The Hundred Best English Poems Part 18

Bird thou never wert, That from heaven, or near it, Pourest thy full heart In profuse strains of unpremeditated art.

Higher still and higher From the earth thou springest Like a cloud of fire; The blue deep thou wingest, And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest.

In the golden lightning Of the sunken sun, O'er which clouds are brightning, Thou dost float and run; Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun.

The pale purple even Melts around thy flight; Like a star of heaven, In the broad day-light Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight,

Keen as are the arrows Of that silver sphere, Whose intense lamp narrows In the white dawn clear, Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there.

All the earth and air With thy voice is loud, As, when night is bare, From one lonely cloud The moon rains out her beams, and heaven is overflowed.

What thou art we know not; What is most like thee?

From rainbow clouds there flow not Drops so bright to see, As from thy presence showers a rain of melody.

Like a poet hidden In the light of thought, Singing hymns unbidden, Till the world is wrought To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not:

Like a high-born maiden In a palace tower, Soothing her love-laden Soul in secret hour With music sweet as love, which overflows her bower:

Like a glow-worm golden In a dell of dew, Scattering unbeholden Its aerial hue Among the flowers and gra.s.s, which screen it from the view:

Like a rose embowered In its own green leaves, By warm winds deflowered, Till the scent it gives Makes faint with too much sweet these heavy-winged thieves:

Sound of vernal showers On the twinkling gra.s.s, Rain-awakened flowers, All that ever was Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music doth surpa.s.s:

Teach us, sprite or bird, What sweet thoughts are thine: I have never heard Praise of love or wine That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine.

Chorus Hymenaeal, Or triumphal chaunt, Matched with thine would be all But an empty vaunt, A thing wherein we feel there is some hidden want.

What objects are the fountains Of thy happy strain?

What fields, or waves, or mountains?

What shapes of sky or plain?

What love of thine own kind? what ignorance of pain?

With thy clear keen joyance Languor cannot be: Shadow of annoyance Never came near thee: Thou lovest; but ne'er knew love's sad satiety.

Waking or asleep, Thou of death must deem Things more true and deep Than we mortals dream, Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream?

We look before and after, And pine for what is not: Our sincerest laughter With some pain is fraught; Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.

Yet if we could scorn Hate, and pride, and fear; If we were things born Not to shed a tear, I know not how thy joy we ever should come near.

Better than all measures Of delightful sound, Better than all treasures That in books are found, Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground!

Teach me half the gladness That thy brain must know, Such harmonious madness From my lips would flow, The world should listen then, as I am listening now.

77. _Chorus from 'h.e.l.las.'_

The world's great age begins anew, The golden years return, The earth doth like a snake renew Her winter weeds outworn: Heaven smiles, and faiths and empires gleam, Like wrecks of a dissolving dream.

A brighter h.e.l.las rears its mountains From waves serener far; A new Peneus rolls his fountains Against the morning-star.

Where fairer Tempes bloom, there sleep Young Cyclads on a sunnier deep.

A loftier Argo cleaves the main, Fraught with a later prize; Another Orpheus sings again, And loves, and weeps, and dies.

A new Ulysses leaves once more Calypso for his native sh.o.r.e.

O, write no more the tale of Troy, If earth Death's scroll must be!

Nor mix with Laian rage the joy Which dawns upon the free: Although a subtler Sphinx renew Riddles of death Thebes never knew.

Another Athens shall arise, And to remoter time Bequeath, like sunset to the skies, The splendour of its prime; And leave, if nought so bright may live, All earth can take or Heaven can give.

Saturn and Love their long repose Shall burst, more bright and good Than all who fell, than One who rose, Than many unsubdued: Not gold, not blood, their altar dowers, But votive tears and symbol flowers.

O cease! must hate and death return?

Cease! must men kill and die?

Cease! drain not to its dregs the urn Of bitter prophecy.

The world is weary of the past, O might it die or rest at last!

78. _Stanzas. Written in Dejection, near Naples._

I.

The sun is warm, the sky is clear, The waves are dancing fast and bright, Blue isles and snowy mountains wear The purple noon's transparent might, The breath of the moist earth is light, Around its unexpanded buds; Like many a voice of one delight, The winds, the birds, the ocean floods, The City's voice itself is soft like Solitude's.

II.

I see the Deep's untrampled floor With green and purple seaweeds strown; I see the waves upon the sh.o.r.e, Like light dissolved in star-showers, thrown: I sit upon the sands alone, The lightning of the noon-tide ocean Is flas.h.i.+ng round me, and a tone Arises from its measured motion, How sweet! did any heart now share in my emotion.

III.

Alas! I have nor hope nor health, Nor peace within nor calm around, Nor that content surpa.s.sing wealth The sage in meditation found, And walked with inward glory crowned-- Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leisure.

Others I see whom these surround-- Smiling they live and call life pleasure;-- To me that cup has been dealt in another measure.

IV.

Yet now despair itself is mild, Even as the winds and waters are; I could lie down like a tired child, And weep away the life of care Which I have borne and yet must bear, Till death like sleep might steal on me, And I might feel in the warm air My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony.

V.

Some might lament that I were cold, As I, when this sweet day is gone, Which my lost heart, too soon grown old, Insults with this untimely moan; They might lament--for I am one Whom men love not,--and yet regret, Unlike this day, which, when the sun Shall in its stainless glory set, Will linger, though enjoyed, like joy in memory yet.

79. _The Indian Serenade._

I.

I arise from dreams of thee In the first sweet sleep of night, When the winds are breathing low, And the stars are s.h.i.+ning bright: I arise from dreams of thee, And a spirit in my feet Hath led me--who knows how?

To thy chamber window, Sweet!