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SONGS

PAUPER POET’S SONG.

• SUN, moon, and stars, the ample air,
• The birds shrill whistling everywhere,
• Fields white with lambs and daisies;
• The pearls of eve, the jewelled morn,
• The rose rich blowing on the thorn,
• The glow of blush‐rose faces;
• The silver glint of sun‐smit rain,
• The shattered sun‐gold of the main,
• And heaven’s sweet breath that moves it;
• The earth, our myriad‐bosomed nurse,
• This whole miraculous universe
• Belongs to him who loves it!

• Why fret then for the gold of this,
• The fame of that man, or the bliss,
• Or such another’s graces?
• Oh heart that chim’st with golden verse,
• My heart, thou art the magic purse
• Which all dull trouble chases;
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• Thine too fruition of all fame
• When the live soul, as flame with flame,
• Weds the dead soul that moves it;
• Then sing for aye, and aye rehearse,
• This whole miraculous universe
• Belongs to him who loves it!

SNOW OR SNOWDROPS?

• IS it snow or snowdrops’ shimmer
• Whitens thus the bladed grass,
• With a faint aërial glimmer,—
• Spring or winter, which did pass?
• For the sky is dim and tender
• With an evanescent light,
• And the fading fields are white,
• White with snow or snowdrops, under
• The fair firstling stars of night.

• Little robin, softly, cheerly
• Piping on yon wintry bough,
• Why have all the fields that pearly
• Iridescence, knowest thou?
• Did old Winter, grim and hoary,
• Aim a parting dart at Spring
• As she fled on azure wing,
• Or did she with rainbow glory
• In his face her snowdrops fling?

A SPRING SONG.

• DARK sod pierced by flames of flowers,
• Dead wood freshly quickening,
• Bright skies dusked with sudden showers,
• Lit by rainbows on the wing.

• Cuckoo calls and young lambs’ bleating,
• Nimble airs which coyly bring
• Little gusts of tender greeting
• From shy nooks where violets cling.

• Half‐fledged buds and birds and vernal
• Fields of grass dew‐glistening;
• Evanescent life’s eternal
• Resurrection, bridal Spring!

“ALL MY HEART IS STIRRING LIGHTLY.”

• ALL my heart is stirring lightly
• Like dim violets winter‐bound,
• Quickening as they feel the brightly
• Glowing sunlight underground.

• Yea, this drear and silent bosom,
• Hushed as snow‐hid grove but now,
• Breaketh into leaf and blossom
• Like a gleaming vernal bough.

• Oh the singing, singing, singing!
• Callow hopes that thrill my breast!
• Can the lark of love be winging
• Back to its abandoned nest?

APRIL RAIN.

• THE April rain, the April rain,
• Comes slanting down in fitful showers,
• Then from the furrow shoots the grain,
• And banks are fledged with nestling flowers;
• And in grey shaw and woodland bowers
• The cuckoo through the April rain
• Calls once again.

• The April sun, the April sun,
• Glints through the rain in fitful splendour,
• And in grey shaw and woodland dun
• The little leaves spring forth and tender
• Their infant hands, yet weak and slender,
• For warmth towards the April sun,
• One after one.

• And between shower and shine hath birth
• The rainbow’s evanescent glory;
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• Heaven’s light that breaks on mists of earth!
• Frail symbol of our human story,
• It flowers through showers where, looming hoary,
• The rain‐clouds flash with April mirth,
• Like Life on earth.

APPLE‐BLOSSOM.

• BLOSSOM of the apple trees!
• Mossy trunks all gnarled and hoary,
• Grey boughs tipped with rose‐veined glory,
• Clustered petals soft as fleece
• Garlanding old apple trees!

• How you gleam at break of day!
• When the coy sun, glancing rarely,
• Pouts and sparkles in the pearly
• Pendulous dewdrops, twinkling gay
• On each dancing leaf and spray.

• Through your latticed boughs on high,
• Framed in rosy wreaths, one catches
• Brief kaleidoscopic snatches
• Of deep lapis‐lazuli
• In the April‐coloured sky.

• When the sundown’s dying brand
• Leaves your beauty to the tender
• Magic spells of moonlight splendour,
• Glimmering clouds of bloom you stand,
• Turning earth to fairyland.

