I never shall hear your voice again,
Your voice so gentle and low
But the thought of you, Jenny Allen,
Will go with me where I go.
Your sweet voice drowns the Atlantic wave
And the rush of the Alpine snow.

You were very fair, Jenny Allen,
Fair as a woodland rose;
Your heart was pure as an angel's heart,
Too good for earth and its woes,
And I loved you, Jenny Allen,
With a sorrowful love, God knows.

You loved me, Jenny Allen,
My sorrow made me wise;
And I read your heart, 'twas an easy task,
For within your clear blue eyes,
Your pure and innocent thoughts shone out
Like stars from the summer skies.

He had riches and fame with his seventy years
When he won you for his wife;
You were but a child, and poor, and tired,
Tir...

i(Man)
In a cleft that's christened Alt
Under broken stone I halt
At the bottom of a pit
That broad noon has never lit,
And shout a secret to the stone.
All that I have said and done,
Now that I am old and ill,
Turns into a question till
I lie awake night after night
And never get the answers right.
Did that play of mine send out
Certain men the English shot?
Did words of mine put too great strain
On that woman's reeling brain?
Could my spoken words have checked
That whereby a house lay wrecked?
And all seems evil until I
Sleepless would lie down and die.
i(Echo)

Lie down and die.

i(Man)
That were to shirk
The spiritual intellect's great work,
And shirk it in vain. There is no release
In a bodkin or dise...

1.

Whene'er I view those lips of thine,
Their hue invites my fervent kiss;
Yet, I forego that bliss divine,
Alas! it were - unhallow'd bliss.


2.

Whene'er I dream of that pure breast,
How could I dwell upon its snows!
Yet, is the daring wish represt,
For that, - would banish its repose.


3.

A glance from thy soul-searching eye
Can raise with hope, depress with fear;
Yet, I conceal my love, - and why?
I would not force a painful tear.


4.

I ne'er have told my love, yet thou
Hast seen my ardent flame too well;
And shall I plead my passion now,
To make thy bosom's heaven a hell?


5.

No! for thou never canst be mine,
United by the priest's decree:
By any ti...

If at hooam yo have to tew,
Though yor comforts may be few,
An yo think yore lot is hard, and yor prospects bad;
Yo may swear ther's nowt gooas reight,
Wi' yor friends an wi' yor meyt,
But yo'll nivver know ther vally till j'o've lost em, lad.

Though yo've but a humble cot,
An yore share's a seedy lot;
Though yo goa to bed i'th dumps, an get up i'th mornin mad,
Yet yo'll find its mich moor wise,
What yo have to fondly prize,
For yo'll nivver know ther vally till yo've lost em, lad.

The day was o'er, and in their tent the weaned victors met,
In wine and social gaiety the carnage to forget.
The merry laugh and sparkling jest, the pleasant tale were there -
Each heart was free and gladsome then, each brow devoid of care.

Yet one was absent from the board who ever was the first
In every joyous, festive scene, in every mirthful burst;
He also was the first to dare each perilous command,
To rush on danger - yet was he the youngest of the band.

Upon the battle-field he lay a damp and fearful grave;
His right hand grasped the cherished flag - the flag he died to save;
While the cold stars shone calmly down on heaps of fallen dead,
And their pale light a halo cast round that fair sleeper's head.

Say, was there none o'er that young chief to shed one...

With heavy groans did I approach my friends,
Heavy as though the mountains I would move.
The flagon they were murdering; they poured
Into the cup, wild-eyed, the grape's red blood.
No, they killed not, they breathed new life therein.
Then, too, in fiery rapture, burned my veins,
But soon the fumes had fled. In vain, in vain!
Ye cannot fill the breach of the rent heart.
Ye crave a sensuous joy; ye strive in vain
To cheat with flames of passion, my despair.
So when the sinking sun draws near to night,
The sky's bright cheeks fade 'neath those tresses black.
Ye laugh - but silently the soul weeps on;
Ye cannot stifle her sincere lament.

