Полная версия
Купить и скачатьДобавить В библиотеку
Poems. Volume 1
Автор:
Жанр:
Год написания книги: 2018
Тэги:
Настройки чтения
Размер шрифта
Высота строк
Поля
LONDON BY LAMPLIGHT
There stands a singer in the street,He has an audience motley and meet;Above him lowers the London night,And around the lamps are flaring bright.His minstrelsy may be unchaste—’Tis much unto that motley taste,And loud the laughter he provokesFrom those sad slaves of obscene jokes.But woe is many a passer byWho as he goes turns half an eye,To see the human form divineThus Circe-wise changed into swine!Make up the sum of either sexThat all our human hopes perplex,With those unhappy shapes that knowThe silent streets and pale cock-crow.And can I trace in such dull eyesOf fireside peace or country skies?And could those haggard cheeks presumeTo memories of a May-tide bloom?Those violated forms have beenThe pride of many a flowering green;And still the virgin bosom heavesWith daisy meads and dewy leaves.But stygian darkness reigns withinThe river of death from the founts of sin;And one prophetic water rollsIts gas-lit surface for their souls.I will not hide the tragic sight—Those drown’d black locks, those dead lips white,Will rise from out the slimy flood,And cry before God’s throne for blood!Those stiffened limbs, that swollen face,—Pollution’s last and best embrace,Will call, as such a picture can,For retribution upon man.Hark! how their feeble laughter rings,While still the ballad-monger sings,And flatters their unhappy breastsWith poisonous words and pungent jests.O how would every daisy blushTo see them ’mid that earthy crush!O dumb would be the evening thrush,And hoary look the hawthorn bush!The meadows of their infancyWould shrink from them, and every tree,And every little laughing spot,Would hush itself and know them not.Precursor to what black despairsWas that child’s face which once was theirs!And O to what a world of guileWas herald that young angel smile!That face which to a father’s eyeWas balm for all anxiety;That smile which to a mother’s heartWent swifter than the swallow’s dart!O happy homes! that still they knowAt intervals, with what a woeWould ye look on them, dim and strange,Suffering worse than winter change!And yet could I transplant them there,To breathe again the innocent airOf youth, and once more reconcileTheir outcast looks with nature’s smile;Could I but give them one clear dayOf this delicious loving May,Release their souls from anguish dark,And stand them underneath the lark;—I think that Nature would have powerTo graft again her blighted flowerUpon the broken stem, renewSome portion of its early hue;—The heavy flood of tears unlock,More precious than the Scriptured rock;At least instil a happier mood,And bring them back to womanhood.Alas! how many lost ones claimThis refuge from despair and shame!How many, longing for the light,Sink deeper in the abyss this night!O, crying sin! O, blushing thought!Not only unto those that wroughtThe misery and deadly blight;But those that outcast them this night!O, agony of grief! for whoLess dainty than his race, will doSuch battle for their human right,As shall awake this startled night?Proclaim this evil human pageWill ever blot the Golden AgeThat poets dream and saints invite,If it be unredeemed this night?This night of deep solemnity,And verdurous serenity,While over every fleecy fieldThe dews descend and odours yield.This night of gleaming floods and falls,Of forest glooms and sylvan calls,Of starlight on the pebbly rills,And twilight on the circling hills.This night! when from the paths of menGrey error steams as from a fen;As o’er this flaring City wreathesThe black cloud-vapour that it breathes!This night from which a morn will springBlooming on its orient wing;A morn to roll with many moreIts ghostly foam on the twilight shore.Morn! when the fate of all mankindHangs poised in doubt, and man is blind.His duties of the day will seemThe fact of life, and mine the dream:The destinies that bards have sung,Regeneration to the young,Reverberation of the truth,And virtuous culture unto youth!Youth! in whose season let aboundAll flowers and fruits that strew the ground,Voluptuous joy where love consents,And health and pleasure pitch their tents:All rapture and all pure delight;A garden all unknown to blight;But never the unnatural sightThat throngs the shameless song this night!SONG
