Poems of Arthur Hugh Clough

by Arthur Hugh Clough

EARLY POEMS.

AN EVENING WALK IN SPRING.

It was but some few nights ago

I wandered down this quiet lane;

I pray that I may never know

The feelings then I felt, again.

The leaves were shining all about,

You might almost have seen them springing;

I heard the cuckoo’s simple shout,

And all the little birds were singing.

It was not dull, the air was clear,

All lovely sights and sounds to deal,

My eyes could see, my ears could hear,

Only my heart, it would not feel;

And yet that it should not be so,

My mind kept telling me within;

Though nought was wrong that I did know,

I thought I must have done some sin.

For I am sure as I can be,

That they who have been wont to look

On all in Nature’s face they see,

Even as in the Holy Book;

They who with pure and humble eyes

Have gazed and read her lessons high,

And taught their spirits to be wise

In love and human sympathy,—

That they can soon and surely tell

When aught has gone amiss within,

When the mind is not sound and well,

Nor the soul free from taint of sin.

For as God’s Spirit from above,

So Beauty is to them below,

And when they slight that holy love,

Their hearts that presence may not know.

So I turned home the way I came,

With downcast looks and heavy heart,

A guilty thing and full of shame,

With a dull grief that had no smart.

It chanced when I was nearly there

That all at once I raised my eyes—

Was it a dream, or vision rare,

That then they saw before them rise?

I see it now, before me here,

As often, often I have done,

As bright as it could then appear,

All shining in the setting sun.

Elms, with their mantling foliage spread,

And tall dark poplars rising out,

And blossomed orchards, white and red,

Cast, like a long low fence, about;

And in the midst the grey church-tower,

With one slight turret at its side,

Bringing to mind with silent power

Those thousand homes the elm-trees hide.

And then there came the thought of one

Who on his bed of sickness lay,

Whilst I beneath the setting sun

Was dreaming this sweet hour away.

I thought of hearts for him that beat,

Of aching eyes their watch that kept;

The sister’s and the mother’s seat—

And oh! I thought I should have wept.

And oh! my spirit melted then,

The weight fell off me that I bore,

And now I felt in truth again

The lovely things that stood before.

O blessed, blessed scene, to thee,

For that thy sweet and softening power,

I could have fallen upon my knee,

Thy stately elms, thy grey church-tower.

So then I took my homeward way,

My heart in sweet and holy frame,

With spirit, I may dare to say,

More good and soft than when I came.

1836

AN INCIDENT.

’Twas on a sunny summer day

I trod a mighty city’s street,

And when I started on my way

My heart was full of fancies sweet;

But soon, as nothing could be seen,

But countenances sharp and keen,

Nought heard or seen around but told

Of something bought or something sold,

And none that seemed to think or care

That any save himself was there,—

Full soon my heart began to sink

With a strange shame and inward pain,

For I was sad within to think

Of this absorbing love of gain,

And various thoughts my bosom tost;

When suddenly my path there crossed,

Locked hand in hand with one another,

A little maiden and her brother—

A little maiden, and she wore

Around her waist a pinafore.

And hand in hand along the street

This pretty pair did softly go,

And as they went, their little feet

Moved in short even steps and slow:

It was a sight to see and bless,

That little sister’s tenderness;

One hand a tidy basket bore

Of flowers and fruit—a chosen store,

Such as kind friends oft send to others—

And one was fastened in her brother’s.

It was a voice of meaning sweet,

And spake amid that scene of strife

Of home and homely duties meet,

And charities of daily life;

And often, should my spirit fail,

And under cold strange glances quail,

’Mid busy shops and busier throng,

That speed upon their ways along

The thick and crowded thoroughfare,

I’ll call to mind that little pair.

1836

THE THREAD OF TRUTH.

Truth is a golden thread, seen here and there

In small bright specks upon the visible side

Of our strange being’s party-coloured web.

How rich the converse! ’Tis a vein of ore

Emerging now and then on Earth’s rude breast,

But flowing full below. Like islands set

At distant intervals on Ocean’s face,

We see it on our course; but in the depths

The mystic colonnade unbroken keeps

Its faithful way, invisible but sure.

Oh, if it be so, wherefore do we men

Pass by so many marks, so little heeding?

1839

REVIVAL.

So I went wrong,

Grievously wrong, but folly crushed itself,

And vanity o’ertoppling fell, and time

And healthy discipline and some neglect,

Labour and solitary hours revived

Somewhat, at least, of that original frame.

