The firmament breaks up. In black eclipse
Light after light goes out. One evil star,
Luridly glaring through the smoke of war,
As in the dream of the Apocalypse,
Drags others down. Let us not weakly weep
Nor rashly threaten. Give us grace to keep
Our faith and patience; wherefore should we leap
On one hand into fratricidal fight,
Or, on the other, yield eternal right,
Frame lies of law, and good and ill confound?
What fear we? Safe on freedom’s vantage-ground
Our feet are planted: let us there remain
In unrevengeful calm, no means untried
Which truth can sanction, no just claim denied,
The sad spectators of a suicide!
They break the links of Union: shall we light
The fires of hell to weld anew the chain
On that red anvil where each blow is pain?
Draw...

        I had come from the city early
                That Saturday afternoon;
            I sat with Beatrix under the trees
            In the mossy orchard; the golden bees
        Buzzed over clover-tops, pink and pearly;
                I was at peace, and inclined to spoon.

        We were stopping awhile with mother,
                At the quiet country place
            Where first we'd met, one blossomy May,
            And fallen in love so the dreamy day
        Brought to my memory many another
                In the happy time when I won her grace.

        Days in the bright Spring weather,
                When the twisted, rough old tree
        Showered down apple-blooms, dainty and sweet,
            That swung in her hair, and blushed ...

"One is not."


Have you seen the beautiful Allumette,
    The magnificent pine-fringed lake,
In its splendour the sun about to set,
    Ere the fair lady moon awake.

The waters are tinged with a golden glow,
    With rose and ruby and purple bars;
Heaven's mantle flung on the lake below
    Till it fades off beneath the stars.

The distant hills, robed in violet mist
    Of the heavenly hues partake,
As they stand, with the sunlight crowned and kissed,
    On guard round the beautiful lake.

Over the waters ride gay little boats,
    Diamonds flash from the dipping oars;
Laughter and song's mingled melody floats
    To ripple and die around the shores.

Life is so gay on the Lake Allumette,
    Ah me! does its sky ever...

Like barley bending
In low fields by the sea,
Singing in hard wind
Ceaselessly;

Like barley bending
And rising again,
So would I, unbroken,
Rise from pain;

So would I softly,
Day long, night long,
Change my sorrow
Into song.

Ah, broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever!
Let the bell toll! a saintly soul floats on the Stygian river;
And, Guy de Vere, hast thou no tear? weep now or nevermore!
See! on yon drear and rigid bier low lies thy love, Lenore!
Come! let the burial rite be read, the funeral song be sung!
An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so young,
A dirge for her the doubly dead in that she died so young.

"Wretches! ye loved her for her wealth and hated her for her pride,
And when she fell in feeble health, ye blessed her, that she died!
How shall the ritual, then, be read? the requiem how be sung
By you- by yours, the evil eye, by yours, the slanderous tongue
That did to death the innocence that died, and died so young?"

Peccavimus; but rave not thus! and l...

    No eyes shall see the poems that I write
    For you; not even yours; but after long
    Forgetful years have passed on our delight
    Some hand may chance upon a dusty song

    Of those fond days when every spoken word
    Was sweet, and all the fleeting things unspoken
    Yet sweeter, and the music half unheard
    Murmured through forests as a charm unbroken.

    It is the plain and ordinary page
    Of two who loved, sole-spirited and clear.
    Will you, O stranger of another age,
    Not grant a human and compassionate tear
    To us, who each the other held so dear?
    A single tear fraternal, sadly shed,
    Since that which was so living, is so dead.

"Dear Charlie," breathed a soldier,
"O comrade true and tried,
Who in the heat of battle
Pressed closely to my side;
I feel that I am stricken,
My life is ebbing fast;
I fain would have you with me,
Dear Charlie, till the last.

"It seems so sudden, Charlie,
To think to-morrow's sun
Will look upon me lifeless,
And I not twenty-one!
I little dreamed this morning,
Twould bring my last campaign;
God's ways are not as our ways,
And I will not complain.

"There's one at home, dear Charlie,
Will mourn for me when dead,
Whose heart--it is a mother's--
Can scarce be comforted.
You'll write and tell her, Charlie,
With my dear love, that I
Fought bravely as a soldier should,
And died as he should die.

"And you will...

A month, sweet Little-ones, is past
Since your dear Mother went away,,
And she tomorrow will return;
Tomorrow is the happy day.

O blessed tidings! thought of joy!
The eldest heard with steady glee;
Silent he stood; then laughed amain,,
And shouted, " Mother, come to me!"

Louder and louder did he shout,
With witless hope to bring her near;
"Nay, patience! patience, little boy!
Your tender mother cannot hear."

I told of hills, and far-off town,
And long, long vale to travel through;,
He listens, puzzled, sore perplexed,
But he submits; what can he do ?

No strife disturbs his sister's breast;
She wars not with the mystery
Of time and distance, night and day;
The bonds of our humanity.

Her joy is like an instinct, ...

She loved the Autumn, I the Spring,
Sad all the songs she loved to sing;
And in her face was strangely set
Some great inherited regret.

Some look in all things made her sigh,
Yea! sad to her the morning sky:
'So sad! so sad its beauty seems' -
I hear her say it still in dreams.

But when the day grew grey and old,
And rising stars shone strange and cold,
Then only in her face I saw
A mystic glee, a joyous awe.

Spirit of Sadness, in the spheres
Is there an end of mortal tears?
Or is there still in those great eyes
That look of lonely hills and skies?

