Bulchevy's Book of English Verse Part 125

Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 1806-1861

683. Sonnets from the Portuguese ii

UNLIKE are we, unlike, O princely Heart!

Unlike our uses and our destinies.

Our ministering two angels look surprise On one another, as they strike athwart Their wings in pa.s.sing. Thou, bethink thee, art A guest for queens to social pageantries, With gages from a hundred brighter eyes Than tears even can make mine, to play thy part Of chief musician. What hast thou to do With looking from the lattice-lights at me-- A poor, tired, wandering singer, singing through The dark, and leaning up a cypress tree?

The chrism is on thine head--on mine the dew-- And Death must dig the level where these agree.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 1806-1861

684. Sonnets from the Portuguese iii

GO from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand Henceforward in thy shadow. Nevermore Alone upon the threshold of my door Of individual life I shall command The uses of my soul, nor lift my hand Serenely in the suns.h.i.+ne as before, Without the sense of that which I forbore-- Thy touch upon the palm. The widest land Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine With pulses that beat double. What I do And what I dream include thee, as the wine Must taste of its own grapes. And when I sue G.o.d for myself, He hears that name of thine, And sees within my eyes the tears of two.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 1806-1861

685. Sonnets from the Portuguese iv

IF thou must love me, let it be for naught Except for love's sake only. Do not say, 'I love her for her smile--her look--her way Of speaking gently,--for a trick of thought That falls in well with mine, and certes brought A sense of pleasant ease on such a day'-- For these things in themselves, Beloved, may Be changed, or change for thee--and love, so wrought, May be unwrought so. Neither love me for Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry: A creature might forget to weep, who bore Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!

But love me for love's sake, that evermore Thou mayst love on, through love's eternity.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 1806-1861

686. Sonnets from the Portuguese v

WHEN our two souls stand up erect and strong, Face to face, silent, drawing nigh and nigher, Until the lengthening wings break into fire At either curving point,--what bitter wrong Can the earth do us, that we should not long Be here contented? Think! In mounting higher, The angels would press on us, and aspire To drop some golden orb of perfect song Into our deep, dear silence. Let us stay Rather on earth, Beloved--where the unfit Contrarious moods of men recoil away And isolate pure spirits, and permit A place to stand and love in for a day, With darkness and the death-hour rounding it.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 1806-1861

687. A Musical Instrument

WHAT was he doing, the great G.o.d Pan, Down in the reeds by the river?

Spreading ruin and scattering ban, Splas.h.i.+ng and paddling with hoofs of a goat, And breaking the golden lilies afloat With the dragon-fly on the river.

He tore out a reed, the great G.o.d Pan, From the deep cool bed of the river; The limpid water turbidly ran, And the broken lilies a-dying lay, And the dragon-fly had fled away, Ere he brought it out of the river.

High on the sh.o.r.e sat the great G.o.d Pan, While turbidly flow'd the river; And hack'd and hew'd as a great G.o.d can With his hard bleak steel at the patient reed, Till there was not a sign of the leaf indeed To prove it fresh from the river.

He cut it short, did the great G.o.d Pan (How tall it stood in the river!), Then drew the pith, like the heart of a man, Steadily from the outside ring, And notch'd the poor dry empty thing In holes, as he sat by the river.

'This is the way,' laugh'd the great G.o.d Pan (Laugh'd while he sat by the river), 'The only way, since G.o.ds began To make sweet music, they could succeed.'

Then dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed, He blew in power by the river.

Sweet, sweet, sweet, O Pan!

Piercing sweet by the river!

Blinding sweet, O great G.o.d Pan!

The sun on the hill forgot to die, And the lilies revived, and the dragon-fly Came back to dream on the river.

Yet half a beast is the great G.o.d Pan, To laugh as he sits by the river, Making a poet out of a man: The true G.o.ds sigh for the cost and pain-- For the reed which grows nevermore again As a reed with the reeds of the river.

Frederick Tennyson. 1807-1898

688. The Holy Tide

THE days are sad, it is the Holy tide: The Winter morn is short, the Night is long; So let the lifeless Hours be glorified With deathless thoughts and echo'd in sweet song: And through the sunset of this purple cup They will resume the roses of their prime, And the old Dead will hear us and wake up, Pa.s.s with dim smiles and make our hearts sublime!

The days are sad, it is the Holy tide: Be dusky mistletoes and hollies strown, Sharp as the spear that pierced His sacred side, Red as the drops upon His th.o.r.n.y crown; No haggard Pa.s.sion and no lawless Mirth Fright off the solemn Muse,--tell sweet old tales, Sing songs as we sit brooding o'er the hearth, Till the lamp flickers, and the memory fails.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. 1807-1882

689. My Lost Youth

OFTEN I think of the beautiful town That is seated by the sea; Often in thought go up and down The pleasant streets of that dear old town, And my youth comes back to me.

And a verse of a Lapland song Is haunting my memory still: 'A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'

I can see the shadowy lines of its trees, And catch, in sudden gleams, The sheen of the far-surrounding seas, And islands that were the Hesperides Of all my boyish dreams.

And the burden of that old song, It murmurs and whispers still: 'A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'

I remember the black wharves and the slips, And the sea-tides tossing free; And Spanish sailors with bearded lips, And the beauty and mystery of the s.h.i.+ps, And the magic of the sea.

And the voice of that wayward song Is singing and saying still: 'A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'

I remember the bulwarks by the sh.o.r.e, And the fort upon the hill; The sunrise gun with its hollow roar, The drum-beat repeated o'er and o'er, And the bugle wild and shrill.

And the music of that old song Throbs in my memory still: 'A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'

I remember the sea-fight far away, How it thunder'd o'er the tide!

And the dead sea-captains, as they lay In their graves o'erlooking the tranquil bay Where they in battle died.

And the sound of that mournful song Goes through me with a thrill: 'A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'

I can see the breezy dome of groves, The shadows of Deering's woods; And the friends.h.i.+ps old and the early loves Come back with a Sabbath sound, as of doves In quiet neighbourhoods.

And the verse of that sweet old song, It flutters and murmurs still: 'A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'

I remember the gleams and glooms that dart Across the schoolboy's brain; The song and the silence in the heart, That in part are prophecies, and in part Are longings wild and vain.

And the voice of that fitful song Sings on, and is never still: 'A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'

There are things of which I may not speak; There are dreams that cannot die; There are thoughts that make the strong heart weak, And bring a pallor into the cheek, And a mist before the eye.

And the words of that fatal song Come over me like a chill: 'A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'

Strange to me now are the forms I meet When I visit the dear old town; But the native air is pure and sweet, And the trees that o'ershadow each well-known street, As they balance up and down, Are singing the beautiful song, Are sighing and whispering still: 'A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'

And Deering's woods are fresh and fair, And with joy that is almost pain My heart goes back to wander there, And among the dreams of the days that were I find my lost youth again.

And the strange and beautiful song, The groves are repeating it still: 'A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'