Oh, well do I remember then the days

When on some grassy slope (what time the sun

Was sinking, and the solemn eve came down

With its blue vapour upon field and wood

And elm-embosomed spire) once more again

I fed on sweet emotion, and my heart

With love o’erflowed, or hushed itself in fear

Unearthly, yea celestial. Once again

My heart was hot within me, and, me seemed,

I too had in my body breath to wind

The magic horn of song; I too possessed

Up-welling in my being’s depths a fount

Of the true poet-nectar whence to fill

The golden urns of verse.

1839

THE SHADY LANE.

Whence comest thou, shady lane? and why and how?

Thou, where with idle heart, ten years ago,

I wandered, and with childhood’s paces slow

So long unthought of, and remembered now!

Again in vision clear thy pathwayed side

I tread, and view thy orchard plots again

With yellow fruitage hung,—and glimmering grain

Standing or shocked through the thick hedge espied.

This hot still noon of August brings the sight;

This quelling silence as of eve or night,

Wherein Earth (feeling as a mother may

After her travail’s latest bitterest throes)

Looks up, so seemeth it, one half repose,

One half in effort, straining, suffering still.

1839

THE HIGHER COURAGE.[1]

Come back again, my olden heart!—

Ah, fickle spirit and untrue,

I bade the only guide depart

Whose faithfulness I surely knew:

I said, my heart is all too soft;

He who would climb and soar aloft

Must needs keep ever at his side

The tonic of a wholesome pride.

Come back again, my olden heart!—

Alas, I called not then for thee;

I called for Courage, and apart

From Pride if Courage could not be,

Then welcome, Pride! and I shall find

In thee a power to lift the mind

This low and grovelling joy above—

’Tis but the proud can truly love.

Come back again, my olden heart!—

With incrustations of the years

Uncased as yet,—as then thou wert,

Full-filled with shame and coward fears:

Wherewith amidst a jostling throng

Of deeds, that each and all were wrong,

The doubting soul, from day to day,

Uneasy paralytic lay.

Come back again, my olden heart!

I said, Perceptions contradict,

Convictions come, anon depart,

And but themselves as false convict.

Assumptions, hasty, crude and vain,

Full oft to use will Science deign;

The corks the novice plies to-day

The swimmer soon shall cast away.

Come back again, my olden heart!

I said, Behold, I perish quite,

Unless to give me strength to start,

I make myself my rule of right:

It must be, if I act at all,

To save my shame I have at call

The plea of all men understood,—

Because I willed it, it is good.

Come back again, my olden heart!

I know not if in very deed

This means alone could aid impart

To serve my sickly spirit’s need;

But clear alike of wild self-will,

And fear that faltered, paltered still,

Remorseful thoughts of after days

A way espy betwixt the ways.

Come back again, old heart! Ah me!

Methinks in those thy coward fears

There might, perchance, a courage be,

That fails in these the manlier years;

Courage to let the courage sink,

Itself a coward base to think,

Rather than not for heavenly light

Wait on to show the truly right.

1840

WRITTEN ON A BRIDGE.

When soft September brings again

To yonder gorse its golden glow,

And Snowdon sends its autumn rain

To bid thy current livelier flow;

Amid that ashen foliage light

When scarlet beads are glistering bright,

While alder boughs unchanged are seen

In summer livery of green;

When clouds before the cooler breeze

Are flying, white and large; with these

Returning, so may I return,

And find thee changeless, Pont-y-wern.

1840

A RIVER POOL.

Sweet streamlet bason! at thy side

Weary and faint within me cried

My longing heart,—In such pure deep

How sweet it were to sit and sleep;

To feel each passage from without

Close up,—above me and about,

Those circling waters crystal clear,

That calm impervious atmosphere!

There on thy pearly pavement pure,

To lean, and feel myself secure,

Or through the dim-lit inter-space,

Afar at whiles upgazing trace

The dimpling bubbles dance around

Upon thy smooth exterior face;

Or idly list the dreamy sound

Of ripples lightly flung, above

That home, of peace, if not of love.

1840

IN A LECTURE-ROOM.

Away, haunt thou not me,

Thou vain Philosophy!

Little hast thou bestead,

Save to perplex the head,

And leave the spirit dead.

Unto thy broken cisterns wherefore go,

While from the secret treasure-depths below,

Fed by the skiey shower,

And clouds that sink and rest on hill-tops high,

Wisdom at once, and Power,

Are welling, bubbling forth, unseen, incessantly?

