. But who now meets her on her way ? Comes he as enemy or friend, Or both ? Her bosom seems to say, He cannot pass, and there an end. Whom does he love ? Does he confer His heart on worth that answers his? Or is he come to worship her? She fears, she hopes, she thinks he is ! Advancing stepless, quick, and still. As in the grass a serpent glides, He fascinates her fluttering will, Then terrifies with dreadful strides. At first, there's nothing to resist ; He fights with all the forms of peace ; He comes about her like a mist, With subtle, swift, unseen increase ; And then, unlook'd for, strikes amain Some stroke that frightens her to death. And grows all harnilessness again. Ere she can cry, or get her breath. At times she stops, and stands at bay ; But he in all, more strong than she, Subdues her with his pale dismay. Or more admired audacity. She plans some final, fatal blow. But when she means with frowns to kill. He looks as if he loved her so. She smiles to him against her will. THE CHASE. 79 How sweetly he implies her praise ! His tender talk, his gentle tone, The manly worship in his gaze, They nearly make her heart his own. With what an air he speaks her name ; His manner always recollects Her sex, and still the woman's claim Is taught its scope by his respects. Her charms, perceived to prosper first In his beloved advertencies, When in her glass they are rehearsed, Prove his most powerful allies. Ah, whither shall a maiden flee, When a bold youth so swift pursues. And siege of tenderest courtesy. With hope perseverant, still renews ? Why fly so fast? Her flatter'd breast Thanks him who finds her fair and good ; She loves her fears ; veil'd joys arrest The foolish terrors of her blood ; By secret, sweet degrees, her heart, Vanquish'd, takes warmth from his desire ; She makes it more, with hidden art. And fuels love's late dreaded fire. The generous credit he accords To all the signs of good in her Redeems itself; his praiseful words The virtues they impute confer. 8o FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Her heart is thrice as rich in bhss, She's three times gentler than before ; He gains a right to call her his, Now she through him is so much more ! 'Tis heaven where'er she turns her head ; 'Tis music when she talks ; 'tis air On which, elate, she seems to tread, The convert of a gladder sphere ! Ah, might he, when by doubts aggrieved, Behold his tokens next her breast, At all his words and sighs perceived Against its blithe upheaval press'd ! But still she flies. Should she be won. It must not be believed or thought She yields ; she's chased to death, undone. Surprised, and violently caught. A THUNDER SHOWER. 8i A THUNDER SHOWER. A DISTANT cloud, bright, huge, and cahn *■ Rose, doubtful if for bale or balm ; O'ertoppling towers and bulwarks bright Appear'd, at beck of viewless might, Along a rifted mountain range. Untraceable and swift in change, Those glittering peaks, disrupted, spread To solemn bulks, seen overhead ; The sunshine quench'd, from one dark form Fumed the appalling light of storm. Straight to the zenith, black with bale, The Gipsies' smoke rose deadly pale ; And one wide night of hopeless hue Hid from the heart the recent blue. And soon, with thunder crackling loud, A flash reveal'd the formless cloud : Lone sailing rack, far wavering rim, And billowy tracts of stormland dim. Against the whirl of leaves and dust Kine dropp'd their heads ; the tortured gust Jagg'd and convuls'd the ascending smoke To mockery of the lightning's stroke. G 82 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. The blood prick'd, and a blinding flash And close coinstantaneous crash Humbled the soul, and the rain all round Resilient dimm'd the whistling ground, Nor flagg'd in force from first to last, Till, sudden as it came, 'twas past, Leaving a trouble in the copse Of brawling birds and tinkling drops. Change beyond hope ! Far thunder faint Mutter'd its vast and vain complaint, And gaps and fractures, fringed with light, Show'd the sweet skies, with squadrons bright Of cloudlets, glittering calm and fair Through gulfs of calm and glittering air. LOVE JUSTIFIED. 8^ LOVE JUSTIFIED. "\ 17" HAT if my pole-star of respect ^ ^ Be dim to others ? Shall their " Nay," Presumably their own defect, Invalidate my heart's strong "Yea"? And can they rightly me condemn, If I, with partial love, prefer? I am not more unjust to them, But only not unjust to her. Leave us alone ! After awhile, This pool of private charity Shall make its continent an isle, And roll, a world-embracing sea ; This foolish zeal of lip for lip, This fond, self-sanction'd, wilful zest, Is that elect relationship Which forms and sanctions all the rest. 84 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. WINTER. T, SINGULARLY moved ■^ To love the lovely that are not beloved, Of all the Seasons, most Love Winter, and to trace The sense of the Trophonian pallor on her face. It is not death, but plenitude of peace ; And the dim cloud that does the world enfold Hath less the characters of dark and cold Than warmth and light asleep ; And correspondent breathing seems to keep With the infant harvest, breathing soft below Its eider coverlet of snow. Nor is in field or garden anything But, duly look'd into, contains serene The substance of things hoped for, in the Spring, And evidence of Summer not yet seen. On every chance-mild day That visits the moist shaw, The honeysuckle, 'sdaining to be crost In urgence of sweet life by sleet or frost, 'Voids the time's law With still increase WINTER. 85 Of leaflet new, and little, wandering spray ; Often, in sheltering brakes, As one from rest disturb'd in the first hour. Primrose or violet bewilder'd wakes. And deems 'tis time to flower ; Though not a whisper of her voice he hear, The buried bulb does know The signals of the year, And hails far Summer with his lifted spear ; The gorse-field dark, by sudden, gold caprice, Turns, here and there, into a Jason's fleece ; Lilies that, soon in Autumn, slipp'd their gowns of green And vanish'd into earth. And came again, ere Autumn died, to birth. Stand fuU-array'd amidst the wavering shower. And perfect for the Summer, less the flower ; In nook of pale or crevice of crude bark, Thou canst not miss. If close thou spy, to mark The ghostly chrysalis. That, if thou touch it, stirs in its dream dark ; And the flush'd Robin, in the evenings hoar, Does of Love's Day, as if he saw it, sing. But sweeter yet than dream or song of Summer or Spring Are Winter's sometime smiles, that seem to well From infancy ineffable ; 86 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Her wandering, languorous gaze, So unfamiliar, so without amaze. On the elemental, chill adversity, The uncomprehended rudeness ; and her sigh And solemn, gathering tear. And look of exile from some great repose, the sphere Of ether, moved by ether only, or By something still more tranquil. — LOVE SERVICEABLE. 87 LOVE SERVICEABLE. WHAT measure Fate to him shall mete Is not the noble Lover's care ; He's heart-sick with a longing sweet To make her happy as she's fair. Oh, misery, should she him refuse. And so her dearest good mistake ! His own success he thus pursues With frantic zeal for her sole sake. To lose her were his life to blight. Being loss to hers ; to make her his. Except as helping her delight. He calls but incidental bliss ; And, holding life as so much pelf To buy her posies, learns this lore : He does not rightly love himself Who does not love another more. 88 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. MA BELLE. T^AREWELL, dear Heart ! Since needs it must I go, Dear Heart, farewell ! Fain would I stay, but that I love thee so. One kiss, ma Belle ! What hope lies in the Land we do not know, Who, Dear, can tell ? But thee I love, and let thy 'plaint be, " Lo, He loved me well ! " A WARNING. 89 A WARNING. T SAW, and trembled for the day •*• When you should see her beauty, gay And pure as apple-blooms, that show Outside a blush and inside snow, Her high and touching elegance Of order'd life as free as chance. Ah, haste from her bewitching side. No friend for you, far less a bride ! He that but once too nearly hears The music of forefended spheres, Is thenceforth lonely, and for all His days like one who treads the Wall Of China, and, on this hand, sees Cities and their civilities. And, on the other, lions. 90 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. SARUM PLAIN. npHE moods of love are like the wind, And none knows whence or why they rise. I ne'er before felt heart and mind So much affected through mine eyes. How cognate with the flatter'd air, How form'd for earth's familiar zone, She moved ; how feeling and how fair For others' pleasure and her own ! And, ah, the heaven of her face How, when she laugh'd, I seem to see The gladness of the primal grace, And how, when grave, its dignity ! Of all she was, the least not less Delighted the devoted eye ; No fold or fashion of her dress Her fairness did not sanctify ; Better it was as now to walk, And humbly by her gentle side SARUM PLAIN. 91 Observe her smile and hear her talk, Than call the world's next best my bride. I could not else than grieve. What cause ? Was I not blest ? Was she not there ? Likely my own ? Ah, that it was : How like seem'd " likely " to despair ? And yet to see her so benign, So honourable and womanly, In every maiden kindness mine, And full of gayest courtesy, Was pleasure so without alloy. Such unreproved, sufficient bliss, I almost wish'd, the while, that joy Might never further go than this. I feign'd her won : the mind finite, Puzzled and fagg'd by stress and strain To comprehend the whole delight, Made bliss more hard to bear than pain. All good, save heart to hold, so summ'd And grasp'd, the thought smote like a knife How laps'd mortality had numb'd The feelings to the feast of life ; How passing good breathes sweetest breath ; And love itself at highest reveals More black than bright, commending death By teaching how much life conceals. 92 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. 3- But happier passions these subdued, When from the close and sultry lane, With eyes made bright by what they view'd We emerged upon the mounded Plain. As to the breeze a flag unfurls, My spirit expanded, sweetly embraced By those same gusts that shook her curls And vex'd the ribbon at her waist. To the future cast I future cares ; Breathed with a heart unfreighted, free, And laugh'd at the presumptuous airs That with her muslins folded me ; Till, one vague rack along my sky. The thought that she might ne'er be mine Lay half forgotten by the eye So feasted with the sun's warm shine. 4- . By the great stones we chose our ground For shade ; and there, in converse sweet, Took luncheon. On a little mound Sat the three ladies ; at their feet, I sat ; and smelt the heathy smell, Pluck'd harebells, tum'd the telescope To the country round. My life went well, For once, without the wheels of hope ; SARUM PLAIN. 93 And I despised the Druid rocks That scovvl'd their chill gloom from above, Like churls whose stolid wisdom mocks The lightness of immortal love. And, as we talk'd, my spirit quaff'd The sparkling winds ; the candid skies At our untruthful strangeness laugh'd ; I kiss'd with mine her smiling eyes ; And sweet familiarness and awe Prevail'd that hour on either part, And in the eternal light I saw That she was mine ; though yet my heart Could not conceive, nor would confess Such contentation ; and there grew More form and more fair stateliness Than heretofore, between us two. 94 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. WIND AND WAVE. nPHE wedded light and heat, -*- Winnowing the witless space, Without a let, What are they till they beat Against the sleepy sod, and there beget Perchance the violet ! Is the One found. Amongst a wilderness of as happy grace, To make Heaven's bound ; So that in Her All which it hath of sensitively good Is sought and understood After the narrow mode the mighty Heavens prefer ? She, as a little breeze Following still Night, Ripples the spirit's cold, deep seas Into delight ; But, in a while, The immeasurable smile Is broke by fresher airs to flashes blent With darkling discontent ; WIND AND WAVE. 95 And all the subtle zephyr hurries gay, And all the heaving ocean heaves one way, T'ward the void sky-line and an unguess'd weal ; Until the vanward billows feel The agitating shallows, and divine the goal. And to foam roll, And spread and stray And traverse wildly, like delighted hands, The fair and fleckless sands ; And so the whole Unfathomable and immense Triumphing tide comes at the last to reach And burst in wind-kiss'd splendours on the deafning beach. Where forms of children in first innocence Laugh and fling pebbles on the rainbow'd crest Of its untired unrest. 96 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. DAWN. T COULD not rest, so rose. The air -^ Was dark and sharp ; the roosted birds Cheep'd, " Here am I, Sweet ; are you there?" On Avon's misty flats the herds Expected, comfortless, the day. Which slowly fired the clouds above ; The cock scream'd, somewhere far away ; In sleep the matrimonial dove Was crooning ; no wind waked the wood. Nor moved the midnight river-damps. Nor thrill'd the poplar ; quiet stood The chestnut with its thousand lamps ; The moon shone yet, but weak and blear. And seem'd to watch, with bated breath, The landscape, all made sharp and clear By stillness, as a face by death. REJECTED. 97 REJECTED. " T)ERHAPS she's dancing somewhere now !" The thoughts of light and music wake Sharp jealousies, that grow and grow Till silence and the darkness ache. He sees her step, so proud and gay, Which, ere he spake, foretold despair ; Thus did she look, on such a day. And such the fashion of her hair, And thus she stood, when, kneeling low, He took the bramble from her dress, And thus she laugh'd and talk'd, whose " No " Was sweeter than another's "Yes." He feeds on thoughts that most deject ; He impudently feigns her charms. So reverenced in his own respect. Dreadfully clasp'd by other arms ; And turns, and puts his brows, that ache. Against the pillow where 'tis cold. If, only now his heart would break ! But oh, how much a heart can hold ! H 98 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. MIGNONNE. ■\ l rHATE'ER thou dost thou'rt dear ! * * Uncertain troubles sanctify That magic well-spring of the willing tear, Thine eye. Thy jealous fear, With not the rustle of a rival near ; Thy careless disregard of all My tenderest care ; Thy dumb despair When thy keen wit my worship may construe Into contempt of thy divinity ; They please me too ! But should it once befall These accidental charms to disappear. Leaving withal Thy sometime self the same throughout the year, So glowing, grave, and shy, Kind, talkative, and dear, As now thou sitt'st to ply The fireside tune Of that neat engine deft at which thou sew'st With fingers mild and foot like the new moon. MIGNONNE. 