There is a far unfading city
    Where bright immortal people are;
    Remote from hollow shame and pity,
    Their portals frame no guiding star
    But blightless pleasure's moteless rays
    That follow their footsteps as they dance
    Long lutanied measures through a maze
    Of flower-like song and dalliance.

    There always glows the vernal sun,
    There happy birds for ever sing,
    There faint perfumed breezes run
    Through branches of eternal spring;
    There faces browned and fruit and milk
    And blue-winged words and rose-bloomed kisses
    In galleys gowned with gold and silk
    Shake on a lake of dainty blisses.

    Coyness is not, nor bear they thought,
    Save of a shining gracious flow;
    All natural joys ...

There is a princess in the South
    About whose beauty rumors hum
Like honey-bees about the mouth
    Of roses dewdrops falter from;
    And O her hair is like the fine
    Clear amber of a jostled wine
    In tropic revels; and her eyes
    Are blue as rifts of Paradise.

Such beauty as may none before
    Kneel daringly, to kiss the tips
Of fingers such as knights of yore
    Had died to lift against their lips:
    Such eyes as might the eyes of gold
    Of all the stars of night behold
    With glittering envy, and so glare
    In dazzling splendor of despair.

So, were I but a minstrel, deft
    At weaving, with the trembling strings
Of my glad harp, the warp and weft
    Of rondels such as rapture sings, -
    I'd loop my l...

    They faced each other: Topaz-brown
    And lambent burnt her eyes and shot
    Sharp flame at his of amethyst. -
    "I hate you!    Go, and be forgot
    As death forgets!" their glitter hissed
    (So seemed it) in their hatred.    Ho!
    Dared any mortal front her so? -
    Tempestuous eyebrows knitted down -
    Tense nostril, mouth - no muscle slack, -
    And black - the suffocating black -
    The stifling blackness of her frown!

    Ah! but the lifted face of her!
    And the twitched lip and tilted head!
    Yet he did neither wince nor stir, -
    Only - his hands clenched; and, instead
    Of words, he answered with a stare
    That stammered not in aught it said,
    As might his voice if trusted there.

    ...

Above the clouds I sail, above the clouds,
    And wish my mind
Above its clouds could climb as well,
    And leave behind
The world and all its crowds,
    And ever dwell
In such a calm and limpid solitude
With ne'er a breath unkind or harsh or rude
    To break the spell -
With ne'er a thought to drive away
The golden splendour of the day.
Alone and lost beneath the tranquil blue,
    My God! With you!

Written in an Aeroplane.

Her thoughts are sweet glimpses of heaven,
Her life is that heaven brought down;
Oh, never to mortal was given
So rare and bejewelled a crown!
I'll wear it as saints wear the glory
That radiantly clasps them above -
    Oh, dower most fair!
    Oh, diadem rare!
Bright crown of her maidenly love.

My heart is a fane of devotion,
My feelings are converts at prayer,
And every thrill of emotion
Makes dearer the crown I would wear.
My soul in its fulness of rapture
Begins its millennial reign,
    Life glows like a sun,
    Love's zenith is won,
And Joy is sole monarch again.

My noonday of life is as morning,
God's light streams approvingly down;
Uncovered, I wait her adorning,
She comes with the beautiful crown!
I'll wear i...

Bid me to live, and I will live
Thy protestant to be;
Or bid me love, and I will give
A loving heart to thee.

A heart as soft, a heart as kind,
A heart as sound and free,
As in the whole world thou canst find,
That heart I'll give to thee.

Bid that heart stay, and it will stay,
To honour thy decree;
Or bid it languish quite away,
And 't shall do so for thee.

Bid me to weep, and I will weep,
While I have eyes to see;
And having none, yet I will keep
A heart to weep for thee.

Bid me despair, and I'll despair,
Under that cypress tree;
Or bid me die, and I will dare
E'en death, to die for thee.

Thou art my life, my love, my heart,
The very eyes of me;
And hast command of every part,
To live and die f...

Dost thou not hear the silver bell,
    Thro' yonder lime-trees ringing?
'Tis my lady's light gazelle;
    To me her love thoughts bringing,--
All the while that silver bell
    Around his dark neck ringing.

See, in his mouth he bears a wreath,
    My love hath kist in tying;
Oh, what tender thoughts beneath
    Those silent flowers are lying,--
Hid within the mystic wreath,
    My love hath kist in trying!

Welcome, dear gazelle, to thee,
    And joy to her, the fairest.
Who thus hath breathed her soul to me.
    In every leaf thou bearest;
Welcome, dear gazelle, to thee,
    And joy to her the fairest!

Hail ye living, speaking flowers,
    That breathe of her who bound ye;
Oh, 'twas not in fields, or bowers;
    'Twa...

The April winds are magical
And thrill our tuneful frames;
The garden walks are passional
To bachelors and dames.
The hedge is gemmed with diamonds,
The air with Cupids full,
The cobweb clues of Rosamond
Guide lovers to the pool.
Each dimple in the water,
Each leaf that shades the rock
Can cozen, pique and flatter,
Can parley and provoke.
Goodfellow, Puck and goblins,
Know more than any book.
Down with your doleful problems,
And court the sunny brook.
The south-winds are quick-witted,
The schools are sad and slow,
The masters quite omitted
The lore we care to know.

O Native scenes, nought to my heart clings nearer
Than you, ye Edens of my youthful hours;
Nought in this world warms my affections dearer
Than you, ye plains of white and yellow flowers;
Ye hawthorn hedge-rows, and ye woodbine bowers,
Where youth has rov'd, and still where manhood roves
The pasture-pathway 'neath the willow groves.
Ah, as my eye looks o'er those lovely scenes,
All the delights of former life beholding;
Spite of the pain, the care that intervenes,--
When lov'd remembrance is her bliss unfolding,
Picking her childish posies on your greens,--
My soul can pause o'er its distress awhile,
And Sorrow's cheek find leisure for a smile.