Why labour at the dull mechanic oar,

When the fresh breeze is blowing,

And the strong current flowing,

Right onward to the Eternal Shore?

1840

‘Blank Misgivings of a Creature moving about in Worlds not realised.’

I

Here am I yet, another twelvemonth spent,

One-third departed of the mortal span,

Carrying on the child into the man,

Nothing into reality. Sails rent,

And rudder broken,—reason impotent,—

Affections all unfixed; so forth I fare

On the mid seas unheedingly, so dare

To do and to be done by, well content.

So was it from the first, so is it yet;

Yea, the first kiss that by these lips was set

On any human lips, methinks was sin—

Sin, cowardice, and falsehood; for the will

Into a deed e’en then advanced, wherein

God, unidentified, was thought-of still.

II

Though to the vilest things beneath the moon

For poor Ease’ sake I give away my heart,

And for the moment’s sympathy let part

My sight and sense of truth, Thy precious boon,

My painful earnings, lost, all lost, as soon,

Almost, as gained; and though aside I start,

Belie Thee daily, hourly,—still Thou art,

Art surely as in heaven the sun at noon;

How much so e’er I sin, whate’er I do

Of evil, still the sky above is blue,

The stars look down in beauty as before:

It is enough to walk as best we may,

To walk, and, sighing, dream of that blest day

When ill we cannot quell shall be no more.

III

Well, well,—Heaven bless you all from day to day!

Forgiveness too, or e’er we part, from each,

As I do give it, so must I beseech:

I owe all much, much more than I can pay;

Therefore it is I go; how could I stay

Where every look commits me to fresh debt,

And to pay little I must borrow yet?

Enough of this already, now away!

With silent woods and hills untenanted

Let me go commune; under thy sweet gloom,

O kind maternal Darkness, hide my head:

The day may come I yet may re-assume

My place, and, these tired limbs recruited, seek

The task for which I now am all too weak.

IV

Yes, I have lied, and so must walk my way,

Bearing the liar’s curse upon my head;

Letting my weak and sickly heart be fed

On food which does the present craving stay,

But may be clean-denied me e’en to-day,

And tho’ ’twere certain, yet were ought but bread;

Letting—for so they say, it seems, I said,

And I am all too weak to disobey!

Therefore for me sweet Nature’s scenes reveal not

Their charm; sweet Music greets me and I feel not

Sweet eyes pass off me uninspired; yea, more,

The golden tide of opportunity

Flows wafting-in friendships and better,—I

Unseeing, listless, pace along the shore.

V

How often sit I, poring o’er

My strange distorted youth,

Seeking in vain, in all my store,

One feeling based on truth;

Amid the maze of petty life

A clue whereby to move,

A spot whereon in toil and strife

To dare to rest and love.

So constant as my heart would be,

So fickle as it must,

’Twere well for others as for me

’Twere dry as summer dust.

Excitements come, and act and speech

Flow freely forth;—but no,

Nor they, nor ought beside can reach

The buried world below.

1841

VI

——Like a child

In some strange garden left awhile alone,

I pace about the pathways of the world,

Plucking light hopes and joys from every stem

With qualms of vague misgiving in my heart

That payment at the last will be required,

Payment I cannot make, or guilt incurred,

And shame to be endured.

1841

VII

——Roused by importunate knocks

I rose, I turned the key, and let them in,

First one, anon another, and at length

In troops they came; for how could I, who once

Had let in one, nor looked him in the face,

Show scruples e’er again? So in they came,

A noisy band of revellers,—vain hopes,

Wild fancies, fitful joys; and there they sit

In my heart’s holy place, and through the night

Carouse, to leave it when the cold grey dawn

Gleams from the East, to tell me that the time

For watching and for thought bestowed is gone.

1841

VIII

O kind protecting Darkness! as a child

Flies back to bury in its mother’s lap

His shame and his confusion, so to thee,

O Mother Night, come I! within the folds

Of thy dark robe hide thou me close; for I

So long, so heedless, with external things

Have played the liar, that whate’er I see,

E’en these white glimmering curtains, yon bright stars,

Which to the rest rain comfort down, for me

Smiling those smiles, which I may not return,

Or frowning frowns of fierce triumphant malice,

As angry claimants or expectants sure

Of that I promised and may not perform,

Look me in the face! O hide me, Mother Night!