99 O, then what cross of any further fate Could my content abate ? Forget, then (but I know Thou canst not so), Thy customs of some praediluvian state. I am no Bullfinch, fair my Butterfly, That thou should'st try Those zigzag courses, in the welkin clear ; Nor cruel Boy that, fledd'st thou straight Or paused, mayhap Might catch thee, for thy colours, with his cap. loo FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE FOREIGN LAND. A WOMAN is a foreign land, Of which, though there he settle young, A man will ne'er quite understand The customs, politics, and tongue. The foolish hie them post-haste through, See fashions odd, and prospects fair, Learn of the language, " How d'ye do," And go and brag that they've been there. The most for leave to trade apply, For once, at Empire's seat, her heart. Then get what knowledge ear and eye Glean chancewise in the life-long mart. And certain others, few and fit. Attach them to the Court, and see The Country's best, its accent hit, And partly sound its polity. THE TOYS. loi THE TOYS. "jV ,TY little Son, who look'd from thoughtful eyes, -'■ -^ And moved and spoke in quiet grown-up wise, Having my law the seventh time disobey' d, 1 struck him, and dismiss'd With hard words and unkiss'd, His Mother, who was patient, being dead. Then, fearing lest his grief should hinder sleep, I visited his bed. But found him slumbering deep, With darken'd eyelids, and their lashes yet From his late sobbing wet. And I, with moan, Kissing away his tears, left others of my own ; For, on a table drawn beside his head, He had put, within his reach, A box of counters and a red-vein'd stone, A piece of glass abraded by the beach. And six or seven shells, A bottle with bluebells, And two French copper coins, ranged there with careful art, To comfort his sad heart. 102 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. So, when that night I pray'd To God, I wept, and said : Ah, when at last we lie with tranced breath, Not vexing Thee in death. And Thou rememberest of what toys We made our joys. How weakly understood. Thy great commanded good, Then, fatherly not less Than 1 whom Thou hast moulded from the clay, Thou'lt leave Thy wrath, and say, " I will be sorry for their childishness." THE VIOLETS. 103 THE VIOLETS. T WENT not to the Dean's unbid : ■*■ I would not have my mystery, From her so delicately hid, Discuss'd by gossips at their tea. A long, long week, and not once there, Had made my spirit sick and faint. And lack-love, foul as love is fair, Perverted all things to complaint. How vain the world had grown to be ! How mean all people and their ways, ' How ignorant their sympathy, And how impertinent their praise ; What they for virtuousness esteem'd. How far removed from heavenly right ; What pettiness their trouble seem'd. How undelightful their delight ; To my necessity how strange The sunshine and the song of birds ; How dull the clouds' continual change, How foolishly content the herds ; I04 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. How unaccountable the law Which bade me sit in blindness here, While she, the sun by which I saw, Shed splendour in an idle sphere ! And then I kiss'd her stolen glove, And sigh'd to reckon and define The modes of martyrdom in love. And how far each one might be mine. I thought how love, whose vast estate Is earth and air and sun and sea, Encounters oft the beggar's fate, Despised on score of poverty ; How Heaven, inscrutable in this, Lets the gross general make or mar The destiny of love, which is So tender and particular ; How nature, as unnatural And contradicting nature's source, Which is but love, seems most of all Well-pleased to harry true love's course ; How, many times, it comes to pass That trifling shades of temperament, Afifecting only one, alas. Not love, but love's success prevent ; How manners often falsely paint The man ; how passionate respect, Hid by itself, may bear the taint Of coldness and a dull neglect ; THE VIOLETS. lo: And how a little outward dust Can a clear merit quite o'ercloud, And make her fatally unjust, And him desire a darker shroud ; How senseless opportunity Gives baser men the better chance ; How powers, adverse else, agree To cheat her in her ignorance ; How Heaven its very self conspires With man and nature against love, As pleased to couple cross desires. And cross where they themselves approve. Wretched were life, if the end were now ! But this gives tears to dry despair. Faith shall be blest, we know not how, And love fulfiU'd, we know not where. While thus I grieved, and kiss'd her glove. My man brought in her note to say, Papa had bid her send his love, And would I dine with them next day ? They had learn'd and practised Purcell's glee, To sing it by to-morrow night. The postscript was : Her sisters and she Enclosed some violets, blue and white ; io6 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. She and her sisters found them where I wager'd once no violets grew ; So they had won the gloves. And there The violets lay, two white, one blue. HONORIA. 107 HONORIA. 'HP HE noble Girl ! With whom she talks -^ She knights first with her smile ; she walks Stands, dances, to such sweet effect, Alone she seems to move erect. The brightest and the chastest brow Rules o'er a cheek which seems to show That love, as a mere vague suspense Of apprehensive innocence, Perturbs her heart ; love without aim Or object, like the sunlit flame That in the Vestals' Temple glow'd, Without the image of a god. And this simplicity most pure She sets off with no less allure Of culture, subtly skill'd to raise The power, the pride, and mutual praise Of human personality Above the common sort so high, It makes such homely souls as mine Marvel how brightly life may shine ! io8 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE ROSE OF THE WORLD. T O, when the Lord made North and South -* — ' And sun and moon ordained, He, Forthbringing each by word of mouth In order of its dignity. Did man from the crude clay express By sequence, and, all else decreed, He form'd the woman ; nor might less Than Sabbath such a work succeed. And still with favour singled out, Marr'd less than man by mortal fall, Her disposition is devout, Her countenance angelical ; The best things that the best believe Are in her face so kindly writ The faithless, seeing her, conceive Not only heaven, but hope of it ; No idle thought her instinct shrouds, But fancy chequers settled sense, Like alteration of the clouds On noonday's azure permanence ; THE ROSE OF THE WORLD. 109 Pure dignity, composure, ease Declare affections nobly fixed, And impulse sprung from due degrees Of sense and spirit sweetly mix'd. Her modesty, her chiefest grace, The cestus clasping Venus' side, How potent to deject the face Of him who would affront its pride ! Wrong dares not in her presence speak, Nor spotted thought its taint disclose Under the protest of a cheek Outbragging Nature's boast the rose. In mind and manners how discreet ; How artless in her very art ; How candid in discourse ; how sweet The concord of her lips and heart ; How simple and how circumspect ; How subtle and how fancy-free ; Though sacred to her love, how deck'd With unexclusive courtesy ; How quick in talk to see from far The way to vanquish or evade ; How able her persuasions are To prove, her reasons to persuade ; How (not to call true instinct's bent And woman's very nature, harm), How amiable and innocent Her pleasure in her power to charm ; no FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS, How humbly careful to attract, Though crown'd with all the soul desires, Connubial aptitude exact, Diversity that never tires. ALEXANDER AND LYCON. 1 1 1 ALEXANDER AND LYCON. " T T THAT, no crown won, ^ • These two whole years, By man of fortitude beyond his peers. In Thrace or Macedon?" " No, none. But what deep trouble does my Lycon feel. And hide 'neath chat about the commonweal ? " " Glaucd but now the third time did again The thing which 1 forbade. I had to box her ears. 'Twas ill to see her both blue eyes Settled in tears Despairing on the skies, And the poor lip all pucker'd into pain ; Yet, for her sake, from kisses to refrain ! " " Ho, Timocles, take down That crown. No, not that common one for blood with extreme valour spilt, But yonder, with the berries gilt. 'Tis, Lycon, thy just meed. To inflict unmoved And firm to bear the woes of the Beloved Is fortitude indeed." 112 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. RACHEL. YOU loved her, and would lie all night Thinking how beautiful she was, And. what to do for her delight. Now both are bound with alien laws ! Be patient ; put your heart to school ; Weep if you will, but not despair ; The trust that nought goes wrong by rule Should ease this load the many bear. Love, if there's heav'n, shall meet his dues. Though here unmatch'd, or match'd amiss ; Meanwhile, the gentle cannot choose But learn to love the lips they kiss. Ne'er hurt the homely sister's ears With Rachel's beauties ; secret be The lofty mind whose lonely tears Protest against mortality. THE OPPORTUNITY. ir THE OPPORTUNITY. I. "PROM little signs, like little stars, Whose faint impression on the sense The very looking straight at mars, Or only seen by confluence ; From instinct of a mutual thought, Whence sanctity of manners flow'd ; From chance unconscious, and from what Concealment, overconscious, show'd ; Her hand's less weight upon my arm. Her lowlier mien ; that match'd with this ; I found, and felt with strange alarm, I stood committed to my bliss. 2. I grew assured, before I ask'd. That she'd be mine without reserve, And in her unclaim'd graces bask'd, At leisure, till the time should serve, With just enough of dread to thrill The hope, and make it trebly dear ; Thus loth to speak the word to kill Either the hope or happy fear. I 114 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. 3. Till once, through lanes returning late, Her laughing sisters lagg'd behind ; And, ere we reach'd her father's gate, We paused with one presentient mind ; And, in the dim and perfumed mist, Their coming stay'd, who, friends to me, And very women, loved to assist Love's timid opportunity. 4- Twice rose, twice died my trembling word ; The faint and frail Cathedral chimes Spake time in music, and we heard The chafers rustling in the limes. Her dress, that touch'd me where I stood. The warmth of her confided arm, Her bosom's gentle neighbourhood. Her pleasure in her power to charm ; Her look, her love, her form, her touch. The least seem'd most by blissful turn. Blissful but that it pleased too much, And taught the wayward soul to yearn. It was as if a harp with wires Was traversed by the breath I drew ; And, oh, sweet meeting of desires. She, answering, own'd that she loved too. AURAS OF DELIGHT. 115 AURAS OF DELIGHT. "DEAUTIFUL habitations, auras of delight ! •^-^ Who shall bewail the crags and bitter foam And angry sword-blades flashing left and right Which guard your glittering height, That none thereby may come ! The vision which we have Revere we so, That yet we crave To foot those fields of ne'er profaned snow ? I, with heart-quake, Dreaming or thinking of that realm of Love, See, oft, a dove Tangled in frightful nuptials with a snake, The tortured knot. Now, like a kite scant-weighted, flung bewitch'd Sunwards, now pitch'd, Tail over head, down, but with no taste got Eternally Of rest in either ruin or the sky. But bird and vermin each incessant strives. With vain dilaceration of both lives. Ii6 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. 'Gainst its abhorred bond insoluble, Coveting fiercer any separate hell Than the most weary Soul in Purgatory On God's sweet breast to lie. And, in this sign, I con The guerdon of that golden Cup, fulfill'd With fornications foul of Babylon, The heart where good is well-perceiv'd and known, Yet is not will'd ; And Him I thank, who can make live again The dust, but not the joy we once profane, That I, of ye, Beautiful habitations, auras of delight. In childish years, and since, had sometime sense and sight. But that ye vanish'd quite. Even from memory, Ere I could get my breath, and whisper " See !" But did for me They altogether die, Those trackless glories glimps'd in upper sky ? Were they of chance, or vain. Nor good at all again For curb of heart or fret ? Nay, though, by grace. Lest, haply, I refuse God to His face, Their likeness wholly I forget, Ah, yet, AURAS OF DELIGHT. 