• Cease, wild winds, O, cease to blow!
• Apple‐blossom, fluttering, flying,
• Palely on the green turf lying,
• Vanishing like winter snow;
• Swift as joy to come and go.

THE MUSIC‐LESSON.

• A THRUSH alit on a young‐leaved spray,
• And, lightly clinging,
• It rocked in its singing
• As the rapturous notes rose loud and gay;
• And with liquid shakes,
• And trills and breaks,
• Rippled though blossoming bough of May.

• Like a ball of fluff, with a warm brown throat
• And throbbing bosom,
• ’Mid the apple‐blossom,
• The new‐fledged nestling sat learning by rote
• To echo the song
• So tender and strong,
• As it feebly put in its frail little note.

• O blissfullest lesson amid the green grove!
• The low wind crispeth
• The leaves, where lispeth
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• The shy little bird with its parent above;
• Two voices that mingle
• And make but a single
• Hymn of rejoicing in praise of their love.

“ONCE ON A GOLDEN DAY.”

• ONCE on a golden day,
• In the golden month of May,
• I gave my heart away—
• Little birds were singing.

• I culled my heart in truth,
• Wet with the dews of youth,
• For love to take, forsooth—
• Little flowers were springing.

• Love sweetly laughed at this,
• And between kiss and kiss
• Fled with my heart in his:
• Winds warmly blowing.

• And with his sun and shower
• Love kept my heart in flower,
• As in the greenest bower
• Rose richly glowing.

• Till, worn at evensong,
• Love dropped my heart among
• Stones by the way ere long;
• Misprizèd token.

• There in the wind and rain,
• Trampled and rent in twain,
• Ne’er to be whole again,
• My heart lies broken.

ROSE D’AMOUR.

• OH haste while roses bloom below,
• Oh haste while pale and bright above
• The sun and moon alternate glow,
• To pluck the rose of love.

• Yea, give the morning to the lark,
• The nightingale its glimmering grove,
• Give moonlight to the hungry dark,
• But to man’s heart give love!

• Then haste while still the roses blow,
• And pale and bright in heaven above
• The sun and moon alternate glow,
• Pluck, pluck the rose of love.

ONLY A SMILE.

• NO butterfly whose frugal fare
• Is breath of heliotrope and clove,
• And other trifles light as air,
• Could live on less than doth my love.

• That childlike smile that comes and goes
• About your gracious lips and eyes,
• Hath all the sweetness of the rose,
• Which feeds the freckled butterflies.

• I feed my love on smiles, and yet
• Sometimes I ask, with tears of woe,
• How had it been if we had met,
• If you had met me long ago,

• Before the fast, defacing years
• Had made all ill that once was well?
• Ah, then your smiling breeds such tears
• As Tantalus may weep in hell.

THE SONGS OF SUMMER.

• THE songs of summer are over and past!
• The swallow’s forsaken the dripping eaves;
• Ruined and black ’mid the sodden leaves
• The nests are rudely swung in the blast:
• And ever the wind like a soul in pain
• Knocks and knocks at the window‐pane.

• The songs of summer are over and past!
• Woe’s me for a music sweeter than theirs—
• The quick, light bound of a step on the stairs,
• The greeting of lovers too sweet to last:
• And ever the wind like a soul in pain
• Knocks and knocks at the window‐pane.

“YEA, THE ROSES ARE STILL ON FIRE.”

• YEA, the roses are still on fire
• With the bygone heat of July,
• Though the least little wind drifting by
• Shake a rose‐leaf or two from the brier,
• Be it never so soft a sigh.

• Ember of love still glows and lingers
• Deep at the red heart’s smouldering core;
• With the sudden passionate throb of yore
• We shook as our eyes and clinging fingers
• Met once only to meet no more.

AUTUMN TINTS.

• CORAL‐COLOURED yew‐berries
• Strew the garden ways,
• Hollyhocks and sunflowers
• Make a dazzling blaze
• In these latter days.

• Marigolds by cottage doors
• Flaunt their golden pride,
• Crimson‐punctured bramble leaves
• Dapple far and wide
• The green mountain‐side.

• Far away, on hilly slopes
• Where fleet rivulets run,
• Miles on miles of tangled fern,
• Burnished by the sun,
• Glow a copper dun.

• For the year that’s on the wane,
• Gathering all its fire,
• Flares up through the kindling world
• As, ere they expire,
• Flames leap high and higher.

