The Poetical Works Of Robert Bridges Part 58

G.o.dFREY

Nay, but I know this melancholy mood; 'Twas your poetic fancy when a boy.

RICHARD

For Fancy cannot live on real food: In youth she will despise familiar joy To dwell in mournful shades; as they grow real, Then buildeth she of joy her far ideal.

G.o.dFREY

And so perverteth all. This stream to me Sings, and in sunny ripples lingeringly The water saith 'Ah me! where have I lept?

Into what garden of life? what banks are these, What secret lawns, what ancient towers and trees?

Where the young sons of heav'n, with shouts of play Or low delighted speech, welcome the day, As if the poetry of the earth had slept To wake in ecstasy. O stay me! alas!

Stay me, ye happy isles, ere that I pa.s.s Without a memory on my sullen course By the black city to the tossing seas!'

RICHARD

So might this old oak say 'My heart is sere; With greater effort every year I force My stubborn leaf.a.ge: soon my branch will crack, And I shall fall or perish in the wrack: And here another tree its crown will rear, And see for centuries the boys at play: And 'neath its boughs, on some fine holiday, Old men shall prate as these.' Come see the game.

G.o.dFREY

Yes, if you will. 'Tis all one picture fair.

RICHARD

Made in a mirror, and who looketh there Must see himself. Is not a dream the same?

G.o.dFREY

_Life is a dream._

RICHARD

And you, who say it, seem Dreaming to speak to a phantom in a dream.

4

ELEGY

THE SUMMER-HOUSE ON THE MOUND

How well my eyes remember the dim path!

My homing heart no happier playground hath.

I need not close my lids but it appears Through the bewilderment of forty years To tempt my feet, my childish feet, between Its leafy walls, beneath its arching green; Fairer than dream of sleep, than Hope more fair Leading to dreamless sleep her sister Care.

There grew two fellow limes, two rising trees, Shadowing the lawn, the summer haunt of bees, Whose stems, engraved with many a russet scar From the spear-hurlings of our mimic war, Pillar'd the portico to that wide walk, A mossy terrace of the native chalk Fas.h.i.+on'd, that led thro' the dark shades around Straight to the wooden temple on the mound.

There live the memories of my early days, There still with childish heart my spirit plays; Yea, terror-stricken by the fiend despair When she hath fled me, I have found her there; And there 'tis ever noon, and glad suns bring Alternate days of summer and of spring, With childish thought, and childish faces bright, And all unknown save but the hour's delight.

High on the mound the ivied arbour stood, A dome of straw upheld on rustic wood: Hidden in fern the steps of the ascent, Whereby unto the southern front we went, And from the dark plantation climbing free, Over a valley look'd out on the sea.

That sea is ever bright and blue, the sky Serene and blue, and ever white s.h.i.+ps lie High on the horizon steadfast in full sail, Or nearer in the roads pa.s.s within hail, Of naked brigs and barques that windbound ride At their taut cables heading to the tide.

There many an hour I have sat to watch; nay, now The brazen disk is cold against my brow, And in my sight a circle of the sea Enlarged to swiftness, where the salt waves flee, And s.h.i.+ps in stately motion pa.s.s so near That what I see is speaking to my ear: I hear the waves dash and the tackle strain, The canvas flap, the rattle of the chain That runs out thro' the hawse, the clank of the winch Winding the rusty cable inch by inch, Till half I wonder if they have no care, Those sailors, that my gla.s.s is brought to bear On all their doings, if I vex them not On every petty task of their rough lot Prying and spying, searching every craft From painted truck to gunnel, fore and aft,-- Thro' idle Sundays as I have watch'd them lean Long hours upon the rail, or neath its screen p.r.o.ne on the deck to lie outstretch'd at length, Sunk in renewal of their wearied strength.

But what a feast of joy to me, if some Fast-sailing frigate to the Channel come Back'd here her topsail, or brought gently up Let from her bow the splas.h.i.+ng anchor drop, By faint contrary wind stay'd in her cruise, The _Phaethon_ or dancing _Arethuse_, Or some immense three-decker of the line, Romantic as the tale of Troy divine; Ere yet our iron age had doom'd to fall The towering freeboard of the wooden wall, And for the engines of a mightier Mars Clipp'd their wide wings, and dock'd their soaring spars.

