2.
What is it? a learned man Could give it a clumsy name. Let him name it who can, The beauty would be the same.
3.
The tiny cell is forlorn, Void of the little living will That made it stir on the shore. Did he stand at the diamond door Of his house in a rainbow frill? Did he push, when he was uncurl❜d, A golden foot or a fairy horn Thro' his dim water-world?
4.
Slight, to be crush'd with a tap Of my finger-nail on the sand, Small, but a work divine, Frail, but of force to withstand, Year upon year, the shock Of cataract seas that snap The three-decker's oaken spine Athwart the ledges of rock, Here on the Breton strand!
5.
Breton, not Briton; here Like a shipwreck'd man on a coast Of ancient fable and fear- Plagued with a flitting to and fro, A disease, a hard mechanic ghost That never came from on high Nor ever arose from below, But only moves with the moving eye, Flying along the land and the main
Why should it look like Maud? Am I to be overawed By what I cannot but know Is a juggle born of the brain?
6.
Back from the Breton coast, Sick of a nameless fear, Back to the dark sea-line Looking, thinking of all I have lost;
An old song vexes my ear But that of Lamech is mine.
7.
For years, a measureless ill, For years, for ever, to part- But she, she would love me still; And as long, O God, as she Have a grain of love for me, So long, no doubt, no doubt, Shall I nurse in my dark heart, However weary, a spark of will Not to be trampled out.
8.
Strange, that the mind, when fraught With a passion so intense
One would think that it well Might drown all life in the eye,- That it should, by being so overwrought, Suddenly strike on a sharper sense For a shell, or a flower, little things Which else would have been past by! And now I remember, I,
When he lay dying there,
I noticed one of his many rings
(For he had many, poor worm) and thought It is his mother's hair.
9.
Who knows if he be dead? Whether I need have fled? Am I guilty of blood? However this may be, Comfort her, comfort her, all things good, While I am over the sea!
Let me and my passionate love go by, But speak to her all things holy and high, Whatever happen to me!
Me and my harmful love go by; But come to her waking, find her asleep, Powers of the height, Powers of the deep, And comfort her tho' I die.
XXV.
COURAGE, poor heart of stone! I will not ask thee why
Thou canst not understand
That thou art left forever alone: Courage, poor stupid heart of stone.- Or if I ask thee why,
Care not thou to reply :
She is but dead, and the time is at hand When thou shalt more than die.
1.
O THAT 'twere possible After long grief and pain To find the arms of my true love Round me once again!
2.
When I was wont to meet her In the silent woody places
By the home that gave me birth, We stood tranced in long embraces Mixt with kisses sweeter, sweeter Than anything on earth.
3.
A shadow flits before me, Not thou, but like to thee; Ah Christ, that it were possible
For one short hour to see
The souls we loved, that they might tell us What and where they be.
4.
It leads me forth at evening, It lightly winds and steals In a cold white robe before me, When all my spirit reels At the shouts, the leagues of lights, And the roaring of the wheels.
5.
Half the night I waste in sighs, Half in dreams I sorrow after The delight of early skies; In a wakeful doze I sorrow For the hand, the lips, the eyes, For the meeting of the morrow, The delight of happy laughter, The delight of low replies.
6.
'Tis a morning pure and sweet, And a dewy splendor falls On the little flower that clings To the turrets and the walls; 'Tis a morning pure and sweet, And the light and shadow fleet; She is walking in the meadow,
VOL. II.
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And the woodland echo rings; In a moment we shall meet; She is singing in the meadow, And the rivulet at her feet Ripples on in light and shadow To the ballad that she sings.
7.
Do I hear her sing as of old,
My bird with the shining head, My own dove with the tender eye ? But there rings on a sudden a passionate cry, There is some one dying or dead, And a sullen thunder is roll'd ; For a tumult shakes the city, And I wake, my dream is fled; In the shuddering dawn, behold, Without knowledge, without pity, By the curtains of my bed That abiding phantom cold.
8.
Get thee hence, nor come again, Mix not memory with doubt, Pass, thou deathlike type of pain, Pass and cease to move about, 'Tis the blot upon the brain That will show itself without.
9.
Then I rise, the eave-drops fall, And the yellow vapors choke The great city sounding wide; The day comes, a dull red ball Wrapt in drifts of lurid smoke, On the misty river-tide.
10.
Thro' the hubbub of the market I steal, a wasted frame,
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