117 Often in straits which else for me were ill, I mind me still I did respire the lonely auras sweet, I did the blest abodes behold, and, at the moun- tains' feet, Bathed in the holy Stream by Hermon's thymy hill. ii8 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. IN LOVE. T F he's capricious she'll be so, -^ But, if his duties constant are, She lets her loving favour glow As steady as a tropic star ; Appears there nought for which to weep, She'll weep for nought, for his dear sake ; She clasps her sister in her sleep ; Her love in dreams is most awake. Her soul, that once with pleasure shook, Did any eyes her beauty own, Now wonders how they dare to look On what belongs to him alone ; The indignity of taking gifts Exhilarates her loving breast ; A rapture of submission lifts Her life into celestial rest ; There's nothing left of what she was ; Back to the babe the woman dies. And all the wisdom that she has Is to love him for being wise. IN LOVE. 119 She's confident because she fears ; And, though discreet when he's away, If none but her dear despot hears, She prattles like a child at play. Perchance, when all her praise is said. He tells the news, a battle won. On either side ten thousand dead. "Alas !" she says ; but if 'twere known. She thinks, " He's looking on my face ! I am his joy ; whate'er I do. He sees such time-contenting grace In that, he'd have me always so !" And, evermore, for either's sake. To the sweet folly of the dove, She joins the cunning of the snake, To rivet and exalt his love ; Her mode of candour is deceit ; And what she thinks from what she'll say (Although I'll never call her cheat) Lies far as Scotland from Cathay. Without his knowledge he was won ; Against his nature kept devout ; She'll never tell him how 'twas done. And he will never find it out. If, sudden, he suspects her wiles. And hears her forging chain and trap. And looks, she sits in simple smiles, Her two hands lying in her lap. I20 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Her secret (privilege of the Bard, Whose fancy is of either sex) Is mine ; but let the darkness guard Myst'ries that Hght would more perplex ! THE QUEEN'S ROOM. 121 THE QUEEN'S ROOM. I. T HERE'S nothing happier than the days In which young love makes every thought Pure as a bride's blush, when she says " I will " unto she knows not what ; And lovers, on the love-lit globe, For love's sweet sake, walk yet aloof, And hear Time weave the marriage-robe, Attraction warp and reverence woof ! My Housekeeper, my Nurse of yore. Cried, as the latest carriage went, " Well, Mr. Felix, Sir, I'm sure The morning's gone off excellent ! I never saw the show to pass The ladies, in their fine fresh gowns. So sweetly dancing on the grass. To music with its ups and downs. 122 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. We'd such work, Sir, to clean the plate ; 'Twas just the busy times of old. The Queen's Room, Sir, look'd quite like state. Miss Smythe, when she went up, made bold To peep into the Rose Boudoir, And cried, ' How charming ! all quite new ; ' And wonder'd who it could be for. All but Miss Honor look'd in too. But she's too proud to peep and pry. None's hke that sweet Miss Honor, Sir ! Excuse my humbleness, but I Pray Heav'n you'll get a wife like her ! The Poor love dear Miss Honor's ways Better than money. Mrs. Rouse, Who ought to know a lady, says No finer goes to Wilton House. Miss Bagshaw thought that dreary room Had kill'd old Mrs. Vaughan with fright ; She would not sleep in such a tomb, For all her host was worth, a night ! Miss Fry, Sir, laugh'd ; they talk'd the rest In French ; and French Sir's Greek to me. But, though they smiled, and seem'd to jest, No love was lost, for I could see How serious-like Miss Honor was — " " Well, Nurse, this is not my affair. The ladies talk'd in French with cause. Good-day ; and thank you for your prayer." THE QUEEN'S ROOM. 123 3- I loiter'd through the vacant house, Soon to be hers ; in one room stay'd, Of old my mother's. Here my vows Of endless thanks were oftenest paid. This room its first condition kept ; For, on her road to Sarum Town, Therein an English Queen had slept. Before the Hurst was half pull'd down. The pictured walls the place became : Here ran the Brook Anaurus, where Stout Jason bore the wrinkled dame Whom serving changed to Juno ; there, Ixion's selfish hope, instead Of the nuptial goddess, clasp'd a cloud ; And, here, translated Psyche fed Her gaze on Love, not disallow' d. 4. And in this chamber had she been, And into that she would not look. My Joy, my Vanity, my Queen, At whose dear name my pulses shook ! To others how express at all My worship in that joyful shrine .'' I scarcely can myself recall What peace and ardour then were mine ! 124 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. And how more sweet than aught below, The daylight and its duties done, It felt to fold the hands, and so Relinquish all regards but one ; To see her features in the dark, To lie and meditate once more The grace I did not fully mark, The tone I had not heard before ; And from my pillow then to take Her notes, her picture, and her glove, Put there for joy when I should wake, And press them to the heart of love ; And then to whisper " Wife ! " and pray To live so long as not to miss That unimaginable day Which farther seems the nearer 'tis ; And stiU from joy's unfathom'd well To drink, in dreams, while on her brows Of innocence ineffable Blossom'd the laughing bridal rose. FELICITY. 125 FELICITY. ■■ I ""O marry her and take her home ! -*- The poet, painting pureness, tells Of lilies ; figures power by Rome ; And each thing shows by something else ! But through the songs of poets look, And who so lucky to have found In universal nature's book A hkeness for a life so crown'd ! Here they speak best who best express Their inability to speak. And none are strong, but who confess With happy skill that they are weak. 126 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. EVENING PEACE. O O lay the Earth that saw the skies ^■^ Grow clear and bright above As the repentant spirit lies In God's forgiving love. The lark forsook the waning day, And all loud songs did cease ; The Robin, from a wither'd spray. Sang like a soul at peace. Far to the South, in sunset glow'd The peaks of Dartmoor ridge, And Tamar, full and tranquil, flow'd Beneath the Gresson Bridge. There, conscious of the numerous noise Of rain-awaken'd rills, And gathering deep and sober joys From the heart-enlarging hills, I sat, until the first white star Appear'd, with dewy rays. And the fair moon began to bar With shadows all the ways. LOVE-SICK. 127 LOVE-SICK. TIJ*OR more of heaven than her have I No sensitive capacity. Ah, she being mine, should God to me Say " Lo ! my Child, I give to thee All heaven besides," what could I then, But, as a child, to Him complain That whereas my dear Father gave A little space for me to have In His great garden, now, o'erblest, I've that, indeed, but all the rest ; Which, somehow, makes it seem I've got All but my only cared-for plot ! Enough was that for my weak hand To tend, my heart to understand. 128 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE CHANGED ALLEGIANCE. "\ 1^ TATCH how a bird that captived sings, The cage set open, first looks out, Yet fears the freedom of his wings, And now withdraws, and flits about, And now looks forth again ; until. Grown bold, he hops on stool and chair, And now attains the window-sill. And now confides himself to air. The maiden so, from love's free sky In chaste and prudent counsels caged, But longing to be loosen'd by Her suitor's faith declared and gaged. When blest with that release desired, First doubts if truly she is free. Then pauses, restlessly retired, Alarm'd at too much liberty ; But soon, remembering all her debt To plighted passion, gets by rote Her duty ; says, " I love him !" yet The thought half chokes her in her throat ; THE CHANGED ALLEGIANCE. 129 And, like that fatal " I am thine," Comes with alternate gush and check And joltings of the heart, as wine Pour'd from a flask of narrow neck. Is he indeed her choice? She fears Her Yes was rashly said, and shame, Remorse, and ineffectual tears Revolt from his conceded claim. Oh, treason ! So, with desperate nerve. She cries, " I am in love, am his ;" Lets run the cables of reserve, And floats into a sea of bliss, And laughs to think of her alarm, Avows she was in love before. Though his avowal was the charm Which open'd to her own the door. She loves him for his mastering air. Whence, Parthian-like, she slaying flies ; His flattering look, which seems to wear Her loveliness in manly eyes ; His smile, which, by reverse, portends An awful wrath, should reason stir ; (How fortunate it is they're friends. And he will ne'er be wroth with her !) ; His power to do or guard from harm ; If he but chose to use it half, And catch her up in one strong arm. What could she do but weep, or laugh ! K I30 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. His words, which still instruct, but so, That this applause seems still implied, " How wise in all she ought to know, How ignorant of all beside !" His skilful suit, which leaves her free, Gives nothing for the world to name, And keeps her conscience safe, while he, With half the bliss, takes all the blame ; His clear repute with great and small ; The jealousy his choice will stir ; But, ten times more than ten times all, She loves him for his love of her. How happy 'tis he seems to see In her that utter loveliness Which she, for his sake, longs to be ! At times, she cannot but confess Her other friends are somewhat blind ; Her parents' years excuse neglect. But all the rest are scarcely kind, And brothers grossly want respect ; And oft she views what he admires Within her glass, and sight of this Makes all the sum of her desires To be devotion unto his. But still, at first, whatever's done, A touch, her hand press'd lightly, she Stands dizzied, shock'd, and flush'd, like one Set sudden neck-deep in the sea ; THE CHANGED ALLEGIANCE. 131 And, though her bond for endless time To his good pleasure gives her o'er, The slightest favour seems a crime, Because it makes her love him more. But that she ne'er will let him know ; For what were love should reverence cease ? A thought which makes her reason so Inscrutable, it seems caprice. With her, as with a desperate town, Too weak to stand, too proud to treat. The conqueror, though the walls are down, Has still to capture street by street ; But, after that, habitual faith. Divorced from self, where late 'twas due. Walks nobly in its novel path. And she's to changed allegiance true ; ' And, prizing what she can't prevent, (Right wisdom, often misdeem'd whim), Her will's indomitably bent On mere submissiveness to him ; To him she'll cleave, for him forsake Father's and mother's fond command ! He is her lord, for he can take Hold of her faint heart with his hand. 132 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. OUTWARD BOUND. "W'ONDER the sombre vessel rides -*- Where my obscure condition hides. Waves scud to shore against the wind That flings the sprinkHng surf behind ; In port the bickering pennons show Which way the ships would gladly go ; Through Edgecumb Park the rooted trees Are tossing, reckless, in the breeze ; On top of Edgecumb's firm-set tower, As foils, not foibles, of its power, The light vanes do themselves adjust To every veering of the gust : By me alone may nought be given To guidance of the airs of heaven ? * * ♦ » Beholding such as her, a man Longs to lay down his life ! How can Aught to itself seem thus enough, When I have so much need thereof? Blest in her place, blissful is she ; And I, departing, seem to be OUTWARD BOUND. 133 Like the strange waif that comes to run A few days flaming near the sun, And carries back, through boundless night. Its lessening memory of light. 134 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. "LET BE!" A H, yes ; we tell the good and evil trees ■^~^ By fruits : but how tell these ? Who does not know That good and ill Are done in secret still, And that which shows is verily but show ! How high of heart is one, and one how sweet of mood : But not all height is holiness, Nor every sweetness good : And grace will sometimes lurk where who could guess ? The Critic of his kind, Dealing to each his share. With easy humour, hard to bear. May not impossibly have in him shrined. As in a gossamer globe or thickly padded pod, Some small seed dear to God. Haply yon wretch, so famous for his falls, Got them beneath the Devil-defended walls "LET BE!" 135 Of some high Virtue he had vow'd to win ; And that which you and I Call his besetting sin Is but the fume of his peculiar fire Of inmost contrary desire, And means wild willingness for her to die, Dash'd with despondence of her favour sweet ; He fiercer fighting, in his worst defeat, Than 1 or you. That only courteous greet Where he does hotly woo, Did ever fight, in our best victory. Another is mistook Through his deceitful likeness to his look ! Let be, let be : Why should I clear myself, why answer thou for me? That shaft of slander shot Miss'd only the right blot. 1 see the shame They cannot see : 'Tis very just they blame The thing that's not. 136 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE FRIENDS. I. pRANK'S long, dull letter, lying by The gay sash from Honoria's waist, Reproach'd me ; passion spared a sigh For friendship without fault disgraced. How should I greet him ? how pretend I felt the love he once inspired ? Time was when either, in his friend, His own deserts with joy admired ; We took one side in school-debate, Like hopes pursued with equal thirst, Were even-bracketed by Fate ; Twin- Wranglers, seventh from the First ; And either loved a lady's laugh More than all music ; he and I Were perfect in the pleasant half Of universal charity. 2. From pride of likeness thus I loved Him, and he me, till love begot The lowliness which now approved Nothing but that which I was not. THE FRIENDS. 137 Blest was the pride of feeling so Subjected to a girl's soft reign. She was my vanity, and, oh, All other vanities how vain ! 3- Frank followed in his letter's track, And set my guilty heart at ease By echoing my excuses back With just the same apologies. So he had slighted me as well ! Nor was my mind disburthen'd less When what I sought excuse to tell He of himself did first confess. 4- Each, rapturous, praised his lady's worth ; He eloquently thus : " Her face Is the summ'd sweetness of the earth. Her soul the glass of heaven's grace. To which she leads me by the hand ; Or, briefly all the truth to say To you who briefly understand, She is both heaven and the way. Displeasures and resentments pass Athwart her charitable eyes More fleetingly than breath from glass, Or truth from foolish memories ; 138 . FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Her heart's so touch'd with others' woes She has no need of chastisement ; Her gentle life's conditions close, Like God's commandments, with content. And make an aspect calm and gay, Where sweet affections come and go, Till all who see her, smile, and say, How fair, and happy that she's so ! She is so lovely, true, and pure. Her virtue all virtue so endears, That often, when I think of her, Life's meanness fills mine eyes with tears — " "You paint Miss Churchill ! Pray go on — " "She's perfect, and, if joy was much To think her nature's paragon, 'Tis more that there's another such ! " 5- Praising and paying back their praise With rapturous hearts, t'ward Sarum Spire We walk'd, in evening's golden haze, Friendship from passion stealing fire. In joy's crown danced the feather jest, And, parting by the Deanery door, Clasp'd hands, less shy than words, confess'd We had not been true friends before. A PORTRAIT. 