O, tomb of the past
Where buried hopes lie,
In my visions I see
Thy phantoms pass by!
A form, long departed,
    Before me appears;
A sweet voice, long silent,
    Again greets my ears.

Fond memory dwells
    On the things that have been;
And my eyes calmly gaze
    On a long vanished scene;
A scene such as memory
    Stores deep in the breast,
Which only appears
    In a season of rest.

Once more we wander,
    Her fair hand in mine;
Once more her promise,
    "I'll ever be thine";
Once more the parting,
    The shroud, and the pall,
The sods' hollow thump
    As they coffinward fall.

The reverie ends--
    All the fancies have flown;
And my sad, lonely heart,
    Now seems doubly alone;...

Come home! come home! O loved and lost, we sigh
Thus, ever, while the weary days go by,
And bring thee not. We miss thy bright, young face,
Thy bounding step, thy form of girlish grace,
            Thy pleasant, tuneful voice, -
We miss thee when the dewy evening hours
Come with their coolness to our garden, bowers, -
We miss thee when the warbler's tuneful lay
Welcomes the rising glories of the day
            And all glad things rejoice!

Come home! - the vine that climbs our cottage eaves,
Hath a low murmur 'mid its glossy leaves
When the south wind sweeps by, that seems to be
Too deeply laden with sad thoughts of thee -
            Of thee, our absent one! -
The roses blossom, and their beauties die,
And the sweet violet opes its pensive eye
By t...

Letter VI. Despair.


I.

    I am undone. My hopes have beggar'd me,
    For I have lov'd where loving was denied.
    To-day is dark, and Yesterday has died,
    And when To-morrow comes, erect and free,
    Like some great king, whose tyrant will he be,
    And whose defender in the days of pride?


II.

    I am not cold, and yet November bands
    Compress my heart. I know the month is May,
    And that the sun will warm me if I stay.
    But who is this? Oh, who is this that stands
    Straight in my path, and with his bony ha...

I'll tell thee why this weary world meseemeth
But as the visions light of one who dreameth,
Which pass like clouds, leaving no trace behind;
Why this strange life, so full of sin and folly,
In me awakeneth no melancholy,
Nor leaveth shade, or sadness, on my mind.
'Tis not that with an undiscerning eye
I see the pageant wild go dancing by,
Mistaking that which falsest is, for true;
'Tis not that pleasure hath entwined me,
'Tis not that sorrow hath enshrined me;
I bear no badge of roses or of rue,
But in the inmost chambers of my soul
There is another world, a blessed home,
O'er which no living power holdeth control,
Anigh to which ill things do never come.
There shineth the glad sunlight of clear thought,
With hope, and faith, holding communion high,
...

How many times, like lotus lilies risen
Upon the surface of a river, there
Have risen floating on my blood the rare
Soft glimmers of my hope escaped from prison.

So I am clothed all over with the light
And sensitive beautiful blossoming of passion;
Till naked for her in the finest fashion
The flowers of all my mud swim into sight.

And then I offer all myself unto
This woman who likes to love me: but she turns
A look of hate upon the flower that burns
To break and pour her out its precious dew.

And slowly all the blossom shuts in pain,
And all the lotus buds of love sink over
To die unopened: when my moon-faced lover,
Kind on the weight of suffering, smiles again.

And must we part, because some say
Loud is our love, and loose our play,
And more than well becomes the day?
Alas for pity! and for us
Most innocent, and injured thus!
Had we kept close, or played within,
Suspicion now had been the sin,
And shame had followed long ere this,
T' have plagued what now unpunished is.
But we, as fearless of the sun,
As faultless, will not wish undone
What now is done, since where no sin
Unbolts the door, no shame comes in.
Then, comely and most fragrant maid,
Be you more wary than afraid
Of these reports, because you see
The fairest most suspected be.
The common forms have no one eye
Or ear of burning jealousy
To follow them: but chiefly where
Love makes the cheek and chin a sphere
To dance and play ...

Launcelot loved Guinevere,
Ages and ages ago,
Beautiful as a bird was she,
Preening its wings in a cypress tree,
Happy in sadness, she and he,
They loved each other so.

Helen of Troy was beautiful
As tender flower in May,
Her loveliness from the towers looked down,
With the sweet moon for silver crown,
Over the walls of Troy Town,
Hundreds of years away.

Cleopatra, Egypt's Queen,
Was wondrous kind to ken,
As when the stars in the dark sky
Like buds on thorny branches lie,
So seemed she too to Antony,
That age-gone prince of men.

The Pyramids are old stones,
Scarred is that grey face,
That by the greenness of Old Nile
Gazes with an unchanging smile,
Man with all mystery to beguile
And give his thinking grace.

O sweet sincerity! -
Where modern methods be
What scope for thine and thee?

Life may be sad past saying,
Its greens for ever graying,
Its faiths to dust decaying;

And youth may have foreknown it,
And riper seasons shown it,
But custom cries: "Disown it:

"Say ye rejoice, though grieving,
Believe, while unbelieving,
Behold, without perceiving!"

- Yet, would men look at true things,
And unilluded view things,
And count to bear undue things,

The real might mend the seeming,
Facts better their foredeeming,
And Life its disesteeming.

February 1899.

A FAIR bell-flower

Sprang tip from the ground;
And early its fragrance

It shed all around;
A bee came thither

And sipp'd from its bell;
That they for each other

Were made, we see well.