If thou in the dear love of some one Friend
Hast been so happy that thou know'st what thoughts
Will sometimes in the happiness of love
Make the heart sink, then wilt thou reverence
This quiet spot; and, Stranger! not unmoved
Wilt thou behold this shapeless heap of stones,
The desolate ruins of St. Herbert's Cell.
Here stood his threshold; here was spread the roof
That sheltered him, a self-secluded Man,
After long exercise in social cares
And offices humane, intent to adore
The Deity, with undistracted mind,
And meditate on everlasting things,
In utter solitude. But he had left
A Fellow-labourer, whom the good Man loved
As his own soul. And, when with eye upraised
To heaven he knelt before the crucifix,
While o'er the lake the cataract of Lodore
Peal...

Why be at pains that I should know
You sought not me?
Do breezes, then, make features glow
So rosily?
Come, the lit port is at our back,
And the tumbling sea;
Elsewhere the lampless uphill track
To uncertainty!

O should not we two waifs join hands?
I am alone,
You would enrich me more than lands
By being my own.
Yet, though this facile moment flies,
Close is your tone,
And ere to-morrow's dewfall dries
I plough the unknown.

(Written in the shadow of 1872.)

Ah, to be by Mooni now,
Where the great dark hills of wonder,
Scarred with storm and cleft asunder
By the strong sword of the thunder,
Make a night on morning’s brow!
Just to stand where Nature’s face is
Flushed with power in forest places
Where of God authentic trace is
Ah, to be by Mooni now!

Just to be by Mooni’s springs!
There to stand, the shining sharer
Of that larger life, and rarer
Beauty caught from beauty fairer
Than the human face of things!
Soul of mine from sin abhorrent
Fain would hide by flashing current,
Like a sister of the torrent,
Far away by Mooni’s springs.

He that is by Mooni now
Sees the water-sapphires gleaming
Where the River Spirit, dreaming,
Sleeps by fa...

Your troubles shrink not, though I feel them less
Here, far away, than when I tarried near;
I even smile old smiles with listlessness -
Yet smiles they are, not ghastly mockeries mere.

A thought too strange to house within my brain
Haunting its outer precincts I discern:
- That I will not show zeal again to learn
Your griefs, and sharing them, renew my pain . . .

It goes, like murky bird or buccaneer
That shapes its lawless figure on the main,
And each new impulse tends to make outflee
The unseemly instinct that had lodgment here;
Yet, comrade old, can bitterer knowledge be
Than that, though banned, such instinct was in me!

1866.

Once, once only, sweet and lovable woman,
you leant your smooth arm on mine
(that memory has never faded a moment
from the shadowy depths of my mind):


it was late: the full moon spread its light
like a freshly minted disc,
and like a river, the solemnity of night
flowed over sleeping Paris.


Along the houses, under carriage gates,
cats crept past furtively,
ears pricked, or else like familiar shades,
accompanied us slowly.


Suddenly, in our easy intimacy,
that flower of the pale light,
from you, rich, sonorous instrument, eternally
quivering gaily, bright,


from you, clear and joyous as a fanfare
in the glittering dawn
a strange, plaintive sigh escaped
a faltering tone


as from some st...

Down into the darkness at last, Daniel, down into the darkness at last;
Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel, sleeping the dreamless sleep,
Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn the pure and the perfect rest:
Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain?
Aye, and is it not better, if only the dead soul knew?

Joy was there in the spring-time and hope like a blossoming rose,
When the wine-blood of youth ran tingling and throbbing in every vein;
Chirrup of robin and blue-bird in the white-blossomed apple and pear;
Carpets of green on the meadows spangled with dandelions;
Lowing of kine in the valleys, bleating of lambs on the hills;
Babble of brooks and the prattle of fountains that flashed in the sun;
Glad, merry voices, ripples of laughter, snatches of music and son...

“A stone upon her heart and head,
But no name written on that stone;
Sweet neighbours whisper low instead,
This sinner was a loving one.”
- Mrs. Browning.



’Tis a nameless stone that stands at your head,
The gusts in the gloomy gorges whirl
Brown leaves and red till they cover your bed,
Now I trust that your sleep is a sound one, girl!

I said in my wrath, when his shadow cross’d
From your garden gate to your cottage door,
“What does it matter for one soul lost?
Millions of souls have been lost before.”

Yet I warn’d you, ah! but my words came true,
“Perhaps some day you will find him out.”
He who was not worthy to loosen your shoe,
Does his conscience therefore prick him? I doubt.

You laughed and were deaf to my wa...

    We mourn the loss of our little pet,
    And sigh o'er her hapless fate,
    For never more by the fire she'll sit,
    Nor play by the old green gate.

    The little grave where her infant sleeps
    Is 'neath the chestnut tree.
    But o'er her grave we may not weep,
    We know not where it may be.

    Her empty bed, her idle ball,
    Will never see her more;
    No gentle tap, no loving purr
    Is heard at the parlor door.

    Another cat comes after her mice,
    A cat with a dirty face,
    But she does not hunt as our darling did,
    Nor play with her airy grace.

    Her stealthy paws tread the very hall
    Where Snowball used to play,
    But she only spits at the dogs our pet
    So gallantly drove away.<...

'Wanted Kind Person to take charge of baby Boy (or Girl),' etc. - Any newspaper, any day.
'Early this morning the body of an infant was found on a doorstep in -- Street,' etc. - Any newspaper, every other day.


Unto the Person kind there came
A young girl bearing her fruit of shame:
She fell and it had to pay the price
Innocent Lamb of Sacrifice!

Lovingly then the Person smiled,
Gazing upon the face of the child;
Smiled like an ogress - 'Don't despond!
I am of children all too fond.'

Then said the mother, speaking low,
Kissing the babe she had born in woe:
'Treat him tenderly-nurse him well.'
Hotly the tears on the baby fell.

Taking the mother's coin with a leer
Ogress remarked: 'Don't cry, my dear,
Motherly persons to me ar...