Poems by William Ernest Henley Part 15

Blows! . . . in the quiet close As in the roaring mart, By ways no mortal knows Love blows into the heart.

The stars some cadence use, Forthright the river flows, In order fall the dews, Love blows as the wind blows: Blows! . . . and what reckoning shows The courses of his chart?

A spirit that comes and goes, Love blows into the heart.

1878

x.x.xV--I. M.--MARGARITAE SORORI (1886)

A late lark twitters from the quiet skies; And from the west, Where the sun, his day's work ended, Lingers as in content, There falls on the old, grey city An influence luminous and serene, A s.h.i.+ning peace.

The smoke ascends In a rosy-and-golden haze. The spires s.h.i.+ne, and are changed. In the valley Shadows rise. The lark sings on. The sun, Closing his benediction, Sinks, and the darkening air Thrills with a sense of the triumphing night - Night with her train of stars And her great gift of sleep.

So be my pa.s.sing!

My task accomplished and the long day done, My wages taken, and in my heart Some late lark singing, Let me be gathered to the quiet west, The sundown splendid and serene, Death.

1876

x.x.xVI

I gave my heart to a woman - I gave it her, branch and root.

She bruised, she wrung, she tortured, She cast it under foot.

Under her feet she cast it, She trampled it where it fell, She broke it all to pieces, And each was a clot of h.e.l.l.

There in the rain and the suns.h.i.+ne They lay and smouldered long; And each, when again she viewed them, Had turned to a living song.

x.x.xVII--To W. A.

Or ever the knightly years were gone With the old world to the grave, I was a King in Babylon And you were a Christian Slave.

I saw, I took, I cast you by, I bent and broke your pride.

You loved me well, or I heard them lie, But your longing was denied.

Surely I knew that by and by You cursed your G.o.ds and died.

And a myriad suns have set and shone Since then upon the grave Decreed by the King in Babylon To her that had been his Slave.

The pride I trampled is now my scathe, For it tramples me again.

The old resentment lasts like death, For you love, yet you refrain.

I break my heart on your hard unfaith, And I break my heart in vain.

Yet not for an hour do I wish undone The deed beyond the grave, When I was a King in Babylon And you were a Virgin Slave.

x.x.xVIII

On the way to Kew, By the river old and gray, Where in the Long Ago We laughed and loitered so, I met a ghost to-day, A ghost that told of you - A ghost of low replies And sweet, inscrutable eyes Coming up from Richmond As you used to do.

By the river old and gray, The enchanted Long Ago Murmured and smiled anew.

On the way to Kew, March had the laugh of May, The bare boughs looked aglow, And old, immortal words Sang in my breast like birds, Coming up from Richmond As I used with you.

With the life of Long Ago Lived my thought of you.

By the river old and gray Flowing his appointed way As I watched I knew What is so good to know - Not in vain, not in vain, Shall I look for you again Coming up from Richmond On the way to Kew.

x.x.xIX

The Past was goodly once, and yet, when all is said, The best of it we know is that it's done and dead.

Dwindled and faded quite, perished beyond recall, Nothing is left at last of what one time was all.

Coming back like a ghost, staring and lingering on, Never a word it speaks but proves it dead and gone.

Duty and work and joy--these things it cannot give; And the Present is life, and life is good to live.

Let it lie where it fell, far from the living sun, The Past that, goodly once, is gone and dead and done.

XL

The spring, my dear, Is no longer spring.

Does the blackbird sing What he sang last year?

Are the skies the old Immemorial blue?

Or am I, or are you, Grown cold?

Though life be change, It is hard to bear When the old sweet air Sounds forced and strange.

To be out of tune, Plain You and I . . .

It were better to die, And soon!