Poems by George Meredith Volume Ii Part 2

This b.u.t.ter-woman's market-trot Of verse is pa.s.sing market-bounds.

XLII

Adieu! the sun sets; he is gone.

On banks of fog faint lines extend: Adieu! bring back a braver dawn To England, and to me my friend.

November 15th, 1867.

TIME AND SENTIMENT

I see a fair young couple in a wood, And as they go, one bends to take a flower, That so may be embalmed their happy hour, And in another day, a kindred mood, Haply together, or in solitude, Recovered what the teeth of Time devour, The joy, the bloom, and the illusive power, Wherewith by their young blood they are endued To move all enviable, framed in May, And of an aspect sisterly with Truth: Yet seek they with Time's laughing things to wed: Who will be prompted on some pallid day To lift the hueless flower and show that dead, Even such, and by this token, is their youth.

LUCIFER IN STARLIGHT

On a starred night Prince Lucifer uprose.

Tired of his dark dominion swung the fiend Above the rolling ball in cloud part screened, Where sinners hugged their spectre of repose.

Poor prey to his hot fit of pride were those.

And now upon his western wing he leaned, Now his huge bulk o'er Afric's sands careened, Now the black planet shadowed Arctic snows.

Soaring through wider zones that p.r.i.c.ked his scars With memory of the old revolt from Awe, He reached a middle height, and at the stars, Which are the brain of heaven, he looked, and sank.

Around the ancient track marched, rank on rank, The army of unalterable law.

THE STAR SIRIUS

Bright Sirius! that when Orion pales To dotlings under moonlight still art keen With cheerful fervour of a warrior's mien Who holds in his great heart the battle-scales: Unquenched of flame though swift the flood a.s.sails, Reducing many l.u.s.trous to the lean: Be thou my star, and thou in me be seen To show what source divine is, and prevails.

Long watches through, at one with G.o.dly night, I mark thee planting joy in constant fire; And thy quick beams, whose jets of life inspire Life to the spirit, pa.s.sion for the light, Dark Earth since first she lost her lord from sight Has viewed and felt them sweep her as a lyre.

SENSE AND SPIRIT

The senses loving Earth or well or ill Ravel yet more the riddle of our lot.

The mind is in their trammels, and lights not By tr.i.m.m.i.n.g fear-bred tales; nor does the will To find in nature things which less may chill An ardour that desires, unknowing what.

Till we conceive her living we go distraught, At best but circle-windsails of a mill.

Seeing she lives, and of her joy of life Creatively has given us blood and breath For endless war and never wound unhealed, The gloomy Wherefore of our battle-field Solves in the Spirit, wrought of her through strife To read her own and trust her down to death.

EARTH'S SECRET

Not solitarily in fields we find Earth's secret open, though one page is there; Her plainest, such as children spell, and share With bird and beast; raised letters for the blind.

Not where the troubled pa.s.sions toss the mind, In turbid cities, can the key be bare.

It hangs for those who hither thither fare, Close interthreading nature with our kind.

They, hearing History speak, of what men were, And have become, are wise. The gain is great In vision and solidity; it lives.

Yet at a thought of life apart from her, Solidity and vision lose their state, For Earth, that gives the milk, the spirit gives.

INTERNAL HARMONY

a.s.sured of worthiness we do not dread Compet.i.tors; we rather give them hail And greeting in the lists where we may fail: Must, if we bear an aim beyond the head!

My betters are my masters: purely fed By their sustainment I likewise shall scale Some rocky steps between the mount and vale; Meanwhile the mark I have and I will wed.

So that I draw the breath of finer air, Station is nought, nor footways laurel-strewn, Nor rivals tightly belted for the race.

Good speed to them! My place is here or there; My pride is that among them I have place: And thus I keep this instrument in tune.

GRACE AND LOVE

Two flower-enfolding crystal vases she I love fills daily, mindful but of one: And close behind pale morn she, like the sun Priming our world with light, pours, sweet to see, Clear water in the cup, and into me The image of herself: and that being done, Choice of what blooms round her fair garden run In climbers or in creepers or the tree She ranges with unerring fingers fine, To harmony so vivid that through sight I hear, I have her heavenliness to fold Beyond the senses, where such love as mine, Such grace as hers, should the strange Fates withhold Their starry more from her and me, unite.

APPRECIATION

Earth was not Earth before her sons appeared, Nor Beauty Beauty ere young Love was born: And thou when I lay hidden wast as morn At city-windows, touching eyelids bleared; To none by her fresh wingedness endeared; Unwelcome unto revellers outworn.

I the last echoes of Diana's horn In woodland heard, and saw thee come, and cheered.

No longer wast thou then mere light, fair soul!

And more than simple duty moved thy feet.

New colours rose in thee, from fear, from shame, From hope, effused: though not less pure a scroll May men read on the heart I taught to beat: That change in thee, if not thyself, I claim.

THE DISCIPLINE OF WISDOM

Rich labour is the struggle to be wise, While we make sure the struggle cannot cease.