Under boughs of breathing May,In the mild spring-time I lay,Lonely, for I had no love; And the sweet birds all sang for pity, Cuckoo, lark, and dove.Tell me, cuckoo, then I cried,Dare I woo and wed a bride?I, like thee, have no home-nest; And the twin notes thus tuned their ditty,— ‘Love can answer best.’Nor, warm dove with tender coo,Have I thy soft voice to woo,Even were a damsel by; And the deep woodland crooned its ditty,— ‘Love her first and try.’Nor have I, wild lark, thy wing,That from bluest heaven can bringBliss, whatever fate befall; And the sky-lyrist trilled this ditty,— ‘Love will give thee all.’So it chanced while June was young,Wooing well with fervent song,I had won a damsel coy; And the sweet birds that sang for pity, Jubileed for joy.PASTORALS
I
How sweet on sunny afternoons,For those who journey light and well,To loiter up a hilly riseWhich hides the prospect far beyond,And fancy all the landscape lying Beautiful and still;Beneath a sky of summer blue,Whose rounded cloudlets, folded soft,Gaze on the scene which we awaitAnd picture from their peacefulness;So calmly to the earth inclining Float those loving shapes!Like airy brides, each singling outA spot to love and bless with love,Their creamy bosoms glowing warm,Till distance weds them to the hills,And with its latest gleam the river Sinks in their embrace.And silverly the river runs,And many a graceful wind he makes,By fields where feed the happy flocks,And hedge-rows hushing pleasant lanes,The charms of English home reflected In his shining eye:Ancestral oak, broad-foliaged elm,Rich meadows sunned and starred with flowers,The cottage breathing tender smokeAgainst the brooding golden air,With glimpses of a stately mansion On a woodland sward;And circling round, as with a ring,The distance spreading amber haze,Enclosing hills and pastures sweet;A depth of soft and mellow lightWhich fills the heart with sudden yearning Aimless and serene!No disenchantment follows here,For nature’s inspiration movesThe dream which she herself fulfils;And he whose heart, like valley warmth,Steams up with joy at scenes like this Shall never be forlorn.And O for any human soulThe rapture of a wide survey—A valley sweeping to the West,With all its wealth of loveliness,Is more than recompense for days That taught us to endure.II
Yon upland slope which hides the sun Ascending from his eastern deeps, And now against the hues of dawn One level line of tillage rears; The furrowed brow of toil and time;To many it is but a sweep of land! To others ’tis an Autumn trust, But unto me a mystery;— An influence strange and swift as dreams; A whispering of old romance; A temple naked to the clouds;Or one of nature’s bosoms fresh revealed, Heaving with adoration! there The work of husbandry is done, And daily bread is daily earned; Nor seems there ought to indicate The springs which move in me such thoughts,But from my soul a spirit calls them up. All day into the open sky, All night to the eternal stars, For ever both at morn and eve Men mellow distances draw near, And shadows lengthen in the dusk,Athwart the heavens it rolls its glimmering line! When twilight from the dream-hued West Sighs hush! and all the land is still; When, from the lush empurpling East, The twilight of the crowing cock Peers on the drowsy village roofs,Athwart the heavens that glimmering line is seen. And now beneath the rising sun, Whose shining chariot overpeers The irradiate ridge, while fetlock deep In the rich soil his coursers plunge— How grand in robes of light it looks!How glorious with rare suggestive grace! The ploughman mounting up the height Becomes a glowing shape, as though ’Twere young Triptolemus, plough in hand, While Ceres in her amber scarf With gentle love directs him howTo wed the willing earth and hope for fruits! The furrows running up are fraught With meanings; there the goddess walks, While Proserpine is young, and there— ’Mid the late autumn sheaves, her voice Sobbing and choked with dumb despair—The nights will hear her wailing for her child! Whatever dim tradition tells, Whatever history may reveal, Or fancy, from her starry brows, Of light or dreamful lustre shed, Could not at this sweet time increaseThe quiet consecration of the spot. Blest with the sweat of labour, blest With the young sun’s first vigorous beams, Village hope and harvest prayer,— The heart that throbs beneath it holds A bliss so perfect in itselfMen’s thoughts must borrow rather than bestow.III
