50. Queen Henrietta Maria



IN the lone tent, waiting for victory,       
  She stands with eyes marred by the mists of pain,       
  Like some wan lily overdrenched with rain:       
The clamorous clang of arms, the ensanguined sky,       
War’s ruin, and the wreck of chivalry,            5   
  To her proud soul no common fear can bring:       
  Bravely she tarrieth for her Lord the King,       
Her soul a-flame with passionate ecstasy.       
O Hair of Gold! O Crimson Lips! O Face       
  Made for the luring and the love of man!     10   
  With thee I do forget the toil and stress,       
The loveless road that knows no resting place,       
  Time’s straitened pulse, the soul’s dread weariness,       
  My freedom and my life republican!

51. Camma



AS one who poring on a Grecian urn       
  Scans the fair shapes some Attic hand hath made,       
  God with slim goddess, goodly man with maid,       
And for their beauty’s sake is loth to turn       
And face the obvious day, must I not yearn            5   
  For many a secret moon of indolent bliss,       
  When in the midmost shrine of Artemis       
I see thee standing, antique-limbed, and stern?       
     
And yet—methinks I’d rather see thee play       
  That serpent of old Nile, whose witchery     10   
Made Emperors drunken,—come, great Egypt, shake       
  Our stage with all thy mimic pageants! Nay,       
  I am grown sick of unreal passions, make       
The world thine Actium, me thine Antony!

52. Panthea



NAY, let us walk from fire unto fire,       
  From passionate pain to deadlier delight,—       
I am too young to live without desire,       
  Too young art thou to waste this summer night       
Asking those idle questions which of old            5   
Man sought of seer and oracle, and no reply was told.       
     
For, sweet, to feel is better than to know,       
  And wisdom is a childless heritage,       
One pulse of passion—youth’s first fiery glow,—       
  Are worth the hoarded proverbs of the sage:     10   
Vex not thy soul with dead philosophy,       
Have we not lips to kiss with, hearts to love, and eyes to see!       
     
Dost thou not hear the murmuring nightingale       
  Like water bubbling from a silver jar,       
So soft she sings the envious moon is pale,     15   
  That high in heaven she is hung so far       
She cannot hear that love-enraptured tune,—       
Mark how she wreathes each horn with mist, yon late and labouring moon.       
     
White lilies, in whose cups the gold bees dream,       
  The fallen snow of petals where the breeze     20   
Scatters the chestnut blossom, or the gleam       
  Of boyish limbs in water,—are not these       
Enough for thee, dost thou desire more?       
Alas! the Gods will give nought else from their eternal store.       
     
For our high Gods have sick and wearied grown     25   
  Of all our endless sins, our vain endeavour       
For wasted days of youth to make atone       
  By pain or prayer or priest, and never, never,       
Hearken they now to either good or ill,       
But send their rain upon the just and the unjust at will.     30   
     
They sit at ease, our Gods they sit at ease,       
  Strewing with leaves of rose their scented wine,       
They sleep, they sleep, beneath the rocking trees       
  Where asphodel and yellow lotus twine,       
Mourning the old glad days before they knew     35   
What evil things the heart of man could dream, and dreaming do.       
     
And far beneath the brazen floor they see       
  Like swarming flies the crowd of little men,       
The bustle of small lives, then wearily       
  Back to their lotus-haunts they turn again     40   
Kissing each other’s mouths, and mix more deep       
The poppy-seeded draught which brings soft purple-lidded sleep.       
     
There all day long the golden-vestured sun,       
  Their torch-bearer, stands with his torch a-blaze,       
And when the gaudy web of noon is spun     45   
  By its twelve maidens through the crimson haze       
Fresh from Endymion’s arms comes forth the moon,       
And the immortal Gods in toils of mortal passions swoon.       
     
There walks Queen Juno through some dewy mead       
  Her grand white feet flecked with the saffron dust     50   
Of wind-stirred lilies, while young Ganymede       
  Leaps in the hot and amber-foaming must,       
His curls all tossed, as when the eagle bare       
The frightened boy from Ida through the blue Ionian air.       
     