139 A PORTRAIT. /^N her face, when she was laughing, was the ^-^ seriousness within ; Her sweetest smiles (and sweeter did a lover never win), In passing, grew so absent that they made her fair cheek thin. On her face, when she was speaking, thoughts un- worded used to live ; So that when she whisper'd to me, "Better joy Earth cannot give," Her following silence added, " But Earth's joy is fugitive." For there a nameless something, though suppress'd, still spread around ; The same was on her eyelids, if she look'd towards the ground ; In her laughing, singing, talking, still the same was in the sound ; — A sweet dissatisfaction, which at no time went away. But shadow'd so her spirit, even at its brightest play, That her mirth was like the sunshine in the closing of the day. 140 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE AMARANTH. FEASTS satiate ; stars distress with height ; Friendship means well, but misses reach, And wearies in its best delight, Vex'd with the vanities of speech ; Too long regarded, roses even Afflict the mind with fond unrest ; And to converse direct with Heaven Is a great labour in the breast ; Whate'er the up-looking soul admires, Whate'er the senses' banquet be, Fatigues at last with vain desires, Or sickens by satiety ; But truly my delight was more In her to whom I'm bound for aye Yesterday than the day before And more to-day than yesterday. SEMELE. 141 SEMELE. NO praise to me ! My joy 'twas to be nothing but the glass Thro' which the general boon of Heaven should pass, To focus upon thee. Nor is't thy blame Thou first should'st glow, and, after, fade i' the flame. It takes more might Than God has given thee, Dear, so long to feel delight. Shall I, alas. Reproach thee with thy change and my regret ? Blind fumblers that we be About the portals of felicity ! The wind of words would scatter, tears would wash Quite out the little heat Beneath the silent and chill-seeming ash, Perchance, still slumbering sweet. 142 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE MARRIED LOVER. ■\ 1 7'HY, having won her, do I woo ? * ^ Because her spirit's vestal grace Provokes me always to pursue, But, spirit-like, eludes embrace ; Because her womanhood is such That, as on court-days subjects kiss The Queen's hand, yet so near a touch Affirms no mean familiarness, Nay, rather marks more fair the height Which can with safety so neglect To dread, as lower ladies might, That grace could meet with disrespect. Thus she with happy favour feeds Allegiance from a love so high That thence no false conceit proceeds Of difference bridged, or state put by ; Because, although in act and word As lowly as a wife can be, Her manners, when they call me lord. Remind me 'tis by courtesy ; THE MARRIED LOVER. 143 Not with her least consent of will, Which would my proud affection hurt, But by the noble style that still Imputes an unattain'd desert ; Because her gay and lofty brows, When all is won which hope can ask. Reflect a light of hopeless snows That bright in virgin ether bask ; Because, though free of the outer court I am, this Temple keeps its shrine Sacred to Heaven ; because, in short, She's not and never can be mine. 144 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE WIFE'S TRAGEDY. ly /TAN must be pleased ; but him to please -'■■*■ Is woman's pleasure ; down the gulf Of his condoled necessities She casts her best, she flings herself. How often flings for nought, and yokes Her heart to an icicle or whim, Whose each impatient word provokes Another, not from her, but him ; While she, too gentle even to force His penitence by kind replies, Waits by, expecting his remorse, With pardon in her pitying eyes ; And if he once, by shame oppress'd, A comfortable word confers. She leans and weeps against his breast, And seems to think the sin was hers ; And whilst his love has any life. Or any eye to see her charms, At any time, she's still his wife, Dearly devoted to his arms ; THE WIFE'S TRAGEDY. 145 She loves with love that cannot tire ; And when, ah woe, she loves alone, Through passionate duty love springs higher, As grass grows taller round a stone. 146 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE MINISTERS OF LOVE. "All are but ministers of Love And feed his sacred flame. " Coleridge. T ET me, Beloved, while gratitude ■'—^ Is garrulous with coming good, Or ere the tongue of happiness Be silenced by your soft caress, Relate how, musing here of you. The clouds, the intermediate blue. The air that rings with larks, the grave And distant rumour of the wave, The solitary sailing skiff. The gusty corn-field on the cliff. The corn-flower by the crumbling ledge, Or, far-down at the shingle's edge. The sighing sea's recurrent crest Breaking, resign'd to its unrest. All whisper, to my home-sick thought. Of charms in you till now uncaught, Or only caught as dreams, to die Ere they were own'd by memory. THE MINISTERS OF LOVE. 147 High and ingenious Decree Of joy-devising Deity ! You, whose ambition only is The assurance that you make my bhss, (Hence my first debt of love to show, That you, past showing, indeed do so !), Trust me, the world, the firmament, With diverse-natured worlds besprent, Were rear'd in no mere undivine Boast of omnipotent design, The lion differing from the snake But for the trick of difference sake. And comets darting to and fro Because in circles planets go ; But rather that sole love might be Refresh'd throughout eternity In one sweet faith, for ever strange, Mirror'd by circumstantial change. For, more and more, do I perceive That everything is relative To you, and that there's not a star, Nor nothing in't, so strange or far, But, if 'twere scann'd, 'twould chiefly mean Somewhat, till then, in you unseen. Something to make the bondage strait Of you and me more intimate. Some unguess'd opportunity Of nuptials in a new degree. 148 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. But, oh, with what a novel force Your best-conn'd beauties, by remorse Of absence, touch ! and, in my heart. How bleeds afresh the youthful smart Of passion fond, despairing still To utter infinite good-will By worthy service ! Yet I know That love is all that love can owe, And this to offer is no less Of worth, in kind speech or caress, Than if my life-blood I should give. For good is God's prerogative. And Love's deed is but to prepare The flatter'd, dear Beloved to dare Acceptance of His gifts. When first On me your happy beauty burst, Honoria, verily it seem'd That nought beyond you could be dream' d Of beauty and of heaven's delight. Zeal of an unknown infinite Yet bade me ever wish you more Beatified than e'er before. Angelical were your replies To my prophetic flatteries ; And sweet was the compulsion strong That drew me in the course along Of heaven's increasing bright allure. With provocations fresh of your THE MINISTERS OF LOVE. 149 Victorious capacity. Whither may love, so fledged, not fly ? Did not mere Earth hold fast the string Of this celestial soaring thing, So measure and make sensitive, And still, to the nerves, nice notice give Of each minutest increment Of such interminable ascent, The heart would lose all count, and beat Unconscious of a height so sweet. And the spirit-pursuing senses strain Their steps on the starry track in vain I I50 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. A DEMONSTRATION. IVTATURE, with endless being rife, Parts each thing into " him " and " her," And in the arithmetic of life, The smallest unit is a pair ; And thus, oh, strange, sweet half of me, If I confess a loftier flame, If more I love high Heaven than thee, I more than love thee, thee I am ; And, if the world's not built of lies. Nor all a cheat the Gospel tells, If that which from the dead shall rise Be I indeed, not something else. There's no position more secure In reason or in faith than this. That those conditions must endure. Which, wanting, I myself should miss. THE WORST 151 THE WORST. T THOUGHT the worsthad brought me balm : -*■ 'Twas but the tempest's central calm. Vague sinkings of the heart aver That dreadful wrong is come to her, And o'er this dream I brood and dote, And learn its agonies by rote. As if I loved it, early and late I make familiar with my fate. And feed, with fascinated will. On very dregs of finish'd ill. I think, she's near him now, alone, With wardship and protection none ; Alone, perhaps, in the hindering stress Of airs that clasp him with her dress, They wander whispering by the wave ; And haply now, in some sea-cave, Where the ribb'd sand is rarely trod. They laugh, they kiss. O God ! O God ! There comes a smile acutely sweet Out of the picturing dark ; I meet The ancient frankness of her gaze. That soft and heart-surprising blaze 152 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Of great goodwill and innocence, And perfect joy proceeding thence ! Ah ! made for earth's delight, yet such The mid-sea air 's too gross to touch. At thought of which, the soul in me Is as the bird that bites a bee, And darts abroad on frantic wing, Tasting the honey and the sting ; And, moaning where all round me sleep Amidst the moaning of the deep, I start at midnight from my bed — And have no right to strike him dead. AFTER BAD WEATHER. 153 AFTER BAD WEATHER. I. /~\NE morn I watch'd the rain subside ; ^ -^ And then fared singly forth Below the clouds, till eve to ride From Edgecumb to the North. Once, only once, I paused upon The sea-transcending height, And turn'd to gaze : far breakers shone. Slow gleams of silent light. Into my steed I struck the spur ; Sad was the soul in me ; Sore were my lids with tears for her Who slept beneath the sea. But soon I sooth'd my startled horse, And check'd that sudden grief. And look'd abroad on crag and gorse And Dartmoor's cloudy reef Far forth the air was dark and clear, The crags acute and large, The clouds uneven, black, and near. And ragged at the marge. 154 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. The spider, in his rainy mesh, Shook not, but, as I rode, The opposing air, sweet, sharp, and fresh. Against my hot hds flow'd. Peat-cutters pass'd me, carrying tools ; Hawks ghmmer'd on the wing ; The ground was glad with grassy pools, And brooklets galloping ; The sparrow chirp'd with feathers spread. And dipp'd and drank his fill. Where, down its sandy channel, fled The lessening road-side rill. 2. I cross'd the furze-grown table-land. And near'd the northern vales. That lay perspicuously plann'd In lesser hills and dales. Then rearward, in a slow review, Fell Dartmoor's jagged lines ; Around were dross-heaps, red and blue. Old shafts of gutted mines ; Impetuous currents copper-stain'd. Wheels steam-urged with a roar, Sluice-guiding grooves, strong works that strain'd With freight of upheaved ore. And then, the train, with shock on shock, Swift rush and birth-scream dire, AFTER BAD WEATHER. 155 Grew from the bosom of the rock, And pass'd in noise and fire. With brazen throb, with vital stroke. It went, far heard, far seen, Setting a track of shining smoke Against the pastoral green. Then, bright drops, lodged in budding trees, Were loos'd in sudden showers, Touch'd by the novel western breeze. Friend of the backward flowers. Then rose the Church at Tavistock, The rain still falling there ; But sunny Dartmoor seem'd to mock The gloom with cheerful glare. About the West the gilt vane reel'd And poised ; and, with sweet art, The sudden, jangling changes peal'd, Until, around my heart. Conceits of brighter times, of times The brighter for past storms. Clung thick as bees, when brazen chimes Call down the hiveless swarms. 3. In love with home, I rose and eyed The rainy North ; but there The distant hill-top, in its pride, Adorn'd the brilliant air ; 156 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. And, as I pass'd from Tavistock, The scatter'd dwellings white, The Church, the golden weather-cock. Were 'whelm'd in happy light ; The children 'gan the sun to greet, With song and senseless shout ; The lambs to skip, their dams to bleat ; In Tavy leapt the trout ; Across a fleeting eastern cloud. The splendid rainbow sprang. And larks, invisible and loud. Within its zenith sang. DEPARTURE. 157 DEPARTURE. IT was not like your great and gracious ways ! Do you, that have nought other to lament, Never, my Love, repent Of how, that July afternoon. You went. With sudden, unintelligible phrase. And frighten'd eye, Upon your journey of so many days, Without a single kiss or a good-bye ? I knew, indeed, that you were parting soon ; And so we sate, within the low sun's rays. You whispering to me, for your voice was weak, Your harrowing praise. Well, it was well To hear you such things speak. And I could tell What made your eyes a growing gloom of love. As a warm South-wind sombres a March grove. And it was like your great and gracious ways To turn your talk on daily things, my Dear, Lifting the luminous, pathetic lash. To let the laughter flash, 158 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Whilst I drew near, Because you spoke so low that I could scarcely hear. But all at once to leave me at the last More at the wonder than the loss aghast, With huddled, unintelligible phrase. And frighten'd eye. And go your journey of all days With not one kiss or a good-bye, And the only loveless look the look with which you pass'd, 'Twas all unlike your great and gracious ways. "SHE WAS MINE." 159 "SHE WAS MINE." " '"PHY tears o'erprize thy loss ! Thy wife, -'- In what was she particular ? Others of comely face and life, Others as chaste and warm there are, And when they speak they seem to sing ; Beyond her sex she was not wise ; And there is no more common thing Than kindness in a woman's eyes. Then wherefore Aveep so long and fast, Why so exceedingly repine ! Say, how has thy Beloved surpass'd So much all others ?" " She was mine." i6o FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. FINIS CORONAT OPUS. nrOO soon, too soon comes Death to show ■*- We love more deeply than we know ! The rain, that fell upon the height Too gently to be call'd delight. Within the dark vale reappears As a wild cataract of tears ; And love in life should strive to see Sometimes what love in death would be ! Easier to love, we so should find. It is than to be just and kind. She's gone : shut close the coffin-lid : What distance for another did That death has done for her ! The good, Once gazed upon with heedless mood, Now fills with tears the famish'd eye, And turns all else to vanity. 