1841

IX

Once more the wonted road I tread,

Once more dark heavens above me spread,

Upon the windy down I stand,

My station whence the circling land

Lies mapped and pictured wide below;—

Such as it was, such e’en again,

Long dreary bank, and breadth of plain

By hedge or tree unbroken;—lo!

A few grey woods can only show

How vain their aid, and in the sense

Of one unaltering impotence,

Relieving not, meseems enhance

The sovereign dulness of the expanse.

Yet marks where human hand hath been,

Bare house, unsheltered village, space

Of ploughed and fenceless tilth between

(Such aspect as methinks may be

In some half-settled colony),

From Nature vindicate the scene;

A wide, and yet disheartening view,

A melancholy world.

’Tis true,

Most true; and yet, like those strange smiles

By fervent hope or tender thought

From distant happy regions brought,

Which upon some sick bed are seen

To glorify a pale worn face

With sudden beauty,—so at whiles

Lights have descended, hues have been,

To clothe with half-celestial grace

The bareness of the desert place.

Since so it is, so be it still!

Could only thou, my heart, be taught

To treasure, and in act fulfil

The lesson which the sight has brought:

In thine own dull and dreary state

To work and patiently to wait:

Little thou think’st in thy despair

How soon the o’ershaded sun may shine,

And e’en the dulling clouds combine

To bless with lights and hues divine

That region desolate and bare,

Those sad and sinful thoughts of thine!

Still doth the coward heart complain;

The hour may come, and come in vain;

The branch that withered lies and dead

No suns can force to lift its head.

True!—yet how little thou canst tell

How much in thee is ill or well;

Nor for thy neighbour nor for thee,

Be sure, was life designed to be

A draught of dull complacency.

One Power too is it, who doth give

The food without us, and within

The strength that makes it nutritive;

He bids the dry bones rise and live,

And e’en in hearts depraved to sin

Some sudden, gracious influence,

May give the long-lost good again,

And wake within the dormant sense

And love of good;—for mortal men,

So but thou strive, thou soon shalt see

Defeat itself is victory.

So be it: yet, O Good and Great,

In whom in this bedarkened state

I fain am struggling to believe,

Let me not ever cease to grieve,

Nor lose the consciousness of ill

Within me;—and refusing still

To recognise in things around

What cannot truly there be found,

Let me not feel, nor be it true,

That, while each daily task I do,

I still am giving day by day

My precious things within away

(Those thou didst give to keep as thine)

And casting, do whate’er I may,

My heavenly pearls to earthly swine.

1841

A SONG OF AUTUMN.

My wind is turned to bitter north,

That was so soft a south before;

My sky, that shone so sunny bright,

With foggy gloom is clouded o’er:

My gay green leaves are yellow-black,

Upon the dank autumnal floor;

For love, departed once, comes back

No more again, no more.

A roofless ruin lies my home,

For winds to blow and rains to pour;

One frosty night befell, and lo!

I find my summer days are o’er:

The heart bereaved, of why and how

Unknowing, knows that yet before

It had what e’en to Memory now

Returns no more, no more.

τὸ καλόν.

I have seen higher, holier things than these,

And therefore must to these refuse my heart,

Yet am I panting for a little ease;

I’ll take, and so depart.

Ah, hold! the heart is prone to fall away,

Her high and cherished visions to forget,

And if thou takest, how wilt thou repay

So vast, so dread a debt?

How will the heart, which now thou trustest, then

Corrupt, yet in corruption mindful yet,

Turn with sharp stings upon itself! Again,

Bethink thee of the debt!

—Hast thou seen higher, holier things than these,

And therefore must to these thy heart refuse?

With the true best, alack, how ill agrees

That best that thou would’st choose!

The Summum Pulchrum rests in heaven above;

Do thou, as best thou may’st, thy duty do:

Amid the things allowed thee live and love;

Some day thou shalt it view.

1841

Χρυσέα κλῄς ἐπὶ γλώσσᾳ.

If, when in cheerless wanderings, dull and cold,

A sense of human kindliness hath found us,

We seem to have around us

An atmosphere all gold,

’Midst darkest shades a halo rich of shine,

An element, that while the bleak wind bloweth,

On the rich heart bestoweth

Imbreathèd draughts of wine;

Heaven guide, the cup be not, as chance may be,

To some vain mate given up as soon as tasted!

No, nor on thee be wasted,

Thou trifler, Poesy!