There in the green heart of some garden close     55   
  Queen Venus with the shepherd at her side,       
Her warm soft body like the briar rose       
  Which would be white yet blushes at its pride,       
Laughs low for love, till jealous Salmacis       
Peers through the myrtle-leaves and sighs for pain of lonely bliss.     60   
     
There never does that dreary north-wind blow       
  Which leaves our English forests bleak and bare,       
Nor ever falls the swift white-feathered snow,       
  Nor doth the red-toothed lightning ever dare       
To wake them in the silver-fretted night     65   
When we lie weeping for some sweet sad sin, some dead delight.       
     
Alas! they know the far Lethæan spring,       
  The violet-hidden waters well they know,       
Where one whose feet with tired wandering       
  Are faint and broken may take heart and go,     70   
And from those dark depths cool and crystalline       
Drink, and draw balm, and sleep for sleepless souls, and anodyne.       
     
But we oppress our natures, God or Fate       
  Is our enemy, we starve and feed       
On vain repentance—O we are born too late!     75   
  What balm for us in bruisèd poppy seed       
Who crowd into one finite pulse of time       
The joy of infinite love and the fierce pain of infinite crime.       
     
O we are wearied of this sense of guilt,       
  Wearied of pleasure’s paramour despair,     80   
Wearied of every temple we have built,       
  Wearied of every right, unanswered prayer,       
For man is weak; God sleeps: and heaven is high:       
One fiery-coloured moment: one great love; and lo! we die.       
     
Ah! but no ferry-man with labouring pole     85   
  Nears his black shallop to the flowerless strand,       
No little coin of bronze can bring the soul       
  Over Death’s river to the sunless land,       
Victim and wine and vow are all in vain,       
The tomb is sealed; the soldiers watch; the dead rise not again.     90   
     
We are resolved into the supreme air,       
  We are made one with what we touch and see,       
With our heart’s blood each crimson sun is fair,       
  With our young lives each spring-impassioned tree       
Flames into green, the wildest beasts that range     95   
The moor our kinsmen are, all life is one, and all is change.       
     
With beat of systole and of diastole       
  One grand great life throbs through earth’s giant heart,       
And mighty waves of single Being roll       
  From nerve-less germ to man, for we are part    100   
Of every rock and bird and beast and hill,       
One with the things that prey on us, and one with what we kill.       
     
From lower cells of waking life we pass       
  To full perfection; thus the world grows old:       
We who are godlike now were once a mass    105   
  Of quivering purple flecked with bars of gold,       
Unsentient or of joy or misery,       
And tossed in terrible tangles of some wild and wind-swept sea.       
     
This hot hard flame with which our bodies burn       
  Will make some meadow blaze with daffodil,    110   
Ay! and those argent breasts of thine will turn       
  To water-lilies; the brown fields men till       
Will be more fruitful for our love to-night,       
Nothing is lost in nature, all things live in Death’s despite.       
     
The boy’s first kiss, the hyacinth’s first bell,    115   
  The man’s last passion, and the last red spear       
That from the lily leaps, the asphodel       
  Which will not let its blossoms blow for fear       
Of too much beauty, and the timid shame       
Of the young bride-groom at his lover’s eyes,—these with the same    120   
     
One sacrament are consecrate, the earth       
  Not we alone hath passions hymeneal,       
The yellow buttercups that shake for mirth       
  At daybreak know a pleasure not less real       
Than we do, when in some fresh-blossoming wood    125   
We draw the spring into our hearts, and feel that life is good.       
     
So when men bury us beneath the yew       
  Thy crimson-stainèd mouth a rose will be,       
And thy soft eyes lush bluebells dimmed with dew,       
  And when the white narcissus wantonly    130   
Kisses the wind its playmate, some faint joy       
Will thrill our dust, and we will be again fond maid and boy.       
     
And thus without life’s conscious torturing pain       
  In some sweet flower we will feel the sun,       
And from the linnet’s throat will sing again,    135   
  And as two gorgeous-mailèd snakes will run       
Over our graves, or as two tigers creep       
Through the hot jungle where the yellow-eyed huge lions sleep       
     
And give them battle! How my heart leaps up       
  To think of that grand living after death    140   
In beast and bird and flower, when this cup,       
  Being filled too full of spirit, bursts for breath,       
And with the pale leaves of some autumn day       
The soul earth’s earliest conqueror becomes earth’s last great prey.       
     
