PERFECT LOVE.
Beloved, those who moan of love's brief day Shall find but little grace with me, I guess, Who know too well this passion's tenderness To deem that it shall lightly pass away, A moment's interlude in life's dull play; Though many loves have lingered to distress, So shall not ours, sweet Lady, ne'ertheless, But deepen with us till both heads be grey.
For perfect love is like a fair green plant, That fades not with its blossoms, but lives on, And gentle lovers shall not come to want, Though fancy with its first mad dream be gone; Sweet is the flower, whose radiant glory flies, But sweeter still the green that never dies.
LOVE-WONDER.
Or whether sad or joyous be her hours, Yet ever is she good and ever fair.
If she be glad, 'tis like a child's wild air, Who claps her hands above a heap of flowers; And if she's sad, it is no cloud that lowers, Rather a saint's pale grace, whose golden hair Gleams like a crown, whose eyes are like a prayer From some quiet window under minster towers.
But ah, Beloved, how shall I be taught To tell this truth in any rhymed line?
For words and woven phrases fall to naught, Lost in the silence of one dream divine, Wrapped in the beating wonder of this thought: Even thou, who art so precious, thou art mine!
COMFORT.
Comfort the sorrowful with watchful eyes In silence, for the tongue cannot avail.
Vex not his wounds with rhetoric, nor the stale Worn truths, that are but maddening mockeries To him whose grief outmasters all replies.
Only watch near him gently; do but bring The piteous help of silent ministering, Watchful and tender. This alone is wise.
So shall thy presence and thine every motion, The grateful knowledge of thy sad devotion Melt out the passionate hardness of his grief, And break the flood-gates of the pent-up soul.
He shall bow down beneath thy mute control, And take thine hands, and weep, and find relief.
DESPONDENCY.
Slow figures in some live remorseless frieze, The approaching days escapeless and unguessed, With mask and shroud impenetrably dressed; Time, whose inexorable destinies Bear down upon us like impending seas; And the huge presence of this world, at best A sightless giant wandering without rest, Aged and mad with many miseries.
The weight and measure of these things who knows?
Resting at times beside life's thought-swept stream, Sobered and stunned with unexpected blows, We scarcely hear the uproar; life doth seem, Save for the certain nearness of its woes, Vain and phantasmal as a sick man's dream.
OUTLOOK.
Not to be conquered by these headlong days, But to stand free: to keep the mind at brood On life's deep meaning, nature's altitude Of loveliness, and time's mysterious ways; At every thought and deed to clear the haze Out of our eyes, considering only this, What man, what life, what love, what beauty is, This is to live, and win the final praise.
Though strife, ill fortune and harsh human need Beat down the soul, at moments blind and dumb With agony; yet, patience--there shall come Many great voices from life's outer sea, Hours of strange triumph, and, when few men heed, Murmurs and glimpses of eternity.
GENTLENESS.
Blind multitudes that jar confusedly At strife, earth's children, will ye never rest From toils made hateful here, and dawns distressed With ravelling self-engendered misery?
And will ye never know, till sleep shall see Your graves, how dreadful and how dark indeed Are pride, self-will, and blind-voiced anger, greed, And malice with its subtle cruelty?
How beautiful is gentleness, whose face Like April sunshine, or the summer rain, Swells everywhere the buds of generous thought?
So easy, and so sweet it is; its grace Smoothes out so soon the tangled knots of pain.
Can ye not learn it? will ye not be taught?
A PRAYER.
Oh earth, oh dewy mother, breathe on us Something of all thy beauty and thy might, Us that are part of day, but most of night, Not strong like thee, but ever burdened thus With glooms and cares, things pale and dolorous Whose gladest moments are not wholly bright; Something of all thy freshness and thy light, Oh earth, oh mighty mother, breathe on us.
Oh mother, who wast long before our day, And after us full many an age shalt be.
Careworn and blind, we wander from thy way: Born of thy strength, yet weak and halt are we Grant us, oh mother, therefore, us who pray, Some little of thy light and majesty.
MUSIC.
Move on, light hands, so strongly tenderly, Now with dropped calm and yearning undersong, Now swift and loud, tumultuously strong, And I in darkness, sitting near to thee, Shall only hear, and feel, but shall not see, One hour made passionately bright with dreams, Keen glimpses of life's splendour, dashing gleams Of what we would, and what we cannot be.
Surely not painful ever, yet not glad, Shall such hours be to me, but blindly sweet, Sharp with all yearning and all fact at strife, Dreams that shine by with unremembered feet, And tones that like far distance make this life Spectral and wonderful and strangely sad.
KNOWLEDGE.
What is more large than knowledge and more sweet; Knowledge of thoughts and deeds, of rights and wrongs, Of passions and of beauties and of songs; Knowledge of life; to feel its great heart beat Through all the soul upon her crystal seat; To see, to feel, and evermore to know; To till the old world's wisdom till it grow A garden for the wandering of our feet.
Oh for a life of leisure and broad hours, To think and dream, to put away small things, This world's perpetual leaguer of dull naughts; To wander like the bee among the flowers Till old age find us weary, feet and wings Grown heavy with the gold of many thoughts.