Now standing on this hedgeside path,Up which the evening winds are blowingWildly from the lingering lines Of sunset o’er the hills;Unaided by one motive thought,My spirit with a strange impulsionRises, like a fledgling,Whose wings are not mature, but stillSupported by its strong desireBeats up its native air and leaves The tender mother’s nest.Great music under heaven is made,And in the track of rushing darknessComes the solemn shape of night, And broods above the earth.A thing of Nature am I now,Abroad, without a sense or feelingBorn not of her bosom;Content with all her truths and fates;Ev’n as yon strip of grass that bowsAbove the new-born violet bloom, And sings with wood and field.IV
Lo, as a tree, whose wintry twigs Drink in the sun with fibrous joy, And down into its dampest roots Thrills quickened with the draught of life,I wake unto the dawn, and leave my griefs to drowse. I rise and drink the fresh sweet air: Each draught a future bud of Spring; Each glance of blue a birth of green; I will not mimic yonder oakThat dallies with dead leaves ev’n while the primrose peeps. But full of these warm-whispering beams, Like Memnon in his mother’s eye,— Aurora! when the statue stone Moaned soft to her pathetic touch,—My soul shall own its parent in the founts of day! And ever in the recurring light, True to the primal joy of dawn, Forget its barren griefs; and aye Like aspens in the faintest breezeTurn all its silver sides and tremble into song.V
Now from the meadow floods the wild duck clamours,Now the wood pigeon wings a rapid flight,Now the homeward rookery follows up its vanguard,And the valley mists are curling up the hills.Three short songs gives the clear-voiced throstle,Sweetening the twilight ere he fills the nest;While the little bird upon the leafless branchesTweets to its mate a tiny loving note.Deeper the stillness hangs on every motion;Calmer the silence follows every call;Now all is quiet save the roosting pheasant,The bell-wether’s tinkle and the watch-dog’s bark.Softly shine the lights from the silent kindling homestead,Stars of the hearth to the shepherd in the fold;Springs of desire to the traveller on the roadway;Ever breathing incense to the ever-blessing sky!VI
How barren would this valley be, Without the golden orb that gazes On it, broadening to hues Of rose, and spreading wings of amber;Blessing it before it falls asleep. How barren would this valley be, Without the human lives now beating In it, or the throbbing hearts Far distant, who their flower of childhoodCherish here, and water it with tears! How barren should I be, were I Without above that loving splendour, Shedding light and warmth! without Some kindred natures of my kindTo joy in me, or yearn towards me now!VII
Summer glows warm on the meadows, and speedwell, and gold-cups, and daisiesDarken ’mid deepening masses of sorrel, and shadowy grassesShow the ripe hue to the farmer, and summon the scythe and the hay-makersDown from the village; and now, even now, the air smells of the mowing,And the sharp song of the scythe whistles daily; from dawn, till the gloamingWears its cool star, sweet and welcome to all flaming faces afield now;Heavily weighs the hot season, and drowses the darkening foliage,Drooping with languor; the white cloud floats, but sails not, for windlessHeaven’s blue tents it; no lark singing up in its fleecy white valleys;Up in its fairy white valleys, once feathered with minstrels, melodiousWith the invisible joy that wakes dawn o’er the green fields of England.Summer glows warm on the meadows; then come, let us roam thro’ them gaily,Heedless of heat, and the hot-kissing sun, and the fear of dark freckles.Never one kiss will he give on a neck, or a lily-white forehead,Chin, hand, or bosom uncovered, all panting, to take the chance coolness,But full sure the fiery pressure leaves seal of espousal.Heed him not; come, tho’ he kiss