'Tis sad to see, with death between, The good we have pass'd and have not seen ! How strong appear the words of all ! The looks of those that live appal. They are the ghosts, and check the breath : There's no reality but death. FINIS CORONAT OPUS. i6i And hunger for some signal given That we shall have our own in heaven. But this the God of love lets be A horrible uncertainty. M i62 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE AZALEA. ■" I "HERE, where the sun shines first Against our room, She train'd the gold Azalea, whose perfume She, Spring-like, from her breathing grace dispersed. Last night the delicate crests of saffron bloom. For that their dainty likeness watch'd and nurst. Were just at point to burst. At dawn I dream'd, O God, that she was dead, And groan'd aloud upon my wretched bed, And waked, ah, God, and did not waken her. But lay, with eyes still closed. Perfectly bless'd in the delicious sphere By which I knew so well that she was near. My heart to speechless thankfulness composed. Till 'gan to stir A dizzy somewhat in my troubled head — It was the azalea's breath, and she tvas dead ! The warm night had the lingering buds disclosed ; And I had fall'n asleep with to my breast A chance-found letter press'd In which she said, THE AZALEA. 163 " So, till to-morrow eve, my Own, adieu ! Parting 's well-paid with soon again to meet, Soon in your arms to feel so small and sweety Sweet to myself that am so sweet to you !" i64 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. LOVE'S IMMORTALITY. T T OW vilely 'twere to misdeserve -*- -*■ The poet's gifts of perfect speech, In song to try, with trembling nerve. The limit of its utmost reach. Only to sound the wretched praise Of what to-morrow shall not be ; So mocking with immortal bays The cross-bones of mortality ! I do not thus. My faith is fast That all the loveliness I sing Is made to bear the mortal blast. And blossom in a better Spring. Doubts of eternity ne'er cross The Lover's mind, divinely clear ; For ever is the gain or loss Which maddens him with hope or fear So trifles serve for his relief, And trifles make him sick and pale ; And yet his pleasure and his grief Are both on a majestic scale. The chance, indefinitely small, Of issue infinitely great, ' Eclipses finite interests all, And has the dignity of fate. '•'LOVE IS ENOUGH." r6s "LOVE IS ENOUGH." THEY bade adieu ; I saw them go Across the sea ; and now I know The ultimate hope I rested on, The hope beyond the grave, is gone. The hope that, in the heavens high, At last it should appear that I Loved most, and so, by claim divine, Should have her, in the heavens, for mine. According to such nuptial sort As may subsist in the holy court. Where, if there are all kinds of joys To exhaust the multitude of choice In many mansions, then there are Loves personal and particular. Conspicuous in the glorious sky Of universal charity, As Phosphor in the sunrise. Now I've seen them, I believe their vow Immortal ; and the dreadful thought. That he less honour'd than he ought Her sanctity, is laid to rest. And, blessing them, I too am blest. i66 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. My goodwill, as a springing air, Unclouds a beauty in despair ; I stand beneath the sky's pure cope Unburthen'd even by a hope ; And peace unspeakable, a joy Which hope would deaden and destroy, Like sunshine fills the airy gulf Left by the vanishing of self. That I have known her ; that she moves Somewhere all-graceful ; that she loves, And is belov'd, and that she's so Most happy, and to heaven will go, Where I may meet with her (yet this I count but accidental bliss), And that the full, celestial weal Of all shall sensitively feel The partnership and work of each. And thus my love and labour reach Her region, there the more to bless Her last, consummate happiness, Is guerdon up to the degree Of that alone true loyalty Which, sacrificing, is not nice About the terms of sacrifice, But offers all, with smiles that say, 'Tis little, but it is for aye ! PAIN. 167 PAIN. r~\ PAIN, Love's mystery, ^-"^ Close next of kin To joy and heart's delight. Low Pleasure's opposite. Choice food of sanctity And medicine of sin. Angel, whom even they that will pursue Pleasure with hell's whole gust Find that they must Perversely woo. My lips, thy live coal touching, speak thee true. Thou sear'st my flesh, O Pain, But brand'st for arduous peace my languid brain. And bright'nest my dull view, Till I, for blessing, blessing give again. And my roused spirit is Another fire of bliss. Wherein I learn Feelingly how the pangful purging fire Shall furiously burn With joy, not only of assured desire, But also present joy i68 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Of seeing the life's corruption, stain by stain, Vanish in the clear heat of Love irate, And, fume by fume, the sick alloy Of luxury, sloth, and hate Evaporate ; Leaving the man, so dark erewhile. The mirror merely of God's smile. Herein, O Pain, abides the praise For which my song I raise ; But even the bastard good of intermittent ease How greatly doth it please ! With what repose The being from its bright exertion glows. When from thy strenuous storm the senses sweep Into a little harbour deep Of rest ; When thou, O Pain, Having devour'd the nerves that thee sustain, Sleep'st, till thy tender food be somewhat grown again ; And how the lull With tear-blind love is full ! What mockery of a man am I express'd That I should wait for thee To woo ! Nor even dare to love, till thou lov'st me. How shameful, too, Is this : PAIN. 169 That, when thou lov'st, I am at first afraid Of thy fierce kiss, Like a young maid ; And only trust thy charms And get my courage in thy throbbing arms. And, when thou partest, what a fickle mind Thou leav'st behind, That, being a little absent from mine eye, It straight forgets thee what thou art. And ofttimes my adulterate heart Dallies with Pleasure, thy pale enemy. O, for the learned spirit without attaint That does not faint, But knows both how to have thee and to lack, And ventures many a spell. Unlawful but for them that love so well, To call thee back. I/O FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. FELIX TO HONORIA. T^EAREST, my Love and Wife, 'tis long ■*-^ Ago I closed the unfinish'd song Which never could be finish'd ; nor Will ever Poet utter more Of love than I did, watching well To lure to speech the unspeakable ! And yet, ah, twenty-fold my Bride ! Rising, this twentieth festal-tide, You still soft sleeping, on this day Of days, some words I long to say, Some words superfluously sweet Of fresh assurance, thus to greet Your waking eyes, which never grow Weary of telling what I know So well, yet only well enough To wish for further news thereof Here, in this early autumn dawn. By windows opening on the lawn. Where sunshine seems asleep, though bright, And shadows yet are sharp with night, And, further on, the wealthy wheat Bends in a golden drowse, how sweet FELIX TO HONORIA. 171 To sit and cast my careless looks Around my walls of well-read books, Wherein is all that stands redeem'd From time's huge wreck, all men have dream'd Of truth, and all by poets known Of feeling, and in weak sort shown, And, turning to my heart again, To find I have what makes them vain. The thanksgiving mind, which wisdom sums. And you, whereby it freshly comes As on that morning (can there be Twenty-two years 'twixt it and me ?) When, thrill'd with hopeful love I rose And came in haste to Sarum Close, Past many a homestead slumbering white In lonely and pathetic light, Merely to fancy which drawn blind Of thirteen had my Love behind, And in her sacred neighbourhood To feel that sweet scorn of all good But her, which let the wise forfend When wisdom learns to comprehend ! Dearest, as each returning May I see the season new and gay With new joy and astonishment. And Nature's infinite ostent Of lovely flowers in wood and mead That weet not whether any heed, 172 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. So see I, daily wondering, you, And worship with a passion new The Heaven that visibly allows Its grace to go about my house, The partial Heaven, that, though I err And mortal am, gave all to her Who gave herself to me. Yet I Boldly thank Heaven (and so defy The beggarly soul'd humblene^ Which fears God's bounty to confess) That I was fashion'd with a mind Seeming for this great gift design'd. So naturally it moved above All sordid contraries of love, Strengthen'd in youth with discipline Of light, to follow the divine Vision (which ever to the dark Is such a plague as was the ark In Ashdod, Gath, and Ekron), still Discerning with the docile will Which comes of full persuaded thought, That intimacy in love is nought Without pure reverence, whereas this, In tearfullest banishment, is bliss. And so, dearest Honoria, I Have never learn'd the weary sigh Of those that to their love-feasts went, Fed, and forgot the Sacrament ; FELIX TO HONORIA. 173 And not a trifle now occurs But sweet initiation stirs Of new-discover'd joy, and lends To feeling change that never ends ; And duties, which the many irk, Are made all wages and no work. How sing of such things save to her, Love's self, so love's interpreter? How the supreme rewards confess Which crown the austere voluptuousness Of heart, that earns, in midst of wealth, The appetite of want and health ; Relinquishes the pomp of life And beauty to the pleasant Wife At home, and does all joy despise As out of place but in her eyes ? How praise the years and gravity That make each favour seem to be A lovelier weakness for her lord ? And, ah, how find the tender word To tell aright of love that glows The fairer for the fading rose ? Of frailty which can weight the arm To lean with thrice its girlish charm? Of grace which, like this autumn day, Is not the sad one of decay, Yet one whose pale brow pondereth The far-off majesty of death ? 174 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. How tell the crowd, whom passion rends That love grows mild as it ascends ? That joy's most high and distant mood Is lost, not found in dancing blood ; Albeit kind acts and smiling eyes, And all those fond realities Which are love's words, in us mean more Delight than twenty years before ? How, Dearest, finish, without wrong To the speechless heart, the unfinish'd song, Its high, eventful passages. Consisting, say, of things like these : — One morning, contrary to law. Which, for the most, we held in awe. Commanding either not to intrude On the other's place of solitude Or solitary mind, for fear Of coming there when God was near. And finding so what should be known To Him who is merciful alone, And views the working ferment base Of waking flesh and sleeping grace, Not as we view, our kindness check'd By likeness of our own defect, I, venturing to her room, because (Mark the excuse !) my Birthday 'twas, Saw, here across a careless chair, A ball-dress flung, as light as air, FELIX TO HONORIA. 175 And, here, beside a silken couch, Pillows which did the pressure vouch Of pious knees (sweet piety ! Of goodness made and charity, If gay looks told the heart's glad sense, Much rather than of penitence), And, on the couch, an open book. And written list — I did not look. Yet just in her clear writing caught : — " Habitual faults of life and thought Which most I need deliverance from." I tum'd aside, and saw her come Adown the filbert-shaded way. Beautified with her usual gay Hypocrisy of perfectness. Which made her heart, and mine no less. So happy ! And she cried to me, *' You lose by breaking rules, you see ! Your Birthday treat is now half-gone Of seeing my new ball-dress on." And, meeting so my lovely Wife, A passing pang, to think that life Was mortal, when I saw her laugh. Shaped in my mind this epitaph : " Faults had she, child of Adam's stem. But only Heaven knew of them." Or thus : 176 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. For many a dreadful day, In sea-side lodgings sick she lay, Noteless of love, nor seem'd to hear The sea, on one side, thundering near, Nor, on the other, the loud Ball Held nightly in the public hall ; Nor vex'd they my short slumbers, though I woke up if she breathed too low. Thus, for three months, with terrors rife, The pending of her precious life I watch'd o'er ; and the danger, at last, The kind Physician said, was past. Howbeit, for seven harsh weeks the East Breathed witheringly, and Spring's growth ceased, And so she only did not die ; Until the bright and blighting sky Changed into cloud, and the sick flowers Remember'd their perfumes, and showers Of warm, small rain refreshing flew Before the South, and the Park grew. In three nights, thick with green. Then she Revived, no less than flower and tree. In the mild air, and, the fourth day, Look'd supernaturally gay With large, thanksgiving eyes, that shone. The while I tied her bonnet on, So that I led her to the glass. And bade her see how fair she was. FELIX TO HONORIA. 177 And how love visibly could shine. Profuse of hers, desiring mine, And mindful I had loved her most When beauty seem'd a vanish' d boast, She laugh'd. I press'd her then to me, Nothing but soft humility ; Nor e'er enhanced she with such charms Her acquiescence in my arms. And, by her sweet love-weakness made Courageous, powerful, and glad, In a clear illustration high Of heavenly aiTection, I Perceived that utter love is all The same as to be rational, And that the mind and heart of love, Which think they cannot do enough, Are truly the everlasting doors Wherethrough, all unpetition'd, pours The eternal pleasance. Wherefore we Had innermost tranquillity. And breathed one life with such a sense Of friendship and of confidence, That, recollecting the sure word : " If two of you are in accord, On earth, as touching any boon Which ye shall ask, it shall be done In heaven," we ask'd that heaven's bhss Might ne'er be any less than this ; N lyS FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. And, for that hour, we seem'd to have The secret of the joy we gave. How sing of such things, save to her, Love's self, so love's interpreter? How read from such a homely page In the ear of this unhomely age ? 