Solomon Ben Judah Gabirol (Died Between 1070-80.)

The listless Palm-trees catch the breeze above
    The pile-built huts that edge the salt Lagoon,
There is no Breeze to cool the heat of love,
    No wind from land or sea, at night or noon.

Perfumed and robed I wait, my Lord, for you,
    And my heart waits alert, with strained delight,
My flowers are loath to close, as though they knew
    That you will come to me before the night.

In the Verandah all the lights are lit,
    And softly veiled in rose to please your eyes,
Between the pillars flying foxes flit,
    Their wings transparent on the lilac skies.

Come soon, my Lord, come soon, I almost fear
    My heart may fail me in this keen suspense,
Break with delight, at last, to know you near.
    Pleasure is one with Pain, if too intense.
...

        I.

With bloodshot eyes the morning rose
Upon a world of gloom and tears;
A kindred glance queen Isoud shows -
Come night, come morn, cease not her fears.
The fog-clouds whiten all the vale,
The sunlight draws them to its love;
The diamond dews wash ev'ry dale,
Where bays the hunt within the grove.
Her lute - the one her touch he taught
To wake beneath the stars a song
Of swan-caught music - is as naught
And on yon damask lounge is flung.
Down o'er her cheeks her hair she draws
In golden rays 'twixt lily tips,
And gazes sad on gloomy shaws
'Neath which had often touched their lips.


        II.

With irised eyes, from morn to noon.
And noon to middle night she stoops
From her high lattice 'neath the moon,
H...

A long, low waste of yellow sand
Lay shining northward far as eye could reach,
Southward a rocky bluff rose high
Broken in wild, fantastic shapes.
Near by, one jagged rock towered high,
And o'er the waters leaned, like giant grim,
Striving to peer into the mysteries
The ocean whispers of continually,
And covers with her soft, treacherous face.
For the rest, the sun was sinking low
Like a great golden globe, into the sea;
Above the rock a bird was flying
In dizzy circles, with shrill cries,
And on a plank floated from some wreck,
With shreds of musty seaweed
Clinging to it yet, a woman sat
Holding a child within her arms;
A sweet-faced woman - looking out to sea
With dark, patient eyes, and singing to the child,
And this the song she in the sunse...

How could I be aware,
The opposite window eyeing
As I lay listless there,
That through its blinds was dying
One I had rated rare
Before I had set me sighing
For another more fair?

Had the house-front been glass,
My vision unobscuring,
Could aught have come to pass
More happiness-insuring
To her, loved as a lass
When spouseless, all-alluring?
I reckon not, alas!

So, the square window stood,
Steadily night-long shining
In my close neighbourhood,
Who looked forth undivining
That soon would go for good
One there in pain reclining,
Unpardoned, unadieu'd.

Silently screened from view
Her tragedy was ending
That need not have come due
Had she been less unbending.
How near, near were we two
At that las...

Yon nightingale who mourns so plaintively
Perchance his fledglings or his darling mate,
Fills sky and earth with sweetness, warbling late,
Prophetic notes of melting melody.
All night, he, as it were, companions me,
Reminding me of my so cruel fate,
Mourning no other grief save mine own state,
Who knew not Death reigned o'er divinity.
How easy 't is to dupe the soul secure!
Those two fair lamps, even than the sun more bright,
Who ever dreamed to see turn clay obscure?
But Fortune has ordained, I now am sure,
That I, midst lifelong tears, should learn aright,
Naught here can make us happy, or endure.

Why do you harbour that great cheval-glass
    Filling up your narrow room?
    You never preen or plume,
Or look in a week at your full-length figure -
    Picture of bachelor gloom!

"Well, when I dwelt in ancient England,
    Renting the valley farm,
    Thoughtless of all heart-harm,
I used to gaze at the parson's daughter,
    A creature of nameless charm.

"Thither there came a lover and won her,
    Carried her off from my view.
    O it was then I knew
Misery of a cast undreamt of -
    More than, indeed, my due!