ON AND ON.

• By long leagues of wood and meadow
• On and on we drive apace;
• In the dreamy light and shadow
• Veiling earth’s autumnal face.

• Rosy clouds are drifting o’er us,
• Rooks rise parleying from their tryst,
• And the road lies far before us,
• Fading into amethyst.

• On and on, through leagues of heather,
• Deeps of scarlet beaded lane,
• Like a pheasant’s golden feather
• Golden leaves around us rain.

• On and on, where woodlands hoary,
• In October’s lavish fire,
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• Flame up with unearthly glory,
• Beauteous summer’s funeral pyre.

• On and on, where casements blinking
• Lighten into transient gules,
• As the dying day in sinking
• Splashes all the wayside pools.

• On and on; the land grows dimmer,
• And our road recedes afar;
• While on either hand there glimmer
• Setting sun and rising star.

• Would I knew what thoughts steal o’er you,
• As the long road lengthens yet:
• Ah, like hope it winds before you,
• And behind me like regret.

A CHILD’S FANCY.

• “HUSH, hush! Speak softly, Mother dear,
• So that the daisies may not hear;
• For when the stars begin to peep,
• The pretty daisies go to sleep.

• “See, Mother, round us on the lawn,
• With soft white lashes closely drawn,
• They’ve shut their eyes so golden‐gay,
• That looked up through the long, long day.

• “But now they’re tired of all the fun—
• Of bees and birds, of wind and sun
• Playing their game at hide‐and‐seek;—
• Then very softly let us speak.”

• A myriad stars above the child
• Looked down from heaven and sweetly smiled;
• But not a star in all the skies
• Beamed on him with his Mother’s eyes.

• She stroked his curly chestnut head,
• And whispering very softly, said,
• “I’d quite forgotten they might hear;
• Thank you for that reminder, dear.”

ON A VIOLA D’AMORE.

CARVED WITH A CUPID’S HEAD, AND PLAYED ON FOR THE FIRST TIME AFTER MORE THAN A CENTURY.

• WHAT fairy music clear and light,
• Responsive to your fingers,
• Swells rippling on the summer night,
• And amorously lingers
• Upon the sense, as long ago
• In days of rouge and rococo!

• A century of silence lay
• On strings that had not spoken
• Since powdered lords to ladies gay
• Gave, for a lover’s token,
• Fans glowing fresh from Watteau’s art,
• Well worth a marchioness’s heart.

• Your dormant music, tranced and bound,
• Was like the Sleeping Beauty
• Prince Charming in the forest found,
• And kissed in loyal duty:
• And when she woke her eyes’ blue fire
• Turned the dumb forest to a lyre.

• Thus Amor with the bandaged eyes,
• Fit symbol of hushed numbers,
• Most musically wakes and sighs
• After an age of slumbers:
• Beneath your magic bow’s control
• The Viol has regained her soul.

BROWN EYES.

• OH, brown Eyes with long black lashes,
• Young brown Eyes,
• Depths of night from which there flashes
• Lightning as of summer skies,
• Beautiful brown Eyes!

• In your veiled mysterious splendour
• Passion lies
• Sleeping, but with sudden tender
• Dreams that fill with vague surmise
• Beautiful brown Eyes.

• All my soul, with yearning shaken,
• Asks in sighs—
• Who will see your heart awaken,
• Love’s divine sunrise
• In those young brown Eyes?

MY LADY.

• LIKE putting forth upon a sea
• On which the moonbeams shimmer,
• Where reefs and unknown perils be
• To wreck, yea, wreck one utterly,
• It were to love you, lady fair,
• In whose black braids of billowy hair
• The misty moonstones glimmer.

• Oh, misty moonstone‐coloured eye,
• Latticed behind long lashes,
• Within whose clouded orbs there lies,
• Like lightning in the sleeping skies,
• A spark to kindle and ignite,
• And set a fire of love alight
• To burn one’s heart to ashes.

• I will not put forth on this deep
• Of perilous emotion;
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• No, though your hands be soft as sleep,
• They shall not have my heart to keep,
• Nor draw it to your fatal sphere.
• Lady, you are as much to fear
• As is the fickle ocean.

SOMETIMES I WONDER.

• SOMETIMES I wonder if you guess
• The deep impassioned tenderness
• Which overflows my heart;
• The love I never dare confess;
• Yet hard, yea, harder to repress
• Than tears too fain to start.

