The Home Book of Verse Volume Ii Part 174

Breathe low her name, my soul; for that means more.

x.x.xIV THE DARK GLa.s.s Not I myself know all my love for thee: How should I reach so far, who cannot weigh To-morrow's dower by gage of yesterday?

Shall birth and death, and all dark names that be As doors and windows bared to some loud sea, Lash deaf mine ears and blind my face with spray; And shall my sense pierce love,--the last relay And ultimate outpost of eternity?

Lo! what am I to Love, the lord of all?

One murmuring sh.e.l.l he gathers from the sand,-- One little heart-flame sheltered in his hand.

Yet through thine eyes he grants me clearest call And veriest touch of powers primordial That any hour-girt life may understand.

XLIX WILLOWWOOD I sat with Love upon a woodside well, Leaning across the water, I and he; Nor ever did he speak nor looked at me, But touched his lute wherein was audible The certain secret thing he had to tell: Only our mirrored eyes met silently In the low wave; and that sound came to be The pa.s.sionate voice I knew; and my tears fell.

And at their fall, his eyes beneath grew hers; And with his foot and with his wing-feathers He swept the spring that watered my heart's drouth.

Then the dark ripples spread to waving hair, And as I stooped, her own lips rising there Bubbled with br.i.m.m.i.n.g kisses at my mouth.

LXXVIII BODY'S BEAUTY Or Adam's first wife, Lilith, it is told (The witch he loved before the gift of Eve,) That, ere the snake's, her sweet tongue could deceive, And her enchanted hair was the first gold.

And still she sits, young while the earth is old, And, subtly of herself contemplative, Draws men to watch the bright web she can weave, Till heart and body and life are in its hold.

The rose and poppy are her flowers: for where Is he not found, O Lilith! whom shed scent And soft-shed kisses and soft sleep shall snare?

Lo! as that youth's eyes burned at thine, so went Thy spell through him, and left his straight neck bent, And round his heart one strangling golden hair.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti [1828-1882]

SONNETS

MEETING They made the chamber sweet with flowers and leaves, And the bed sweet with flowers on which I lay; While my soul, love-bound, loitered on its way.

I did not hear the birds about the eaves, Nor hear the reapers talk among the sheaves: Only my soul kept watch from day to day, My thirsty soul kept watch for one away:-- Perhaps he loves, I thought, remembers, grieves.

At length there came the step upon the stair, Upon the lock the old familiar hand: Then first my spirit seemed to scent the air Of Paradise; then first the tardy sand Of time ran golden; and I felt my hair Put on a glory, and my soul expand.

THE FIRST DAY I wish I could remember the first day, First hour, first moment of your meeting me, If bright or dim the season, it might be Summer or Winter for aught I can say; So unrecorded did it slip away, So blind was I to see and to foresee, So dull to mark the budding of my tree That would not blossom yet for many a May.

If only I could recollect it, such A day of days! I let it come and go As traceless as a thaw of bygone snow; It seemed to mean so little, meant so much; If only now I could recall that touch, First touch of hand in hand--Did one but know!

REMEMBER Remember me when I am gone away, Gone far away into the silent land; When you can no more hold me by the hand, Nor I half turn to go, yet turning stay.

Remember me when no more, day by day, You tell me of our future that you planned: Only remember me; you understand It will be late to counsel then or pray.

Yet if you should forget me for a while And afterwards remember, do not grieve: For if the darkness and corruption leave A vestige of the thoughts that once I had, Better by far you should forget and smile Than that you should remember and be sad.

REST O earth, lie heavily upon her eyes; Seal her sweet eyes weary of watching, Earth; Lie close around her; leave no room for mirth With its harsh laughter, nor for sound of sighs.

She hath no questions, she hath no replies, Hushed in and curtained with a blessed dearth Of all that irked her from the hour of birth; With stillness that is almost Paradise.

Darkness more clear than noonday holdeth her, Silence more musical than any song; Even her very heart has ceased to stir: Until the morning of Eternity Her rest shall not begin nor end, but be; And when she wakes she will not think it long.

Christina Georgina Rossetti [1830-1894]

HOW MY SONGS OF HER BEGAN

G.o.d made my lady lovely to behold;-- Above the painter's dream he set her face, And wrought her body in divinest grace; He touched the brown hair with a sense of gold, And in the perfect form He did enfold What was alone as perfect, the sweet heart; Knowledge most rare to her He did impart, And filled with love and wors.h.i.+p all her days.

And then G.o.d thought Him how it would be well To give her music, and to Love He said, "Bring thou some minstrel now that he may tell How fair and sweet a thing My hands have made."

Then at Love's call I came, bowed down my head, And at His will my lyre grew audible.

Philip Bourke Marston [1850-1887]

AT THE LAST

Because the shadows deepened verily,-- Because the end of all seemed near, forsooth,-- Her gracious spirit, ever quick to ruth, Had pity on her bond-slave, even on me.

She came in with the twilight noiselessly, Fair as a rose, immaculate as Truth; She leaned above my wrecked and wasted youth; I felt her presence, which I could not see.

"G.o.d keep you, my poor friend," I heard her say; And then she kissed my dry, hot lips and eyes.

Kiss thou the next kiss, quiet Death, I pray; Be instant on this hour, and so surprise My spirit while the vision seems to stay; Take thou the heart with the heart's Paradise.

Philip Bourke Marston [1850-1887]

TO ONE WHO WOULD MAKE A CONFESSION

On! leave the past to bury its own dead.

The past is naught to us, the present all.

What need of last year's leaves to strew Love's bed?

What need of ghosts to grace a festival?

I would not, if I could, those days recall, Those days not ours. For us the feast is spread, The lamps are lit, and music plays withal.

Then let us love and leave the rest unsaid.

This island is our home. Around it roar Great gulfs and oceans, channels, straits and seas.

What matter in what wreck we reached the sh.o.r.e, So we both reached it? We can mock at these.

Oh leave the past, if past indeed there be; I would not know it; I would know but thee.

Wilfrid Scawen Blunt [1840-1922]

THE PLEASURES OF LOVE

I do not care for kisses. 'Tis a debt We paid for the first privilege of love.

These are the rains of April which have wet Our fallow hearts and forced their germs to move.

Now the green corn has sprouted. Each new day Brings better pleasures, a more dear surprise, The blade, the ear, the harvest--and our way Leads through a region wealthy grown and wise.

We now compare our fortunes. Each his store Displays to kindred eyes of garnered grain, Two happy farmers, learned in love's lore, Who weigh and touch and argue and complain-- Dear endless argument! Yet sometimes we Even as we argue kiss. There! Let it be.

Wilfrid Scawen Blunt [1840-1922]

"WERE BUT MY SPIRIT LOOSED UPON THE AIR"

Were but my spirit loosed upon the air,-- By some High Power who could Life's chains unbind, Set free to seek what most it longs to find,-- To no proud Court of Kings would I repair: I would but climb, once more, a narrow stair, When day was wearing late, and dusk was kind; And one should greet me to my failings blind, Content so I but shared his twilight there.

Nay! well I know he waits not as of old,-- I could not find him in the old-time place,-- I must pursue him, made by sorrow bold, Through worlds unknown, in strange celestial race, Whose mystic round no traveller has told, From star to star, until I see his face.