O think of it! We shall inform ourselves    145   
  Into all sensuous life, the goat-foot Faun,       
The Centaur, or the merry bright-eyed Elves       
  That leave their dancing rings to spite the dawn       
Upon the meadows, shall not be more near       
Than you and I to nature’s mysteries, for we shall hear    150   
     
The thrush’s heart beat, and the daisies grow,       
  And the wan snowdrop sighing for the sun       
On sunless days in winter, we shall know       
  By whom the silver gossamer is spun,       
Who paints the diapered fritillaries,    155   
On what wide wings from shivering pine to pine the eagle flies.       
     
Ay! had we never loved at all, who knows       
  If yonder daffodil had lured the bee       
Into its gilded womb, or any rose       
  Had hung with crimson lamps its little tree!    160   
Methinks no leaf would ever bud in spring,       
But for the lovers’ lips that kiss, the poets’ lips that sing.       
     
Is the light vanished from our golden sun,       
  Or is this dædal-fashioned earth less fair,       
That we are nature’s heritors, and one    165   
  With every pulse of life that beats the air?       
Rather new suns across the sky shall pass,       
New splendour come unto the flower, new glory to the grass.       
     
And we two lovers shall not sit afar,       
  Critics of nature, but the joyous sea    170   
Shall be our raiment, and the bearded star       
  Shoot arrows at our pleasure! We shall be       
Part of the mighty universal whole,       
And through all æons mix and mingle with the Kosmic Soul!       
     
We shall be notes in that great Symphony    175   
  Whose cadence circles through the rhythmic spheres,       
And all the live World’s throbbing heart shall be       
  One with our heart, the stealthy creeping years       
Have lost their terrors now, we shall not die,       
The Universe itself shall be our Immortality!    18

53. Impression: Le Reveillon



    THE sky is laced with fitful red,       
    The circling mists and shadows flee,       
    The dawn is rising from the sea,       
Like a white lady from her bed.       
     
    And jagged brazen arrows fall            5   
    Athwart the feathers of the night,       
    And a long wave of yellow light       
Breaks silently on tower and hall,       
     
    And spreading wide across the wold       
    Wakes into flight some fluttering bird,     10   
    And all the chestnut tops are stirred,       
And all the branches streaked with gold.   

54. At Verona



HOW steep the stairs within Kings’ houses are       
  For exile-wearied feet as mine to tread,       
  And O how salt and bitter is the bread       
Which falls from this Hound’s table,—better far       
That I had died in the red ways of war,            5   
  Or that the gate of Florence bare my head,       
  Than to live thus, by all things comraded       
Which seek the essence of my soul to mar.       
     
“Curse God and die: what better hope than this?       
  He hath forgotten thee in all the bliss     10   
  Of his gold city, and eternal day”—       
Nay peace: behind my prison’s blinded bars       
  I do possess what none can take away,       
  My love, and all the glory of the stars.

55. Apologia



IS it thy will that I should wax and wane,       
  Barter my cloth of gold for hodden grey,       
And at thy pleasure weave that web of pain       
  Whose brightest threads are each a wasted day?       
     
Is it thy will—Love that I love so well—            5   
  That my Soul’s House should be a tortured spot       
Wherein, like evil paramours, must dwell       
  The quenchless flame, the worm that dieth not?       
     
Nay, if it be thy will I shall endure,       
  And sell ambition at the common mart,     10   
And let dull failure be my vestiture,       
  And sorrow dig its grave within my heart.       
     
Perchance it may be better so—at least       
  I have not made my heart a heart of stone,       
Nor starved my boyhood of its goodly feast,     15   
  Nor walked where Beauty is a thing unknown.       
     
Many a man hath done so; sought to fence       
  In straitened bonds the soul that should be free,       
Trodden the dusty road of common sense,       
  While all the forest sang of liberty,     20   
     
Not marking how the spotted hawk in flight       
  Passed on wide pinion through the lofty air,       
To where the steep untrodden mountain height       
  Caught the last tresses of the Sun God’s hair.       
     