Heaven grant the manlier heart, that timely, ere

Youth fly, with life’s real tempest would be coping;

The fruit of dreamy hoping

Is, waking, blank despair.

1841

THE SILVER WEDDING.[2]

The Silver Wedding! on some pensive ear

From towers remote as sound the silvery bells,

To-day from one far unforgotten year

A silvery faint memorial music swells.

And silver-pale the dim memorial light

Of musing age on youthful joys is shed,

The golden joys of fancy’s dawning bright,

The golden bliss of, Woo’d, and won, and wed.

Ah, golden then, but silver now! In sooth,

The years that pale the cheek, that dim the eyes,

And silver o’er the golden hairs of youth,

Less prized can make its only priceless prize.

Not so; the voice this silver name that gave

To this, the ripe and unenfeebled date,

For steps together tottering to the grave,

Hath bid the perfect golden title wait.

Rather, if silver this, if that be gold,

From good to better changed on age’s track,

Must it as baser metal be enrolled,

That day of days, a quarter-century back.

Yet ah, its hopes, its joys were golden too,

But golden of the fairy gold of dreams:

To feel is but to dream; until we do,

There’s nought that is, and all we see but seems.

What was or seemed it needed cares and tears,

And deeds together done, and trials past,

And all the subtlest alchemy of years,

To change to genuine substance here at last.

Your fairy gold is silver sure to-day;

Your ore by crosses many, many a loss,

As in refiners’ fires, hath purged away

What erst it had of earthy human dross.

Come years as many yet, and as they go,

In human life’s great crucible shall they

Transmute, so potent are the spells they know,

Into pure gold the silver of to-day.

Strange metallurge is human life! ’Tis true;

And Use and Wont in many a gorgeous case

Full specious fair for casual outward view

Electrotype the sordid and the base.

Nor lack who praise, avowed, the spurious ware,

Who bid young hearts the one true love forego,

Conceit to feed, or fancy light as air,

Or greed of pelf and precedence and show.

True, false, as one to casual eyes appear,

To read men truly men may hardly learn;

Yet doubt it not that wariest glance would here

Faith, Hope and Love, the true Tower-stamp discern.

Come years again! as many yet! and purge

Less precious earthier elements away,

And gently changed at life’s extremest verge,

Bring bright in gold your perfect fiftieth day!

That sight may children see and parents show!

If not—yet earthly chains of metal true,

By love and duty wrought and fixed below,

Elsewhere will shine, transformed, celestial-new;

Will shine of gold, whose essence, heavenly bright,

No doubt-damps tarnish, worldly passions fray;

Gold into gold there mirrored, light in light,

Shall gleam in glories of a deathless day.

1845

THE MUSIC OF THE WORLD AND OF THE SOUL.

I

Why should I say I see the things I see not?

Why be and be not?

Show love for that I love not, and fear for what I fear not?

And dance about to music that I hear not?

Who standeth still i’ the street

Shall be hustled and justled about;

And he that stops i’ the dance shall be spurned by the dancers’ feet,—

Shall be shoved and be twisted by all he shall meet,

And shall raise up an outcry and rout;

And the partner, too,—

What’s the partner to do?

While all the while ’tis but, perchance, an humming in mine ear,

That yet anon shall hear,

And I anon, the music in my soul,

In a moment read the whole;

The music in my heart,

Joyously take my part,

And hand in hand, and heart with heart, with these retreat, advance;

And borne on wings of wavy sound,

Whirl with these around, around,

Who here are living in the living dance!

Why forfeit that fair chance?

Till that arrive, till thou awake,

Of these, my soul, thy music make,

And keep amid the throng,

And turn as they shall turn, and bound as they are bounding,—

Alas! alas! alas! and what if all along

The music is not sounding?

II

Are there not, then, two musics unto men?—

One loud and bold and coarse,

And overpowering still perforce

All tone and tune beside;

Yet in despite its pride

Only of fumes of foolish fancy bred,

And sounding solely in the sounding head:

The other, soft and low,

Stealing whence we not know,

Painfully heard, and easily forgot,

With pauses oft and many a silence strange

(And silent oft it seems, when silent it is not),

Revivals too of unexpected change:

Haply thou think’st ’twill never be begun,

Or that ’t has come, and been, and passed away:

Yet turn to other none,—

Turn not, oh, turn not thou!

But listen, listen, listen,—if haply be heard it may;

Listen, listen, listen,—is it not sounding now?