'Tis now as when the Prophet cried : " The nation hast Thou multiplied, But Thou hast not increased the joy !" And yet, ere wrath or rot destroy Of England's state the ruin fair, Oh, might I so its charm declare, That, in new Lands, in far-off years, Delighted he should cry that hears : " Great is the Land that somewhat best Works, to the wonder of the rest ! We, in our day, have better done This thing or that than any one ; And who but, still admiring, sees How excellent for images Was Greece, for laws how wise was Rome But read this Poet, and say if home And private love did e'er so smile As in that ancient English isle !" MAGNA EST VERITAS. 179 MAGNA EST VERITAS. TTERE, in this little Bay, ■*- ■*• Full of tumultuous life and great repose, Where, twice a day, The purposeless, glad ocean comes and goes. Under high cliffs, and far from the huge town, I sit me down. For want of me the world's course will not fail : When all its work is done, the lie shall rot ; The truth is great, and shall prevail. When none cares whether it prevail or not. l8o FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. LIFE OF LIFE. "\^ THAT'S that, which, ere I spake, was gone ' * So joyful and intense a spark That, whilst o'erhead the wonder shone, The day, before but dull, grew dark. I do not know ; but this I know, That, had the splendour lived a year, The truth that I some heavenly show Did see, could not be now more clear. This know I too : might mortal breath Express the passion then inspired. Evil would die a natural death. And nothing transient be desired ; And error from the soul would pass, And leave the senses pure and strong As sunbeams. But the best, alas, Has neither memory nor tongue ! TO THE UNKNOWN EROS. i8i TO THE UNKNOWN EROS. WHAT rumour'd heavens are these Which not a poet sings, O Unknowm Eros ? What this breeze Of sudden wings Speeding at far returns of time from interstellar space To fan my very face, And gone as fleet, Through delicatest ether feathering soft their solitary beat. With ne'er a light plume dropp'd, nor any trace To speak of whence they came, or whither they depart ? And why this palpitating heart, This blind and unrelated joy. This meaningless desire, That moves me like the Child Who in the flushing darkness troubled lies. Inventing lonely prophecies. Which even to his Mother mild He dares not tell ; To which himself is infidel ; i82 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. His heart not less on fire With dreams impossible as wildest Arab Tale, (So thinks the boy), With dreams that turn him red and pale, Yet less impossible and wild Than those which bashful Love, in his own way and hour, Shall duly bring to flower ! O Unknown Eros, sire of awful bliss. What portent and what Delphic word, Such as in form of snake forebodes the bird, Is this? In me life's even flood What eddies thus ? What in its ruddy orbit lifts the blood Like a perturbed moon of Uranus Reaching to some great world in ungauged darkness hid; And whence This rapture of the sense Which, by thy whisper bid, Reveres with obscure rite and sacramental sign A bond 1 know not of nor dimly can divine ; This subject loyalty which longs For chains and thongs Woven of gossamer and adamant, To bind me to my unguess'd want, And so to lie. TO THE UNKNOWN EROS. 183 Between those quivering plumes that thro' fine ether pant, For hopeless, sweet eternity ? What God unhonour'd hitherto in songs, Or which, that now Forgettest the disguise That Gods must wear who visit human eyes, Art Thou ? Thou art not Amor ; or, if so, yon pyre, That waits the willing victim, flames with vestal fire ; Nor mooned Queen of maids ; or, if thou'rt she, Ah, then, from Thee Let Bride and Bridegroom learn what kisses be ! In what veil'd hymn Or mystic dance Would he that were thy Priest advance Thine earthly praise, thy glory limn ? Say, should the feet that feel thy thought In double-center'd circuit run ; In that compulsive focus, Nought, In this a furnace like the sun ? And might some note of thy renown And high behest Thus in enigma be express'd : " There lies the crown Which all thy longing cures. Refuse it, Mortal, that it may be yours ! i84 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. It is a Spirit, though it seems red gold ; And such may no man, but by shunning, hold. Refuse it, though refusing be despair ; And thou shalt feel the phantom in thy hair." LOVE THINKING. 185 LOVE THINKING. WHAT lifts her in my thought so far Beyond all else ? Let Love not err ! 'Tis that which all right women are, But which I'll know in none but her. She is to me the only Ark Of that high mystery which locks The lips of joy, or speaks in dark Enigmas and in paradox ; That potent charm, which none can fly, Nor would, which makes me bond and free, Nor can I tell if first 'twas I Chose it, or it elected me ; Which, when I look intentest, lo, Cheats most mine eyes, albeit my heart, Content to feel and not to know, Perceives it all in every part ; I kiss its cheek ; its life divine Exhales from its resplendent shroud ; Ixion's fate reversed is mine, Authentic Juno seems a cloud ; i86 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. I feel a blessed warmth, I sec A bright circumference of rays, But darkness, where the sun should be, Fills admiration with amaze ; And when, for joy's relief, I think To fathom with the line of thought The well from which I, blissful, drink. The spring's so deep I come to nought. TO THE BODY. 187 TO THE BODY. /"CREATION'S and Creator's crowning good ; ^^ Wall of infinitude ; Foundation of the sky ; In Heaven forecast And long'd for from eternity, Though laid the last ; Reverberating dome, Of music cunningly built home Against the void and indolent disgrace Of unresponsive space ; Little, sequester'd pleasure-house For God and for His Spouse ; Elaborately, yea, past conceiving, fair, Since, from the graced decorum of the hair, Ev'n to the tingling, sweet Soles of the simple, earth-confiding feet, And from the inmost heart Outwards unto the thin Silk curtains of the skin, Every least part Astonish'd hears And sweet replies to some like region of the spheres ; i88 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Form'd for a dignity prophets but darkly name, Lest shameless men cry " Shame ! " So rich with wealth conceal'd That Heaven and Hell fight chiefly for this field; Clinging to ever)'thing that pleases thee With indefectible fidelity ; Alas, so true To all thy friendships that no grace Thee from thy sin can wholly disembrace ; Which thus 'bides with thee as the Jebusite, That, maugre all God's promises could do. The chosen People never conquer'd quite ; Who therefore lived with them, And that by formal truce and as of right. In metropolitan Jerusalem. For which false fealty Thou needs must, for a season, lie In the grave's arms, foul and unshriven, Albeit, in Heaven, Thy crimson-throbbing Glow Into its old abode aye pants to go, And does with envy see Enoch, Elijah, and the Lady, she Who left the lilies in her body's lieu. O, if the pleasures I have known in thee But my poor faith's poor first-fruits be. What quintessential, keen, ethereal bliss TO THE BODY. 189 Then shall be his Who has thy birth-time's consecrating dew For death's sweet chrism retain'd, Quick, tender, virginal, and unprofaned ! 190 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE OBSCURE HOPE. /'"^OUSIN, my thoughts no longer try ^^ To cast the fashion of the sky. Imagination can extend Scarcely in part to comprehend The sweetness of our common food Ambrosial, which ingratitude And impious inadvertence waste, Studious to eat but not to taste. And who can tell what's yet in store There, but that earthly things have more Of all that makes their inmost bliss. And life's an image still of this, But haply such a glorious one As is the rainbow of the sun ? Sweet are your words, but, after all Their mere reversal may befall The partners of His glories who Daily is crucified anew : Splendid privations, martyrdoms To which no weak remission comes ; Perpetual passion for the good Of them that feel no gratitude ; THE OBSCURE HOPE. 191 Far circlings, as of planets' fires, Round never-to-be-reach'd desires ; Whatever rapturously sighs That life is love, love sacrifice. All I am sure of heaven is this : Howe'er the mode, I shall not miss One true delight which I have known. Not on the changeful earth alone Shall loyalty remain unmoved T'wards everything I ever loved. So Heaven's voice calls, like Rachel's voice To Jacob in the field, " Rejoice ! Serve on some seven more sordid years, Too short for weariness or tears ; Serve on ; then, O Beloved, well-tried. Take me for ever as thy Bride ! " 192 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. DELICI^ SAPIENTI^ DE AMORE. T OVE, light for me -*-— ' Thy ruddiest blazing torch, That I, albeit a beggar by the Porch Of the glad Palace of Virginity, May gaze within, and sing the pomp I see ; For, crown'd with roses all, 'Tis there, O Love, they keep thy festival ! But first warn off the beatific spot Those wretched who have not Even afar beheld the shining wall. And those who, once beholding, have forgot, And those, most vile, who dress The charnel spectre drear Of utterly dishallow'd nothingness In that refulgent fame, And cry, Lo, here ! And name The Lady whose smiles inflame The sphere. Bring, Love, anear. And bid be not afraid Young Lover true, and love-foreboding Maid, DELICTI SAPIENTI^ DE AMORE. 193 And wedded Spouse, if virginal of thought ; For I will sing of nought Less sweet to hear Than seems A music in their half-remember'd dreams. The magnet calls the steel : Answers the iron to the magnet's breath ; What do they feel But death ! The clouds of summer kiss in flame and rain, And are not found again ; But the heavens themselves eternal are with fire Of unapproach'd desire, By the aching heart of Love, which cannot rest, In blissfullest pathos so indeed possess'd. O spousals high ; O doctrine blest, Unutterable in even the happiest sigh ; This know ye all Who can recall With what a welling of indignant tears Love's simpleness first hears The meaning of his mortal covenant, And from what pride comes down To wear the crown Of which 'twas very heaven to feel the want. How envies he the ways Of yonder hopeless star, O 194 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. And so would laugh and yearn With trembling lids eterne, Ineffably content from infinitely far Only to gaze On his bright Mistress's responding rays, That never know eclipse ; And, once in his long year, With pra^ternuptial ecstasy and fear, By the delicious law of that ellipse Wherein all citizens of ether move, With hastening pace to come Nearer, though never near, His Love And always inaccessible sweet Home ; There on his path doubly to burn, Kiss'd by her doubled light That whispers of its source. The ardent secret ever clothed with Night, Then go forth in new force Towards a new return. Rejoicing as a Bridegroom on his course ! This know ye all ; Therefore gaze bold. That so in you be joyful hope increas'd. Thorough the Palace portals, and behold The dainty and unsating Marriage-Feast. O, hear Them singing clear DELICI/E SAPIENTLE DE AMORE. 19 " Cor meum et caro mea " round the " I am," The Husband of the Heavens, and the Lamb Whom they for ever follow there that kept, Or, losing, never slept Till they reconquer'd had in mortal fight The standard white. O, hear From the harps they bore from Earth, five-strung, what music springs. While the glad Spirits chide The wondering strings ! And how the shining sacrificial Choirs, Offering for aye their dearest hearts' desires. Which to their hearts come back beatified, Hymn, the bright aisles along, The nuptial song. Song ever new to us and them, that saith, " Hail Virgin in Virginity a Spouse ! " Heard first below Within the little house At Nazareth ; Heard yet in many a cell where Brides of Christ Lie hid, emparadised, And where, although By the hour 'tis night, There's light. The Day still lingering in the lap of snow. Gaze and be not afraid 196 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Ye wedded few that honour, in sweet thought And ghttcring will, So freshly from the garden gather still The lily sacrificed ; For ye, though self-suspected here for nought, Are highly styled With the thousands twelve times twelve of undefiled. Gaze and be not afraid Young Lover true and love-foreboding Maid. The full noon of deific vision bright Abashes nor abates No spark minute of Nature's keen delight. Tis there your Hymen waits ! There where in courts afar all unconfused they crowd, As fumes the starlight soft In gulfs of cloud, And each to the other, well-content. Sighs oft, "'Twas this we meant ! " Gaze without blame Ye in whom living Love yet blushes for dead shame. There of pure Virgins none Is fairer seen, Save One, Than Mary Magdalene. Gaze without doubt or fear Ye to whom generous Love, by any name, is dear. DELICI^ SAPIENTI^ DE AMORE. 197 Love makes the life to be A fount perpetual of virginity ; For, lo, the Elect Of generous Love, how named soe'er, affect Nothing but God, Or mediate or direct, Nothing but God, The Husband of the Heavens : And who Him love, in potence great or small, Are, one and all, Heirs of the Palace glad And inly clad With the bridal robes of ardour virginal. 198 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. LOVE'S REALITY. I WALK, I trust, with open eyes ; I've travell'd half my worldly course ; And in the way behind me lies Much vanity and some remorse ; I've lived to feel how pride may part Spirits, tho' match'd like hand and glove ; I've blush'd for love's abode, the heart ; But have not disbelieved in love ; Nor unto love, sole mortal thing Of worth immortal, done the wrong To count it, with the rest that sing, Unworthy of a serious song ; And love is my reward ; for now, When most of dead'ning time complain, The myrtle blooms upon my brow. Its odour quickens all my brain. A WEDDING SERMON. 