Or how the little flower he trod upon,     25   
  The daisy, that white-feathered shield of gold,       
Followed with wistful eyes the wandering sun       
  Content if once its leaves were aureoled.       
     
But surely it is something to have been       
  The best belovèd for a little while,     30   
To have walked hand in hand with Love, and seen       
  His purple wings flit once across thy smile.       
     
Ay! though the gorgèd asp of passion feed       
  On my boy’s heart, yet have I burst the bars,       
Stood face to face with Beauty, known indeed     35   
  The Love which moves the Sun and all the stars!   

56. Quia Multum amavi



DEAR Heart I think the young impassioned priest       
  When first he takes from out the hidden shrine       
His God imprisoned in the Eucharist,       
  And eats the bread, and drinks the dreadful wine,       
     
Feels not such awful wonder as I felt            5   
  When first my smitten eyes beat full on thee,       
And all night long before thy feet I knelt       
  Till thou wert wearied of Idolatry.       
     
Ah! had’st thou liked me less and loved me more,       
  Through all those summer days of joy and rain,     10   
I had not now been sorrow’s heritor,       
  Or stood a lackey in the House of Pain.       
     
Yet, though remorse, youth’s white-faced seneschal       
  Tread on my heels with all his retinue,       
I am most glad I loved thee—think of all     15   
  The suns that go to make one speedwell blue!

57. Silentium Amoris



AS oftentimes the too resplendent sun       
  Hurries the pallid and reluctant moon       
Back to her sombre cave, ere she hath won       
  A single ballad from the nightingale,       
  So doth thy Beauty make my lips to fail,            5   
And all my sweetest singing out of tune.       
     
And as at dawn across the level mead       
  On wings impetuous some wind will come,       
And with its too harsh kisses break the reed       
  Which was its only instrument of song,     10   
  So my too stormy passions work me wrong,       
And for excess of Love my Love is dumb.       
     
But surely unto Thee mine eyes did show       
  Why I am silent, and my lute unstrung;       
Else it were better we should part, and go,     15   
  Thou to some lips of sweeter melody,       
  And I to nurse the barren memory       
Of unkissed kisses, and songs never sung.

58. Her Voice



THE wild bee reels from bough to bough       
  With his furry coat and his gauzy wing.       
Now in a lily-cup, and now       
  Setting a jacinth bell a-swing,       
          In his wandering;            5   
Sit closer love: it was here I trow       
          I made that vow,       
     
Swore that two lives should be like one       
  As long as the sea-gull loved the sea,       
As long as the sunflower sought the sun,—     10   
  It shall be, I said, for eternity       
          ’Twixt you and me!       
Dear friend, those times are over and done,       
          Love’s web is spun.       
     
Look upward where the poplar trees     15   
  Sway and sway in the summer air,       
Here in the valley never a breeze       
  Scatters the thistledown, but there       
          Great winds blow fair       
From the mighty murmuring mystical seas,     20   
          And the wave-lashed leas.       
     
Look upward where the white gull screams,       
  What does it see that we do not see?       
Is that a star? or the lamp that gleams       
  On some outward voyaging argosy,—     25   
          Ah! can it be       
We have lived our lives in a land of dreams!       
          How sad it seems.       
     
Sweet, there is nothing left to say       
  But this, that love is never lost,     30   
Keen winter stabs the breasts of May       
  Whose crimson roses burst his frost,       
          Ships tempest-tossed       
Will find a harbour in some bay,       
          And so we may.     35   
     
And there is nothing left to do       
  But to kiss once again, and part,       
Nay, there is nothing we should rue,       
  I have my beauty,—you your Art,       
          Nay, do not start,     40   
One world was not enough for two       
          Like me and you.

59. My Voice



WITHIN this restless, hurried, modern world       
  We took our hearts’ full pleasure—You and I,       
And now the white sails of our ship are furled,       
  And spent the lading of our argosy.       
     
Wherefore my cheeks before their time are wan,            5   
  For very weeping is my gladness fled,       
Sorrow hath paled my lip’s vermilion,       
  And Ruin draws the curtains of my bed.       
     
But all this crowded life has been to thee       
  No more than lyre, or lute, or subtle spell     10   
Of viols, or the music of the sea       
  That sleeps, a mimic echo, in the shell.