Selections from Wordsworth and Tennyson Part 8

Dip down upon the northern sh.o.r.e, O sweet new-year delaying long; Thou doest expectant nature wrong; Delaying long, delay no more.

What stays thee from the clouded noons, 5 Thy sweetness from its proper place?

Can trouble live with April days, Or sadness in the summer moons?

Bring orchis, bring the foxglove spire, The little speedwell's darling blue, 10 Deep tulips dash'd with fiery dew, Laburnums, dropping-wells of fire.

O thou, new-year, delaying long, Delayest the sorrow in my blood, That longs to burst a frozen bud 15 And flood a fresher throat with song.

Lx.x.xVI

Sweet after showers, ambrosial air, That rollest from the gorgeous gloom Of evening over brake and bloom And meadow, slowly breathing bare

The round of s.p.a.ce, and rapt below 5 Thro' all the dewy-ta.s.sell'd wood, And shadowing down the horned flood In ripples, fan my brows and blow

The fever from my cheek, and sigh The full new life that feeds thy breath 10 Throughout my frame, till Doubt and Death, Ill brethren, let the fancy fly

From belt to belt of crimson seas On leagues of odour streaming far, To where in yonder orient star 15 A hundred spirits whisper "Peace."

CI

Unwatch'd, the garden bough shall sway, The tender blossom flutter down, Unloved, that beech will gather brown, This maple burn itself away;

Unloved, the sun-flower, s.h.i.+ning fair, 5 Ray round with flames her disk of seed, And many a rose-carnation feed With summer spice the humming air;

Unloved, by many a sandy bar, The brook shall babble down the plain, 10 At noon or when the lesser wain Is twisting round the polar star;

Uncared for, gird the windy grove, And flood the haunts of hern and crake; Or into silver arrows break 15 The sailing moon in creek and cove;

Till from the garden and the wild A fresh a.s.sociation blow, And year by year the landscape grow Familiar to the stranger's child; 20

As year by year the labourer tills His wonted glebe, or lops the glades; And year by year our memory fades From all the circle of the hills.

CXIV

Who loves not Knowledge? Who shall rail Against her beauty? May she mix With men and prosper! Who shall fix Her pillars? Let her work prevail.

But on her forehead sits a fire: 5 She sets her forward countenance And leaps into the future chance, Submitting all things to desire.

Half-grown as yet, a child, and vain-- She cannot fight the fear of death. 10 What is she, cut from love and faith, But some wild Pallas from the brain

Of Demons? fiery-hot to burst All barriers in her onward race For power. Let her know her place; 15 She is the second, not the first.

A higher hand must make her mild, If all be not in vain; and guide Her footsteps, moving side by side With wisdom, like the younger child: 20

For she is earthly of the mind, But Wisdom heavenly of the soul.

O friend, who earnest to thy goal So early, leaving me behind

I would the great world grew like thee, 25 Who grewest not alone in power And knowledge, but by year and hour In reverence and in charity.

CXV

Now fades the last long streak of snow, Now burgeons every maze of quick About the flowering squares, and thick By ashen roots the violets blow,

Now rings the woodland loud and long, 5 The distance takes a lovelier hue, And drown'd in yonder living blue The lark becomes a sightless song.

Now dance the lights on lawn and lea, The flocks are whiter down the vale, 10 And milkier every milky sail On winding stream or distant sea;

Where now the seamew pipes, or dives In yonder greening gleam, and fly The happy birds, that change their sky 15 To build and brood, that live their lives

From land to land; and in my breast Spring wakens too; and my regret Becomes an April violet, And buds and blossoms like the rest. 20

CXVIII

Contemplate all this work of Time, The giant labouring in his youth; Nor dream of human love and truth, As dying Nature's earth and lime;

But trust that those we call the dead 5 Are breathers of an ampler day For ever n.o.bler ends. They say, The solid earth whereon we tread

In tracts of fluent heat began, And grew to seeming-random forms, 10 The seeming prey of cyclic storms, Till at the last arose the man;

Who throve and branch'd from clime to clime, The herald of a higher race, And of himself in higher place, 15 If so he type this work of time

Within himself, from more to more; Or, crown'd with attributes of woe Like glories, move his course, and show That life is not as idle ore, 20

But iron dug from central gloom, And heated hot with burning fears, And dipt in baths of hissing tears, And batter'd with the shocks of doom

To shape and use. Arise and fly 25 The reeling Faun, the sensual feast; Move upward, working out the beast And let the ape and tiger die.

CXXIII

There rolls the deep where grew the tree.

O earth, what changes hast thou seen!

There where the long street roars hath been The stillness of the central sea.

The hills are shadows, and they flow 5 From form to form, and nothing stands; They melt like mist, the solid lands, Like clouds they shape themselves and go.

But in my spirit will I dwell, And dream my dream, and hold it true; 10 For tho' my lips may breathe adieu, I cannot think the thine farewell.