till the soft little upper-lip losesHalf its pure whiteness; just speck’d where the curve of the rosy mouth reddens.Come, let him kiss, let him kiss, and his kisses shall make thee the sweeter.Thou art no nun, veiled and vowed; doomed to nourish a withering pallor!City exotics beside thee would show like bleached linen at mid-day,Hung upon hedges of eglantine! Thou in the freedom of nature,Full of her beauty and wisdom, gentleness, joyance, and kindness!Come, and like bees will we gather the rich golden honey of noontide;Deep in the sweet summer meadows, border’d by hillside and river,Lined with long trenches half-hidden, where smell of white meadow-sweet, sweetest,Blissfully hovers—O sweetest! but pluck it not! even in the tenderestGrasp it will lose breath and wither; like many, not made for a posy.See, the sun slopes down the meadows, where all the flowers are falling!Falling unhymned; for the nightingale scarce ever charms the long twilight:Mute with the cares of the nest; only known by a ‘chuck, chuck,’ and dovelikeCall of content, but the finch and the linnet and blackcap pipe loudly.Round on the western hill-side warbles the rich-billed ouzel;And the shrill throstle is filling the tangled thickening copses;Singing o’er hyacinths hid, and most honey’d of flowers, white field-rose.Joy thus to revel all day in the grass of our own beloved country;Revel all day, till the lark mounts at eve with his sweet ‘tirra-lirra’:Trilling delightfully. See, on the river the slow-rippled surfaceShining; the slow ripple broadens in circles; the bright surface smoothens;Now it is flat as the leaves of the yet unseen water-lily.There dart the lives of a day, ever-varying tactics fantastic.There, by the wet-mirrored osiers, the emerald wing of the kingfisherFlashes, the fish in his beak! there the dab-chick dived, and the motionLazily undulates all thro’ the tall standing army of rushes.Joy thus to revel all day, till the twilight turns us homeward!Till all the lingering deep-blooming splendour of sunset is over,And the one star shines mildly in mellowing hues, like a spiritSent to assure us that light never dieth, tho’ day is now buried.Saying: to-morrow, to-morrow, few hours intervening, that intervalTuned by the woodlark in heaven, to-morrow my semblance, far eastward,Heralds the day ’tis my mission eternal to seal and to prophecy.Come then, and homeward; passing down the close path of the meadows.Home like the bees stored with sweetness; each with a lark in the bosom,Trilling for ever, and oh! will yon lark ever cease to sing up there?TO A SKYLARK
O skylark! I see thee and call thee joy!Thy wings bear thee up to the breast of the dawn;I see thee no more, but thy song is stillThe tongue of the heavens to me!Thus are the days when I was a boy;Sweet while I lived in them, dear now they’re gone:I feel them no longer, but still, O stillThey tell of the heavens to me.SONG
SPRING
When buds of palm do burst and spread Their downy feathers in the lane,And orchard blossoms, white and red, Breathe Spring delight for Autumn gain; And the skylark shakes his wings in the rain;O then is the season to look for a bride! Choose her warily, woo her unseen;For the choicest maids are those that hide Like dewy violets under the green.SONG
AUTUMN
When nuts behind the hazel-leaf Are brown as the squirrel that hunts them free,And the fields are rich with the sun-burnt sheaf, ’Mid the blue cornflower and the yellowing tree; And the farmer glows and beams in his glee;O then is the season to wed thee a bride! Ere the garners are filled and the ale-cups foam;For a smiling hostess is the pride And flower of every Harvest Home.SORROWS AND JOYS
Bury thy sorrows, and they shall riseAs souls to the immortal skies,And there look down like mothers’ eyes.But let thy joys be fresh as flowers,That suck the honey of the showers,And bloom alike on huts and towers.So shall thy days be sweet and bright;Solemn and sweet thy starry night,Conscious of love each change of light.The stars will watch the flowers asleep,The flowers will feel the soft stars weep,And both will mix sensations deep.With these below, with those above,Sits evermore the brooding dove,Uniting both in bonds of love.For both by nature are akin;Sorrow, the ashen fruit of sin,And joy, the juice of life within.Children of earth are these; and thoseThe spirits of divine repose—Death radiant o’er all human woes.O, think what then had been thy doom,If homeless and without a tombThey had been left to haunt the gloom!O, think again what now they are—Motherly love, tho’ dim and far,Imaged in every lustrous star.For they, in their salvation, knowNo vestige of their former woe,While thro’ them all the heavens do flow.Thus art thou wedded to the skies,And watched by ever-loving eyes,And warned by yearning sympathies.SONG