"Then far rumours of her ill-usage
    Came, like a chilling breath
    When a man languisheth;
Followed by news that her mind lost balance,
    And, in a space, of her death.

"Soon sank her father; an...

1.

Why should my anxious breast repine,
Because my youth is fled?
Days of delight may still be mine;
Affection is not dead.
In tracing back the years of youth,
One firm record, one lasting truth
Celestial consolation brings;
Bear it, ye breezes, to the seat,
Where first my heart responsive beat, -
"Friendship is Love without his wings!"


2

Through few, but deeply chequer'd years,
What moments have been mine!
Now half obscured by clouds of tears,
Now bright in rays divine;
Howe'er my future doom be cast,
My soul, enraptured with the past,
To one idea fondly clings;
Friendship! that thought is all thine own,
Worth worlds of bliss, that thought alone -
"Friendship is Love without his wings!"


3
...

The sun descending in the west,
The evening star does shine;
The birds are silent in their nest,
And I must seek for mine.
The moon, like a flower
In heaven's high bower,
With silent delight,
Sits and smiles on the night.

Farewell, green fields and happy grove,
Where flocks have ta'en delight.
Where lambs have nibbled, silent move
The feet of angels bright;
Unseen they pour blessing,
And joy without ceasing,
On each bud and blossom,
And each sleeping bosom.

They look in every thoughtless nest
Where birds are covered warm;
They visit caves of every beast,
To keep them all from harm:
If they see any weeping
That should have been sleeping,
They pour sleep on their head,
And sit down by their bed.

When wolv...

Two savings of the Holy Scriptures beat
Like pulses in the Church's brow and breast;
And by them we find rest in our unrest
And, heart deep in salt-tears, do yet entreat
God's fellowship as if on heavenly seat.
The first is Jesus wept, whereon is prest
Full many a sobbing face that drops its best
And sweetest waters on the record sweet:
And one is where the Christ, denied and scorned
Looked upon Peter. Oh, to render plain
By help of having loved a little and mourned,
That look of sovran love and sovran pain
Which He, who could not sin yet suffered, turned
On him who could reject but not sustain!

        "It fell on a day, that he went out to his father to the reapers.
        And he said unto his father, My head, my head.    And he said to a lad,
        Carry him to his mother.    And . . . he sat on her knees till noon,
        and then died.    And she went up, and laid him on the bed. . . .
        And shut the door upon him and went out."



        Immortal story that no mother's heart
        Ev'n yet can read, nor feel the biting pain
        That rent her soul!    Immortal not by art
        Which makes a long past sorrow sting again

        Like grief of yesterday:    but since it said
        In simplest word the truth which all may see,
        Where any mother sobs above her dead
        And plays anew the silent tragedy.

When I seek the world through
For images of you,
Though apple-blossom is glad
And the lily stately-sad,
Gilliflowers kind of breath,
Rosemary true till death;
Though the wind can stir the grass
To memories as you pass.
And the soft-singing streams
Are music like your dreams;
Though constant stars embrace
The quiet of your face,
Your smile lights up sunrise,
And evening's in your eyes,
Each so shadows its part,
All cannot show your heart;
And weighing the beauty of earth
I see it so little worth,
When reckoned beside you,
That I hold heaven for true
But all my heaven is you.

I shall go away
To the brown hills, the quiet ones,
The vast, the mountainous, the rolling,
Sun-fired and drowsy!

My horse snuffs delicately
At the strange wind;
He settles to a swinging trot; his hoofs tramp the dust.
The road winds, straightens,
Slashes a marsh,
Shoulders out a bridge,
Then --
Again the hills.
Unchanged, innumerable,
Bowing huge, round backs;
Holding secret, immense converse:
In gusty voices,
Fruitful, fecund, toiling
Like yoked black oxen.

The clouds pass like great, slow thoughts
And vanish
In the intense blue.

My horse lopes; the saddle creaks and sways.
A thousand glittering spears of sun slant from on high.
The immensity, the spaces,
Are like the spaces
Between star and star...