The gale that in their tackle sang, the wave That neath their gilded galleries dasht so brave Lost then their merriment, nor look to play With the heavy-hearted monsters of to-day.

One noon in March upon that anchoring ground Came Napier's fleet unto the Baltic bound: Cloudless the sky and calm and blue the sea, As round Saint Margaret's cliff mysteriously, Those murderous queens walking in Sabbath sleep Glided in line upon the windless deep: For in those days was first seen low and black Beside the full-rigg'd mast the strange smoke-stack, And neath their stern revolv'd the twisted fan.

Many I knew as soon as I might scan, The heavy _Royal George_, the _Acre_ bright, The _Hogue_ and _Ajax_, and could name aright Others that I remember now no more; But chief, her blue flag flying at the fore, With fighting guns a hundred thirty and one, The Admiral s.h.i.+p _The Duke of Wellington_, Whereon sail'd George, who in her gig had flown The silken ensign by our sisters sewn.

The iron Duke himself,--whose soldier fame To England's proudest s.h.i.+p had given her name, And whose white hairs in this my earliest scene Had scarce more honour'd than accustom'd been,-- Was two years since to his last haven past: I had seen his castle-flag to fall half-mast One morn as I sat looking on the sea, When thus all England's grief came first to me, Who hold my childhood favour'd that I knew So well the face that won at Waterloo.

But now 'tis other wars, and other men;-- The year that Napier sail'd, my years were ten-- Yea, and new homes and loves my heart hath found: A priest has there usurped the ivied mound, The bell that call'd to horse calls now to prayers, And silent nuns tread the familiar stairs.

Within the peach-clad walls that old outlaw, The Roman wolf, scratches with privy paw.

5

O Love, I complain, Complain of thee often, Because thou dost soften My being to pain:

Thou makest me fear The mind that createth, That loves not nor hateth In justice austere; Who, ere he make one, With millions toyeth, And lightly destroyeth Whate'er is begun.

An' wer't not for thee, My glorious pa.s.sion, My heart I could fas.h.i.+on To sternness, as he.

But thee, Love, he made Lest man should defy him, Connive and outvie him, And not be afraid:

Nay, thee, Love, he gave His terrors to cover, And turn to a lover His insolent slave.

6

THE SOUTH WIND

The south wind rose at dusk of the winter day, The warm breath of the western sea Circling wrapp'd the isle with his cloke of cloud, And it now reach'd even to me, at dusk of the day, And moan'd in the branches aloud: While here and there, in patches of dark s.p.a.ce, A star shone forth from its heavenly place, As a spark that is borne in the smoky chase; And, looking up, there fell on my face-- Could it be drops of rain Soft as the wind, that fell on my face?

Gossamers light as threads of the summer dawn, Suck'd by the sun from midmost calms of the main, From groves of coral islands secretly drawn, O'er half the round of earth to be driven, Now to fall on my face In silky skeins spun from the mists of heaven.

Who art thou, in wind and darkness and soft rain Thyself that robest, that bendest in sighing pines To whisper thy truth? that usest for signs A hurried glimpse of the moon, the glance of a star In the rifted sky?

Who art thou, that with thee I Woo and am wooed?

That robing thyself in darkness and soft rain Choosest my chosen solitude, Coming so far To tell thy secret again, As a mother her child, in her folding arm Of a winter night by a flickering fire, Telleth the same tale o'er and o'er With gentle voice, and I never tire, So imperceptibly changeth the charm, As Love on buried ecstasy buildeth his tower, --Like as the stem that beareth the flower By trembling is knit to power;-- Ah! long ago In thy first rapture I renounced my lot, The vanity, the despondency and the woe, And seeking thee to know Well was 't for me, and evermore I am thine, I know not what.

For me thou seekest ever, me wondering a day In the eternal alternations, me Free for a stolen moment of chance To dream a beautiful dream In the everlasting dance Of speechless worlds, the unsearchable scheme, To me thou findest the way, Me and whomsoe'er I have found my dream to share Still with thy charm encircling; even to-night To me and my love in darkness and soft rain Under the sighing pines thou comest again, And staying our speech with mystery of delight, Of the kiss that I give a wonder thou makest, And the kiss that I take thou takest.

7

I climb the mossy bank of the glade: My love awaiteth me in the shade.

She holdeth a book that she never heedeth: In G.o.ddes work her spirit readeth.

She is all to me, and I to her: When we embrace, the stars confer.