The flower unfolds its dawning cup,And the young sun drinks the star-dews up,At eve it droops with the bliss of day,And dreams in the midnight far away.So am I in thy sole, sweet glancePressed with a weight of utterance;Lovingly all my leaves unfold,And gleam to the beams of thirsty gold.At eve I droop, for then the swellOf feeling falters forth farewell;—At midnight I am dreaming deep,Of what has been, in blissful sleep.When—ah! when will love’s own fightWed me alike thro’ day and night,When will the stars with their linking charmsWake us in each other’s arms?SONG
Thou to me art such a spring As the Arab seeks at eve, Thirsty from the shining sands; There to bathe his face and hands, While the sun is taking leave,And dewy sleep is a delicious thing. Thou to me art such a dream As he dreams upon the grass, While the bubbling coolness near Makes sweet music in his ear; And the stars that slowly passIn solitary grandeur o’er him gleam. Thou to me art such a dawn As the dawn whose ruddy kiss Wakes him to his darling steed; And again the desert speed, And again the desert bliss,Lightens thro’ his veins, and he is gone!ANTIGONE
The buried voice bespake Antigone.‘O sister! couldst thou know, as thou wilt know,The bliss above, the reverence below,Enkindled by thy sacrifice for me;Thou wouldst at once with holy ecstasyGive thy warm limbs into the yearning earth.Sleep, Sister! for Elysium’s dawning birth,—And faith will fill thee with what is to be!Sleep, for the Gods are watching over thee!Thy dream will steer thee to perform their will,As silently their influence they instil.O Sister! in the sweetness of thy prime,Thy hand has plucked the bitter flower of death;But this will dower thee with Elysian breath,That fade into a never-fading clime.Dear to the Gods are those that do like theeA solemn duty! for the tyrannyOf kings is feeble to the soul that daresDefy them to fulfil its sacred cares:And weak against a mighty will are men.O, Torch between two brothers! in whose gleamOur slaughtered House doth shine as one again,Tho’ severed by the sword; now may thy dreamKindle desire in thee for us, and thou,Forgetting not thy lover and his vow,Leaving no human memory forgot,Shalt cross, not unattended, the dark streamWhich runs by thee in sleep and ripples not.The large stars glitter thro’ the anxious night,And the deep sky broods low to look at thee:The air is hush’d and dark o’er land and sea,And all is waiting for the morrow light:So do thy kindred spirits wait for thee.O Sister! soft as on the downward rill,Will those first daybeams from the distant hillFall on the smoothness of thy placid brow,Like this calm sweetness breathing thro’ me now:And when the fated sounds shall wake thine eyes,Wilt thou, confiding in the supreme will,In all thy maiden steadfastness arise,Firm to obey and earnest to fulfil;Remembering the night thou didst not sleep,And this same brooding sky beheld thee creep,Defiant of unnatural decree,To where I lay upon the outcast land;Before the iron gates upon the plain;A wretched, graveless ghost, whose wailing chillCame to thy darkened door imploring thee;Yearning for burial like my brother slain;—And all was dared for love and piety!This thought will nerve again thy virgin handTo serve its purpose and its destiny.’She woke, they led her forth, and all was still.Swathed round in mist and crown’d with cloud,O Mountain! hid from peak to base—Caught up into the heavens and claspedIn white ethereal arms that makeThy mystery of size sublime!What eye or thought can measure nowThy grand dilating loftiness!What giant crest dispute with theeSupremacy of air and sky!What fabled height with thee compare!Not those vine-terraced hills that seetheThe lava in their fiery cusps;Nor that high-climbing robe of snow,Whose summits touch the morning star,And breathe the thinnest air of life;Nor crocus-couching Ida, warmWith Juno’s latest nuptial lure;Nor Tenedos whose dreamy eyeStill looks upon beleaguered Troy;Nor yet Olympus crown’d with godsCan boast a majesty like thine,O Mountain! hid from peak to base,And image of the awful powerWith which the secret of all things,That stoops from heaven to garment earth,Can speak to any human soul,When once the earthly limits loseTheir pointed heights and sharpened lines,And measureless immensityIs palpable to sense and sight.SONG
