And when iny marriage morn may fall, |Of wisdom. Wait: my faith is large in time Still father Truth? O shall the braggart shout For some blind glimpse of freedom work itself Ill-fated that I am, what lot is mine Whose foresight preaches peace, my heart so slow To feel it! For how hard it seem'd to me, When eyes, love-languid thro half-tears, would dwell One earnest, earnest moment upon mine, Then not to dare to see! when thy low voice, Faltering, would break its syllables, to keep My own full-tuned, — hold passion in a And not leap forth and fall about thy neck, Upon my brain, my senses and my soul ! himself -came -- Thro' madness, hated by the wise, to law If this were thus, if this, indeed, were all, Better the narrow brain, the stony heart, The long mechanic pacings to and fro, The Sun will run his orbit, and the Moon The drooping flower of knowledge changed to fruit Like Death betwixt thy dear embrace and mine, And crying, "Who is this? behold thy bride," She push'd me from thee. If the sense is hard To alien ears, I did not speak to these -No, not to thee, but to thyself in me: Hard is my doom and thine: thou knowest it all. Could Love part thus? was it not well to speak, To have spoken once? It could not but be well. The slow sweet hours that bring us all things good, The slow sad hours that bring us all things ill, And all good things from evil, brought the night In which we sat together and alone, And to the want, that hollow'd all the heart, Gave utterance by the yearning of an eye, That burn'd upon its object thro' such tears As flow but once a life. The trance gave way To those caresses, when a hundred times In that last kiss, which never was the last, Farewell, like endless welcome, lived and died. Then follow'd counsel, comfort, and the words That make a man feel strong in speaking truth; Till now the dark was worn, and overhead The lights of sunset and of sunrise mix'd In that brief night; the summer night, that paused Among her stars to hear us; stars that hung Love-charm'd to listen: all the wheels of Time Spun round in station, but the end had Full quire, and morning driv'n her plough of pearl Far furrowing into light the mounded rack, Beyond the fair green field and eastern sea. THE GOLDEN YEAR. WELL, you shall have that song which Leonard wrote: It was last summer on a tour in Wales: Old James was with me: we that day had been Up Snowdon; and I wish'd for Leonard there, And found him in Llanberis: then we crost Between the lakes, and clamber'd half way up The counter side; and that same song of his He told me; for I banter'd him, and swore They said he lived shut up within himself, A tongue-tied Poet in the feverous days, That, setting the how much before the how, Cry, like the daughters of the horseleech, "Give, Cram us with all," but count not me the herd! To which "They call me what they will," he said: "But I was born too late: the fair new forms, And slow and sure comes up the golden year. "When wealth no more shall rest in mounded heaps, But smit with freër light shall slowly melt In many streams to fatten lower lands, And light shall spread, and man be liker man Thro' all the season of the golden year. "Shall eagles not be eagles? wrens be wrens ? If all the world were falcons, what of that? The wonder of the eagle were the less, But he not less the eagle. Happy days Roll onward, leading up the golden yea. "Fly, happy happy sails and bear the Press; Fly happy with the mission of the Cross; Knit land to land, and blowing havenward With silks, and fruits, and spices, clear of toll, Enrich the markets of the golden year. "But we grow old. Ah! when shall all men's good Be each man's rule, and universal Peace Lie like a shaft of light across the land, And like a lane of beams athwart the sea, Thro' all the circle of the golden year?' Thus far he flow'd, and ended; where know not me. I cannot rest from travel: I will drink Life to the lees all times I have enjoy'd Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those That loved me, and alone; on shore, and when Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades Myself not least, but honor'd of them all; For ever and for ever when I move. Were all too little, and of one to me |