The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning Volume II Part 32

Must this deep sigh of thine own Haunt thee with humanity?

Green visioned banks that are too steep To be o'erbrowzed by the sheep, May all sad thoughts adown you creep Without a shepherd? Mighty sea, Can we dwarf thy magnitude And fit it to our straitest mood?

O fair, fair Nature, are we thus Impotent and querulous Among thy workings glorious, Wealth and sanct.i.ties, that still Leave us vacant and defiled And wailing like a soft-kissed child, Kissed soft against his will?

XI.

G.o.d, G.o.d!

With a child's voice I cry, Weak, sad, confidingly-- G.o.d, G.o.d!

Thou knowest, eyelids, raised not always up Unto Thy love, (as none of ours are) droop As ours, o'er many a tear; Thou knowest, though Thy universe is broad, Two little tears suffice to cover all: Thou knowest, Thou who art so prodigal Of beauty, we are oft but stricken deer Expiring in the woods, that care for none Of those delightsome flowers they die upon.

XII.

O blissful Mouth which breathed the mournful breath We name our souls, self-spoilt!--by that strong pa.s.sion Which paled Thee once with sighs, by that strong death Which made Thee once unbreathing--from the wrack Themselves have called around them, call them back, Back to Thee in continuous aspiration!

For here, O Lord, For here they travel vainly, vainly pa.s.s From city-pavement to untrodden sward Where the lark finds her deep nest in the gra.s.s Cold with the earth's last dew. Yea, very vain The greatest speed of all these souls of men Unless they travel upward to the throne Where sittest THOU the satisfying ONE, With help for sins and holy perfectings For all requirements: while the archangel, raising Unto Thy face his full ecstatic gazing, Forgets the rush and rapture of his wings.

_TO BETTINE,_

THE CHILD-FRIEND OF GOETHE.

"I have the second sight, Goethe!"--_Letters of a Child._

I.

Bettine, friend of Goethe, _Hadst_ thou the second sight-- Upturning wors.h.i.+p and delight With such a loving duty To his grand face, as women will, The childhood 'neath thine eyelids still?

II.

--Before his shrine to doom thee, Using the same child's smile That heaven and earth, beheld erewhile For the first time, won from thee Ere star and flower grew dim and dead Save at his feet and o'er his head?

III.

--Digging thine heart and throwing Away its childhood's gold, That so its woman-depth might hold His spirit's overflowing?

(For surging souls, no worlds can bound, Their channel in the heart have found.)

IV.

O child, to change appointed, Thou hadst not second sight!

What eyes the future view aright Unless by tears anointed?

Yea, only tears themselves can show The burning ones that have to flow.

V.

O woman, deeply loving, Thou hadst not second sight!

The star is very high and bright, And none can see it moving.

Love looks around, below, above, Yet all his prophecy is--love.

VI.

The bird thy childhood's playing Sent onward o'er the sea, Thy dove of hope came back to thee Without a leaf: art laying Its wet cold wing no sun can dry, Still in thy bosom secretly?

VII.

Our Goethe's friend, Bettine, I have the second sight!

The stone upon his grave is white, The funeral stone between ye; And in thy mirror thou hast viewed Some change as hardly understood.

VIII.

Where's childhood? where is Goethe?

The tears are in thine eyes.

Nay, thou shalt yet reorganize Thy maidenhood of beauty In his own glory, which is smooth Of wrinkles and sublime in youth.

IX.

The poet's arms have wound thee, He breathes upon thy brow, He lifts thee upward in the glow Of his great genius round thee,-- The childlike poet undefiled Preserving evermore THE CHILD.

_MAN AND NATURE._

A sad man on a summer day Did look upon the earth and say--

"Purple cloud the hill-top binding; Folded hills the valleys wind in; Valleys with fresh streams among you; Streams with bosky trees along you; Trees with many birds and blossoms; Birds with music-trembling bosoms; Blossoms dropping dews that wreathe you To your fellow flowers beneath you; Flowers that constellate on earth; Earth that shakest to the mirth Of the merry t.i.tan Ocean, All his s.h.i.+ning hair in motion!

Why am I thus the only one Who can be dark beneath the sun?"

But when the summer day was past, He looked to heaven and smiled at last, Self-answered so-- "Because, O cloud, Pressing with thy crumpled shroud Heavily on mountain top,-- Hills that almost seem to drop Stricken with a misty death To the valleys underneath,-- Valleys sighing with the torrent,-- Waters streaked with branches horrent,-- Branchless trees that shake your head Wildly o'er your blossoms spread Where the common flowers are found,-- Flowers with foreheads to the ground,-- Ground that shriekest while the sea With his iron smiteth thee-- I am, besides, the only one Who can be bright _without_ the sun."

_A SEA-SIDE WALK._

I.

We walked beside the sea After a day which perished silently Of its own glory--like the princess weird Who, combating the Genius, scorched and seared, Uttered with burning breath, "Ho! victory!"

And sank adown, a heap of ashes pale: So runs the Arab tale.

II.

The sky above us showed A universal and unmoving cloud On which the cliffs permitted us to see Only the outline of their majesty, As master-minds when gazed at by the crowd: And s.h.i.+ning with a gloom, the water grey Sw.a.n.g in its moon-taught way.

III.

Nor moon, nor stars were out; They did not dare to tread so soon about, Though trembling, in the footsteps of the sun: The light was neither night's nor day's, but one Which, life-like, had a beauty in its doubt, And silence's impa.s.sioned breathings round Seemed wandering into sound.