• Sometimes I ponder, O my sweet,
• The things I’ll tell you when we meet;
• But straightway at your sight
• My heart’s blood oozes to my feet
• Like thawing waters in the heat,
• Confused with too much light.

• I hardly know, when you are near,
• If it is love, or joy, or fear
• Which fills my languid frame;
• Enveloped in your atmosphere,
• My dark self seems to disappear,
• A moth entombed in flame.

MANY WILL LOVE YOU.

• MANY will love you; you were made for love;
• For the soft plumage of the unruffled dove
• Is not so soft as your caressing eyes.
• You will love many; for the winds that veer
• Are not more prone to shift their compass, dear,
• Than your quick fancy flies.

• Many will love you; but I may not, no;
• Even though your smile sets all my life aglow,
• And at your fairness all my senses ache.
• You will love many; but not me, my dear,
• Who have no gift to give you but a tear
• Sweet for your sweetness’ sake.

A DREAM.

• ONLY a dream, a beautiful baseless dream;
• Only a bright
• Flash from your eyes, a brief electrical gleam,
• Charged with delight.

• Only a waking, alone, in the moon’s last gleam
• Fading from sight;
• Only a flooding of tears that shudder and stream
• Fast through the night.

GREEN LEAVES AND SERE.

• THREE tall poplars beside the pool
• Shiver and moan in the gusty blast,
• The carded clouds are blown like wool,
• And the yellowing leaves fly thick and fast.

• The leaves, now driven before the blast,
• Now flung by fits on the curdling pool,
• Are tossed heaven‐high and dropped at last
• As if at the whim of a jabbering fool.

• O leaves, once rustling green and cool!
• Two met here where one moans aghast
• With wild heart heaving towards the past:
• Three tall poplars beside the pool.

THE HUNTER’S MOON.

• THE Hunter’s Moon rides high,
• High o’er the close‐cropped plain;
• Across the desert sky
• The herded clouds amain
• Scamper tumultuously,
• Chased by the hounding wind
• That yelps behind.

• The clamorous hunt is done,
• Warm‐housed the kennelled pack;
• One huntsman rides alone
• With dangling bridle slack;
• He wakes a hollow tone,
• Far echoing to his horn
• In clefts forlorn.

• The Hunter’s Moon rides low,
• Her course is nearly sped.
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• Where is the panting roe?
• Where hath the wild deer fled?
• Hunter and hunted now
• Lie in oblivion deep:
• Dead or asleep.

A PARTING.

• THE year is on the wing, my love,
• With tearful days and nights;
• The clouds are on the wing above
• With gathering swallow‐flights.

• The year is on the wing, my sweet,
• And in the ghostly race,
• With patter of unnumbered feet,
• The dead leaves fly apace.

• The year is on the wing, and shakes
• The last rose from its tree;
• And I, whose heart in parting breaks,
• Must bid adieu to thee.

LASSITUDE.

• I LAID me down beside the sea,
• Endless in blue monotony;
• The clouds were anchored in the sky.
• Sometimes a sail went idling by.

• Upon the shingles on the beach
• Grey linen was spread out to bleach,
• And gently with a gentle swell
• The languid ripples rose and fell.

• A fisher‐boy, in level line,
• Cast stone by stone into the brine:
• Methought I too might do as he,
• And cast my sorrows on the sea.

• The old, old sorrows in a heap
• Dropped heavily into the deep;
• But with its sorrow on that day
• My heart itself was cast away.

SEEKING.

• IN many a shape and fleeting apparition,
• Sublime in age or with clear morning eyes,
• Ever I seek thee, tantalising Vision,
• Which beckoning flies.

• Ever I seek Thee, O evasive Presence,
• Which on the far horizon’s utmost verge,
• Like some wild star in luminous evanescence,
• Shoots o’er the surge.

• Ever I seek Thy features ever flying,
• Which ne’er beheld I never can forget:
• Lightning which flames through love, and mimics dying
• In souls that set.

• Ever I seek Thee through all clouds of error;
• As when the moon behind earth’s shadow slips,
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• She wears a momentary mask of terror
• In brief eclipse.

• Ever I seek Thee, passionately yearning;
• Like altar‐fire on some forgotten fane,
• My life flames up irrevocably burning,
• And burnt in vain.