199 A WEDDING SERMON. npHE truths of Love are like the sea For clearness and for mystery. Of that sweet love which, startling, wakes Maiden and Youth, and mostly breaks The word of promise to the ear, But keeps it, after many a year, To the full spirit, how shall I speak ? My memory with age is weak, And I for hopes do oft suspect The things I seem to recollect. Yet who but must remember well 'Twas this made heaven intelligible As motive, though 'twas small the power The heart might have, for even an hour, To hold possession of the height Of nameless pathos and delight ! 2. In Godhead rise, thither flow back All loves, which, as they keep or lack. In their return, the course assign'd, Are virtue or sin. Love's every kind, 200 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Lofty or low, of spirit or sense, Desire is, or Benevolence. He who is fairer, better, higher Than all His works, claims all desire, And in His Poor, His Proxies, asks Our whole benevolence : He tasks, Howbeit, His People by their powers ; And if, my Children, you, for hours Daily, untortur'd in the heart. Can worship, and time's other part Give, without rough recoils of sense. To the claims ingrate of indigence, Happy are you, and fit to be Wrought to rare heights of sanctity. For the humble to grow humbler at. But if the flying spirit falls flat, After the modest spell of prayer That saves the day from sin and care, And the upward eye a void descries, And praises are hypocrisies, And, in the soul, o'erstrain'd for grace, A godless anguish grows apace ; Or, if impartial charity Seems, in the act, a sordid lie, Do not infer you cannot please God, or that He His promises Postpones, but be content to love No more than He accounts enough. A WEDDING SERMON. 201 Every ambition bears a curse, And none, if height metes error, worse Than his who sets his hope on more Godliness than God made him for. Account them poor enough who want Any good thing which you can grant ; And fathom well the depths of life In loves of Husband and of Wife, Child, Mother, Father ; simple keys To what cold faith calls mysteries. The love of marriage claims, above All other kinds, the name of love. As perfectest, though not so high As love which Heaven with single eye Considers. Equal and entire. Therein Benevolence, Desire, Elsewhere ill-join'd or found apart, Become the pulses of one heart. Which now contracts, and now dilates. And, both to the height exalting, mates Self-seeking to self-sacrifice. Nay, in its subtle paradise (When purest) this one love unites All modes of these two opposites. All balanced in accord so rich Who may determine which is which .'' 202 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Chiefly God's Love does in it live, And nowhere else so sensitive ; For each is all that the other's eye, In the vague vast of Deity, Can comprehend and so contain As still to touch and ne'er to strain The fragile nerves of joy. And then 'Tis such a wise goodwill to men And politic economy As in a prosperous State we see, Where every plot of common land Is yielded to some private hand To fence about and cultivate. Does narrowness its praise abate ? Nay, the infinite of man is found But in the beating of its bound, And, if a brook its banks o'erpass, 'Tis not a sea, but a morass. 4. No giddiest hope, no wildest guess Of Love's most innocent loftiness Had dared to dream of its own worth, Till Heaven's bold sun-gleam lit the earth. Christ's marriage with the Church is more, My Children, than a metaphor. The heaven of heavens is symbol'd where The torch of Psyche flash'd despair. A WEDDING SERMON. 203 But here I speak of heights, and heights Are hardly scaled. The best delights Of even this homeliest passion, are In the most perfect souls so rare, That they who feel them are as men Sailing the Southern ocean, when, At midnight, they look up, and eye The starry Cross, and a strange sky Of brighter stars ; and sad thoughts come To each how far he is from home. 5- Love's inmost nuptial sweetness see In the doctrine of virginity ! Could lovers, at their dear wish, blend, 'Twould kill the bliss which they intend ; For joy is love's obedience Against the law of natural sense ; And those perpetual yearnings sweet Of lives which dream that they can meet Are given that lovers never may Be without sacrifice to lay On the high altar of true love, With tears of vestal joy. To move Frantic, like comets to our bliss. Forgetting that we always miss. And so to seek and fly the sun. By turns, around which love should run, 204 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Perverts the ineffable delight Of service guerdon'd with full sight And pathos of a hopeless want, To an unreal victory's vaunt, And plaint of an unreal defeat. Yet no less dangerous misconceit May also be of the virgin will, Whose goal is nuptial blessing still, And whose true being doth subsist. There where outward forms are miss'd, In those who learn and keep the sense Divine of "due benevolence," Seeking for aye, without alloy Of selfish thought, another's joy, And finding in degrees unknown, That which in act they shunn'd, their own. For all delights of earthly love Are shadows of the heavens, and move As other shadows do : they flee From him that follows them ; and he Who flies, for ever finds his feet Embraced by their pursuings sweet. 6. Then, even in love humane, do I Not counsel aspirations high, So much as sweet and regular Use of the good in which we are. A WEDDING SERMON. 205 As when a man along the ways Walks, and a sudden music plays, His step unchanged, he steps in time, So let your Grace with Nature chime. Her primal forces burst, like straws, The bonds of uncongenial laws. Right life is glad as well as just, And, rooted strong in " This I must," It bears aloft the blossom gay And zephyr-toss'd, of " This I may ; " Whereby the complex heavens rejoice In fruits of uncommanded choice. Be this your rule : seeking delight, Esteem success the test of right ; For 'gainst God's will much may be done. But nought enjoy'd, and pleasures none Exist, but, like to springs of steel Active no longer than they feel The checks that make them serve the soul, They take their vigour from control. A man need only keep but well The Church's indispensable First precepts, and she then allows. Nay, more, she bids him leave, for his spouse, Even his heavenly Father's awe. At times, and his immaculate law. Construed in its extremer sense. Jehovah's mild magnipotence 2o6 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Smiles to behold His children play In their own free and childish way, And can His fullest praise descry In the exuberant liberty Of those who, having understood The glory of the Central Good, And how souls ne'er may match or merge, But as they thitherward converge, Take, in love's innocent gladness, part. With infantine, untroubled heart, And faith that, straight t'wards heaven's far Spring Sleeps, like the swallow, on the wing. 7- Lovers, once married, deem their bond ' Then perfect, scanning nought beyond For love to do but to sustain The spousal hour's delighted gain. But time and a right life alone Fulfil the promise then foreshown. The Bridegroom and the Bride withal Are but unwrought material Of marriage ; nay, so far is love, Thus crown'd, for being thereto enough, Without the long, compulsive awe Of duty, that the bond of law Does oftener marriage-love evoke. Than love, which does not wear the yoke A WEDDING SERMON. 207 Of legal vows, submits to be Self-rein'd from ruinous liberty. Lovely is love ; but age well knows 'Twas law which kept the lover's vows Inviolate through the year or years Of worship pieced with panic fears, When she who lay within his breast Seem'd of all women perhaps the best, But not the whole, of womankind, Or love, in his yet wayward mind, Had ghastly doubts its precious life Was pledged for aye to the wrong wife. Could it be else ? A youth pursues A maid, whom chance, not he, did choose. Till to his strange arms hurries she In a despair of modesty. Then simply and without pretence Of insight or experience, They plight their vows. The parents say, " We cannot speak them yea or nay ; The thing proceedeth from the Lord ! " And wisdom still approves their word ; For God created so these two They match as well as others do That take more pains, and trust Him less Who never fails, if ask'd, to bless His children's helpless ignorance And blind election of life's chance. 2o8 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Verily, choice not matters much, If but the woman's truly such, And the young man has led the life Without which how shall e'er the wife Be the one woman in the world ? Love's sensitive, tendrils sicken, curl'd Round folly's former stay ; for 'tis The doom of all unsanction'd bliss To mock some good that, gain'd, keeps still The taint of the rejected ill. 8. Howbeit, though both were perfect, she Of whom the maid was prophecy As yet lives not, and Love rebels Against the law of any else ; And, as a steed takes blind alarm, Disowns the rein, and hunts his harm. So, misdespairing word and act May now perturb the happiest pact. The more, indeed, is love, the more Peril to love is now in store. Against it nothing can be done But only this : leave ill alone ! Who tries to mend his wife succeeds As he who knows not what he needs. He much affronts a worth as high As his, and that equality A WEDDING SERMON. 209 Of spirits in which abide the grace And joy of her subjected place ; And does the still growth check and blur Of contraries, confusing her Who better knows what he desires Than he, and to that mark aspires With perfect zeal, and a deep wit Which nothing helps but trusting it. So, loyally o'erlooking all In which love's promise short may fall Of full performance, honour that As won, which aye love worketh at ! It is but as the pedigree Of perfectness which is to be That our best good can honour claim ; Yet honour to deny were shame And robbery ; for it is the mould Wherein to beauty runs the gold Of good intention, and the prop That lifts to the sun the earth-drawn crop Of human sensibilities. Such honour, with a conduct wise In common things, as, not to steep The lofty mind of love in sleep Of over much familiarness ; Not to degrade its kind caress, As those do that can feel no more, So give themselves to pleasures o'er ; p 210 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Not to let morning-sloth destroy The evening-flower, domestic joy ; Not by uxoriousness to chill The warm devotion of her will Who can but half her love confer On him that cares for nought but her ; — These, and like obvious prudencies Observed, he's safest that relies, For the hope she will not always seem, Caught, but a laurel or a stream, On time ; on her unsearchable Love-wisdom ; on their work done well. Discreet with mutual aid ; on might Of shared affliction and delight ; On pleasures that so childish be They're 'shamed to let the children see, By which life keeps the valleys low Where love does naturally grow ; On much whereof hearts have account, Though heads forget ; on babes, chief fount Of union, and for which babes are No less than this for them, nay far More, for the bond of man and wife To the very verge of future life Strengthens, and yearns for brighter day, While others, with their use, decay ; And, though true marriage purpose keeps Of offspring, as the centre sleeps A WEDDING SERMON. 211 Within the wheel, transmitting thence Fury to the circumference, Love's self the noblest offspring is, And sanction of the nuptial kiss ; Lastly, on cither's primal curse, Which help and sympathy reverse To blessings. 9- God, who may be well Jealous of His chief miracle. Bids sleep the meddling soul of man, Through the long process of this plan, Whereby, from his unweeting side, The Wife's created, and the Bride, That chance one of her strange, sweet sex He to his glad life did annex, Grows more and more, by day and night, The one in the whole world opposite Of him, and in her nature all So suited and reciprocal To his especial form of sense, Affection, and intelligence. That, whereas love at first had strange Relapses into lust of change. It now finds (wondrous this, but true !) The long-accustom'd only new, 212 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. And the untried common ; and, whereas An equal seeming danger was Of Hkeness lacking joy and force, Or difference reaching to divorce, Now can the finish'd lover see Marvel of me most far from me, Whom without pride he may admire, Without Narcissus' doom desire, Serve without selfishness, and love " Even as himself," in sense above Niggard "as much," yea, as she is The only part of him that's his. lO. I do not say love's youth returns ; That joy which so divinely yearns ! But just esteem of present good Shows all regret such gratitude As if the sparrow in her nest. Her woolly young beneath her breast. Should these despise, and sorrow for Her five blue eggs that are no more. Nor say I the fruit has quite the scope Of the flower's spiritual hope. Love's best is service, and of this, Howe'er devout, use dulls the bliss. Though love is all of earth that's dear, Its home, my Children, is not here : A WEDDING SERMON. 