No, no, the falling blossom is no sign Of loveliness destroy’d and sorrow mute;The blossom sheds its loveliness divine;— Its mission is to prophecy the fruit.Nor is the day of love for ever dead, When young enchantment and romance are gone;The veil is drawn, but all the future dread Is lightened by the finger of the dawn.Love moves with life along a darker way, They cast a shadow and they call it death:But rich is the fulfilment of their day; The purer passion and the firmer faith.THE TWO BLACKBIRDS
A Blackbird in a wicker cage, That hung and swung ’mid fruits and flowers,Had learnt the song-charm, to assuage The drearness of its wingless hours.And ever when the song was heard, From trees that shade the grassy plotWarbled another glossy bird, Whose mate not long ago was shot.Strange anguish in that creature’s breast, Unwept like human grief, unsaid,Has quickened in its lonely nest A living impulse from the dead.Not to console its own wild smart,— But with a kindling instinct strong,The novel feeling of its heart Beats for the captive bird of song.And when those mellow notes are still, It hops from off its choral perch,O’er path and sward, with busy bill, All grateful gifts to peck and search.Store of ouzel dainties choice To those white swinging bars it brings;And with a low consoling voice It talks between its fluttering wings.Deeply in their bitter grief Those sufferers reciprocate,The one sings for its woodland life, The other for its murdered mate.But deeper doth the secret prove, Uniting those sad creatures so;Humanity’s great link of love, The common sympathy of woe.Well divined from day to day Is the swift speech between them twain;For when the bird is scared away, The captive bursts to song again.Yet daily with its flattering voice, Talking amid its fluttering wings,Store of ouzel dainties choice With busy bill the poor bird brings.And shall I say, till weak with age Down from its drowsy branch it drops,It will not leave that captive cage, Nor cease those busy searching hops?Ah, no! the moral will not strain; Another sense will make it range,Another mate will soothe its pain, Another season work a change.But thro’ the live-long summer, tried, A pure devotion we may see;The ebb and flow of Nature’s tide; A self-forgetful sympathy.JULY
IBlue July, bright July, Month of storms and gorgeous blue;Violet lightnings o’er thy sky, Heavy falls of drenching dew;Summer crown! o’er glen and gladeShrinking hyacinths in their shade;I welcome thee with all thy pride,I love thee like an Eastern bride. Though all the singing days are done As in those climes that clasp the sun; Though the cuckoo in his throat Leaves to the dove his last twin note;Come to me with thy lustrous eye,Golden-dawning oriently,Come with all thy shining blooms,Thy rich red rose and rolling glooms. Though the cuckoo doth but sing ‘cuk, cuk,’ And the dove alone doth coo; Though the cushat spins her coo-r-roo, r-r-roo— To the cuckoo’s halting ‘cuk.’IISweet July, warm July! Month when mosses near the stream,Soft green mosses thick and shy, Are a rapture and a dream.Summer Queen! whose foot the fernFades beneath while chestnuts burn;I welcome thee with thy fierce love,Gloom below and gleam above. Though all the forest trees hang dumb, With dense leafiness o’ercome; Though the nightingale and thrush, Pipe not from the bough or bush;Come to me with thy lustrous eye,Azure-melting westerly,The raptures of thy face unfold,And welcome in thy robes of gold! Tho’ the nightingale broods—‘sweet-chuck-sweet’— And the ouzel flutes so chill, Tho’ the throstle gives but one shrilly trill To the nightingale’s ‘sweet-sweet.’
