Love Letters of a Violinist and Other Poems Part 17

VI.

Oh, hus.h.!.+ Oh, hus.h.!.+ how wild a gush of rapture in the distance,-- A roll of rhymes, a toll of chimes, a cry for love's a.s.sistance; A sound that wells from happy throats, A flood of song where beauty floats, And where our thoughts, like golden boats, do seem to cross a river.

VII.

This is the advent of the lark--the priest in gray apparel-- Who doth prepare to trill in air his sinless Summer carol; This is the prelude to the lay The birds did sing in Caesar's day, And will again, for aye and aye, in praise of G.o.d's creation.

VIII.

O dainty thing, on wonder's wing, by life and love elated, Oh! sing aloud from cloud to cloud, till day be consecrated; Till from the gateways of the morn, The sun, with all his light unshorn, His robes of darkness round him torn, doth scale the lofty heavens!

A BALLAD OF KISSES.

I.

There are three kisses that I call to mind, And I will sing their secrets as I go.

The first, a kiss too courteous to be kind, Was such a kiss as monks and maidens know; As sharp as frost, as blameless as the snow.

II.

The second kiss, ah G.o.d! I feel it yet, And evermore my soul will loathe the same.

The toys and joys of fate I may forget, But not the touch of that divided shame: It clove my lips; it burnt me like a flame.

III.

The third, the final kiss, is one I use Morning and noon and night; and not amiss.

Sorrow be mine if such I do refuse!

And when I die, be love, enrapt in bliss, Re-sanctified in Heaven by such a kiss.

MARY ARDEN.

I.

O thou to whom, athwart the perish'd days And parted nights long sped, we lift our gaze, Behold! I greet thee with a modern rhyme, Love-lit and reverent as befits the time, To solemnize the feast-day of thy son.

II.

And who was he who flourish'd in the smiles Of thy fair face? 'Twas Shakespeare of the Isles, Shakespeare of England, whom the world has known As thine, and ours, and Glory's, in the zone Of all the seas and all the lands of earth.

III.

He was un-famous when he came to thee, But sound, and sweet, and good for eyes to see, And born at Stratford, on St. George's Day, A week before the wondrous month of May; And G.o.d therein was gracious to us all.

IV.

He lov'd thee, Lady! and he lov'd the world; And, like a flag, his fealty was unfurl'd; And Kings who flourished ere thy son was born Shall live through him, from morn to furthest morn, In all the far-off cycles yet to come.

V.

He gave us Falstaff, and a hundred quips, A hundred mottoes from immortal lips; And, year by year, we smile to keep away The generous tears that mind us of the sway Of his great singing, and the pomp thereof.

VI.

His was the nectar of the G.o.ds of Greece, The lute of Orpheus, and the Golden Fleece Of grand endeavour; and the thunder-roll Of words majestic, which, from pole to pole, Have borne the tidings of our English tongue.

VII.

He gave us Hamlet; and he taught us more Than schools have taught us; and his fairy-lore Was fraught with science; and he called from death Verona's Lovers, with the burning breath Of their great pa.s.sion that has filled the spheres.

VIII.

He made us know Cordelia, and the man Who murder'd sleep, and baleful Caliban; And, one by one, athwart the gloom appear'd Maidens and men and myths who were revered In olden days, before the earth was sad.

IX.

Aye! this is true. It was ordained so; He was thine own, three hundred years ago; But ours to-day; and ours till earth be red With doom-day splendour for the quick and dead, And days and nights are scattered like the leaves.

X.

It was for this he lived, for this he died; To raise to Heaven the face that never lied, To lean to earth the lips that should become Fraught with conviction when the mouth was dumb, And all the firm, fine body turn'd to clay.

XI.

He lived to seal, and sanctify the lives Of perish'd maids, and uncreated wives, And gave them each a s.p.a.ce wherein to dwell; And for his mother's sake he loved them well, And made them types, undying, of all truth.