21; The pathos of eternity Does in its fullest pleasure sigh. Be grateful and most glad thereof. Parting, as 'tis, is pain enough. If love, by joy, has learn'd to give Praise with the nature sensitive, At last, to God, we then possess The end of mortal happiness. And henceforth very well may wait The unbarring of the golden gate, Wherethrough, already, faith can see That apter to each wish than we Is God, and curious to bless Better than we devise or guess ; Not without condescending craft To disappoint with bliss, and waft Our vessels frail, when worst He mocks The heart with breakers and with rocks, To happiest havens. You have heard Your bond death-sentenced by His Word. What, if, in heaven, the name be o'er, Because the thing is so much more? All are, 'tis writ, as angels there. Nor male nor female. Each a stair In the hierarchical ascent Of active and recipient Affections, what if all are both By turn, as they themselves betroth 214 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. To adoring what is next above, Or serving what's below their love? Of this we are certified, that we Are shaped here for eternity, So that a careless word will make Its dint upon the form we take For ever. If, then, years have wrought Two strangers to become, in thought, Will, and affection, but one man For likeness, as none others can. Without like process, shall this tree The king of all the forest, be, Alas, the only one of all That shall not lie where it doth fall ? Shall this unflagging flame, here nursed By everything, yea, when reversed. Blazing, in fury, brighter, wink. Flicker, and into darkness shrink, When all else glows, baleful or brave, In the keen air beyond the grave? Beware ; for fiends in triumph laugh O'er him who learns the truth by half ! Beware ; for God will not endure For men to make their hope more pure Than His good promise, or require Another than the five-string'd lyre Which He has vow'd again to the hands Devout of him who understands A WEDDING SERMON. 215 To tune it justly here ! Beware The Powers of Darkness and the Air, Which lure to empty heights man's hope, Bepraising heaven's ethereal cope, But covering with their cloudy cant Its ground of solid adamant, That strengthens ether for the flight Of angels, makes and measures height, And in materiality Exceeds our Earth's in such degree As all else Earth exceeds ! Do I Here utter aught too dark or high ? Have you not seen a bird's beak slay Proud Psyche, on a summer's day ? Down fluttering drop the frail wings four. Missing the weight which made them soar Spirit is heavy Nature's wing, And is not rightly anything Without its burthen, whereas this. Wingless, at least a maggot is, And, wing'd, is honour and delight Increasing endlessly with height. II. If unto any here that chance Fell not, which makes a month's romance, Remember, few wed whom they would. And this, like all God's laws, is good ; 2i6 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. For nought's so sad, the whole world o'er, As much love which has once been more. Glorious for light is the earliest love ; But worldly things, in the rays thereof, Extend their shadows every one False as the image which the sun At noon or eve dwarfs or protracts. A perilous lamp to light men's acts ! By Heaven's kind, impartial plan, Well-wived is he that's truly man If but the woman's womanly, As such a man's is sure to be. Joy of all eyes and pride of life Perhaps she is not ; the likelier wife ! If it be thus ; if you have known (As who has not .'') some heavenly one, Whom the dull background of despair Help'd to show forth supremely fair ; If memory, still remorseful, shapes Young Passion bringing Eshcol grapes To travellers in the Wilderness, This truth will make regret the less : Mighty in love as graces are, God's ordinance is mightier far ; And he who is but just and kind And patient, shall for guerdon find, Before long, that the body's bond Is all else utterly beyond A WEDDING SERMON. 217 In power of love to actualise The soul's bond which it signifies, And even to deck a wife with grace External in the form and face. A five years' wife, and not yet fair ! Blame let the man, not Nature, bear ! For, as the sun, warming a bank Where last year's grass droops grey and dank, Evokes the violet, bids disclose In yellow crowds the fresh primrose. And foxglove hang her flushing head. So vernal love, where all seems dead. Makes beauty abound. Then was that nought, That trance of joy beyond all thought. The vision, in one, of womanhood ? Nay, for all women holding good, Should marriage such a prologue want, 'Twere sordid and most ignorant Profanity ; but, having this, 'Tis honour now, and future bliss ; For where is he that, knowing the height And depth of ascertain'd delight. Inhumanly henceforward lies Content with mediocrities ! 2i8 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. THE NURSLING OF CIVILITY. T O, how the woman once was woo'd ; -* — ' Forth leapt the savage from his lair And fell'd her, and to nuptials rude He dragg'd her, bleeding, by the hair. From that to Chloe's dainty wiles And Portia's dignified consent. What distance ! But these pagan styles How far below Time's far intent ! Siegfried sued Kriemhild. Sweeter life Could Love's self covet ? Yet 'tis sung In what rough sort he chid his wife For want of curb upon her tongue ! Shall Love, where last I leave him, halt ? Nay ; none can fancy or foresee To how strange bliss may time exalt This nursling of civility. SPONSA DEI. 219 SPONSA DEL T 17 HAT is this Maiden fair * * The laughing of whose eye Is in man's heart renew'd virginity ; Who yet sick longing breeds For marriage which exceeds The inventive guess of Love to satisfy With hope of utter binding and of loosing endless dear despair? What gleams about her shine, More transient than delight and more divine ! If she does something but a little sweet, As gaze towards the glass to set her hair, See how his soul falls humbled at her feet ! Her gentle step, to go or come, Gains her more merit than a martyrdom ; And, if she dance, it doth such grace confer As opes the heaven of heavens to more than her, And makes a rival of her worshipper. To die unknown for her were little cost ! So is she without guile, Her mere refused smile Makes up the sum of that which may be lost ! 220 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Who is this Fair Whom each hath seen, The darkest once in this bewailed dell. Be he not destined for the glooms of hell? Whom each hath seen And known, with sharp remorse and sweet, as Queen And tear-glad Mistress of his hopes of bliss, Too fair for man to kiss ? Who is this only happy She, Whom, by a frantic flight of courtesy Born of despair Of better lodging for his Spirit fair. He adores as Margaret, Maude, or Cecily ? And what this sigh, That each one heaves for earth's last lowlihead And the Heaven high Ineffably lock'd in dateless bridal-bed? Are all, then, mad, or is it prophecy ? " Sons now we are of God," as we have heard, " But what we shall be hath not yet appear'd." O Heart, remember thee That man is none. Save One. What if this Lady be thy soul, and He Who claims to enjoy her sacred beauty be, Not thou, but God ; and thy sick fire A female vanity, Such as a bride, viewing her mirror'd charms. SPONSA DEI. 221 Feels whens he sighs, " All these are for his arms ! ' A reflex heat Flash'd on thy cheek from His immense desire Which waits to crown, beyond thy brain's conceit, Thy nameless, secret, hopeless longing sweet, Not by-and-by, but now. Unless deny Him thou ! 222 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. AUREA DICTA. T) ECO ME whatever good you see, Nor sigh if, forthwith, fades from view The grace of which you may not be The subject and spectator too. II. You love ? That's high as you shall go ; For 'tis as true as Gospel text, Not noble then is never so. Either in this world or the next. III. Love, kiss'd by Wisdom, wakes twice Love, And Wisdom is, thro' loving, wise. Let Dove and Snake, and Snake and Dove, This Wisdom's be, that Love's device. IV. 'Tis truth (although this truth's a star Too deep-enskied for all to see), As poets of grammar, lovers are The fountains of morality. AUREA DICTA. 223 V. Kind souls, you wonder why, love you, When you, you wonder why, love none. We love, Fool, for the good we do. Not that which unto us is done ! VI. Endow the Fool with sun and moon, Being his, he holds them mean and low. But to the wise a little boon Is great, because the giver's so. VII. To tryst Love blindfold goes, for fear He should not see, and eyeless night He chooses still for breathing near Beauty, that lives but in the sight. VIII. " I saw you take his kiss !" " 'Tis true." " O modesty !" " 'Twas strictly kept : He thought me asleep ; at least, I knew He thought I thought he thought I slept." IX. " I'll hunt for dangers North and South, To prove my love, which sloth maligns !" What seems to say her rosy mouth ? " I'm not convinced by proofs but signs." 224 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. X. I vow'd unvarying faith, and she, To whom in full I pay that vow, Rewards me with variety Which men who change can never know. XL Did first his beauty wake her sighs ? That's Lais ! Thus Lucretia's known : The beauty in her Lover's eyes Was admiration of her own. XII. The lack of lovely pride, in her Who strives to please, my pleasure numbs, And still the Maid I most prefer Whose care to please with pleasing comes. XIII. Who pleasure follows pleasure slays ; God's wrath upon himself he wreaks ; But all delights rejoice his days Who takes with thanks, and never seeks. XIV. The wrong is made and measured by The right's inverted dignity. Change love to shame, as love is high So low in hell your bed shall be. ARBOR VIT.E. 225 ARBOR VIT^. "\ 1 7"ITH honeysuckle, over-sweet, festoon'd ; * • With bitter ivy bound ; Terraced with funguses unsound ; Deform'd with many a boss And closed scar, o'ercushion'd deep with moss Bunch'd all about with pagan mistletoe ; And thick with nests of the hoarse bird That talks, but understands not his own word ; Stands, and so stood a thousand years ago, A single tree. Thunder has done its worst among its twigs, Where the great crest yet blackens, never pruned, But in its heart, alway Ready to push new verdurous boughs whene'er The rotten saplings near it fall and leave it air, Is all antiquity and no decay. Rich, though rejected by the forest-pigs, Its fruit, beneath whose rough, concealing rind They that will break it find Heart-succouring savour of each several meat, And kernell'd drink of brain-renewing power. With bitter condiment and sour, Q 226 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. And sweet economy of sweet, And odours that remind Of haunts of childhood and a different day. Beside this tree, Praising no Gods nor blaming, sans a wish Sits, Tartar-like, the Time's civility. And eats its dead-dog off a golden dish. LADY CLITHEROE TO EMILY GRAHAM. 227 LADY CLITHEROE TO EMILY GRAHAM. A /r Y dearest Niece, I'm charm'd to hear -*■ The scenery's fine at Windermere, And glad a six-weeks' wife defers In the least to wisdom not yet hers. But, Child, I've no advice to give ! Rules only make it hard to live. And Where's the good of having been Well taught from seven to seventeen. If, married, you may not leave off, And say, at last, ' I'm good enough !' Weeding out folly, still leave some. It gives both lightness and aplomb. We know, however wise by rule, Woman is still by nature fool ; And men have sense to like her all The more when she is natural. 'Tis true that, if we choose, we can Mock to a miracle the man ; But iron in the fire red hot, Though 'tis the heat, the fire 'tis not : And who, for such a feint, would pledge The babe's and woman's privilege, No duties and a thousand rights? Besides, defect love's flow incites, 228 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. As water in a well will run Only the while 'tis drawn upon. ' Point de culte sans mystere,' you say, 'And what if that should die away?' Child, never fear that either could Pull from Saint Cupid's face the hood. The follies natural to each Surpass the other's moral reach. Just think how men, with sword and gun, Will really fight, and never run ; And all in sport ; for they'd have died, For sixpence more, on the other side ! A woman's heart must ever warm At such odd ways ; and, so, we charm By strangeness which, the more they mark. The more men get into the dark. The marvel, by familiar life, Grows, and attaches to the wife By whom it grows. Thus, silly Girl, To John you'll always be the pearl In the oyster of the universe ; And, though in time he'll treat you worse, He'll love you more, you need not doubt, And never, never find you out ! My dear, I know that dreadful thought That you've been kinder than you ought. It almost makes you hate him ! Yet 'Tis wonderful how men forget, LADY CLITHEROE TO EMILY GRAHAM. 229 And how a merciful Providence Deprives our husbands of all sense Of kindness past, and makes them deem We always were what now we seem. For their own good we must, you know, However plain the way we go, Still make it strange with stratagem ; And instinct tells us that, to them, 'Tis always right to bate their price. Yet I must say they're rather nice, And, oh, so easily taken in To cheat them almost seems a sin ! And, dearest, 'twould be most unfair To John your feelings to compare With his, or any man's ; for she Who loves at all loves always ; he, ■ Who loves far more, loves yet by fits. And, when the wayward wind remits To blow, his feelings faint and drop, Like forge-flames when the bellows stop. Such things don't trouble you at all, When once you know they are natural. My love to John ; and, pray, my dear, Don't let me see you for a year ; Unless, indeed, ere then you've learn'd That Beauties wed are blossoms turn'd To unripe codlings, meant to dwell In modest shadow hidden well, 230 FLORILEGIUM AMANTIS. Till this green stage again permute To glow of flowers with good of fruit. I will not have my patience tried By your absurd new-married pride, That scorns the world's slow-gather'd sense, Ties up the hands of Providence, Rules babes, before there's hope of one, Better than mothers e'er have done. And for your poor particular. Neglects delights and graces far Beyond your crude and thin conceit. Age has romance almost as sweet, And much more generous than this Of yours and John's. With all the bliss Of the evenings when you coo'd with him, And upset home for your sole whim. You might have envied, were you wise. The tears within your mother's eyes, Which, I dare say, you did not see. But let that pass ! Yours yet will be, I hope, as happy, kind, and true As lives which now seem void to you. Have you not seen shop-painters paste Their gold in sheets, then rub to waste Full half, and, lo, you read the name ? Well, Time, my dear, does much the same With this unmeaning glare of love. END. COVENTRY PATMORE'S POEMS. 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