III

Yea, and as thought of some departed friend

By death or distance parted will descend,

Severing, in crowded rooms ablaze with light,

As by a magic screen, the seër from the sight

(Palsying the nerves that intervene

The eye and central sense between);

So may the ear,

Hearing not hear,

Though drums do roll, and pipes and cymbals ring;

So the bare conscience of the better thing

Unfelt, unseen, unimaged, all unknown,

May fix the entrancèd soul ’mid multitudes alone.

LOVE, NOT DUTY.

Thought may well be ever ranging,

And opinion ever changing,

Task-work be, though ill begun,

Dealt with by experience better;

By the law and by the letter

Duty done is duty done:

Do it, Time is on the wing!

Hearts, ’tis quite another thing,

Must or once for all be given,

Or must not at all be given;

Hearts, ’tis quite another thing!

To bestow the soul away

Is an idle duty-play!—

Why, to trust a life-long bliss

To caprices of a day,

Scarce were more depraved than this!

Men and maidens, see you mind it;

Show of love, where’er you find it,

Look if duty lurk behind it!

Duty-fancies, urging on

Whither love had never gone!

Loving—if the answering breast

Seem not to be thus possessed,

Still in hoping have a care;

If it do, beware, beware!

But if in yourself you find it,

Above all things—mind it, mind it!

1841

LOVE AND REASON.

When panting sighs the bosom fill,

And hands by chance united thrill

At once with one delicious pain

The pulses and the nerves of twain;

When eyes that erst could meet with ease,

Do seek, yet, seeking, shyly shun

Extatic conscious unison,—

The sure beginnings, say, be these

Prelusive to the strain of love

Which angels sing in heaven above?

Or is it but the vulgar tune,

Which all that breathe beneath the moon

So accurately learn—so soon?

With variations duly blent;

Yet that same song to all intent,

Set for the finer instrument;

It is; and it would sound the same

In beasts, were not the bestial frame,

Less subtly organised, to blame;

And but that soul and spirit add

To pleasures, even base and bad,

A zest the soulless never had.

It may be—well indeed I deem;

But what if sympathy, it seem,

And admiration and esteem,

Commingling therewithal, do make

The passion prized for Reason’s sake?

Yet, when my heart would fain rejoice,

A small expostulating voice

Falls in; Of this thou wilt not take

Thy one irrevocable choice?

In accent tremulous and thin

I hear high Prudence deep within,

Pleading the bitter, bitter sting,

Should slow-maturing seasons bring,

Too late, the veritable thing.

For if (the Poet’s tale of bliss)

A love, wherewith commeasured this

Is weak and beggarly, and none,

Exist a treasure to be won,

And if the vision, though it stay,

Be yet for an appointed day,—

This choice, if made, this deed, if done,

The memory of this present past,

With vague foreboding might o’ercast

The heart, or madden it at last.

Let Reason first her office ply;

Esteem, and admiration high,

And mental, moral sympathy,

Exist they first, nor be they brought

By self-deceiving afterthought,—

What if an halo interfuse

With these again its opal hues,

That all o’erspreading and o’erlying,

Transmuting, mingling, glorifying,

About the beauteous various whole.

With beaming smile do dance and quiver;

Yet, is that halo of the soul?—

Or is it, as may sure be said,

Phosphoric exhalation bred

Of vapour, steaming from the bed

Of Fancy’s brook, or Passion’s river?

So when, as will be by-and-by,

The stream is waterless and dry,

This halo and its hues will die;

And though the soul contented rest

With those substantial blessings blest,

Will not a longing, half confest,

Betray that this is not the love,

The gift for which all gifts above

Him praise we, Who is Love, the Giver?

I cannot say—the things are good:

Bread is it, if not angels’ food;

But Love? Alas! I cannot say;

A glory on the vision lay;

A light of more than mortal day

About it played, upon it rested;

It did not, faltering and weak,

Beg Reason on its side to speak:

Itself was Reason, or, if not,

Such substitute as is, I wot,

Of seraph-kind the loftier lot;—

Itself was of itself attested;—

To processes that, hard and dry,

Elaborate truth from fallacy,

With modes intuitive succeeding,

Including those and superseding;

Reason sublimed and Love most high

It was, a life that cannot die,

A dream of glory most exceeding.

1844

Ὁ Θεὸς μετὰ σοῦ![3]

Farewell, my Highland lassie! when the year returns around,

Be it Greece, or be it Norway, where my vagrant feet are found,

I shall call to mind the place, I shall call to mind the day,

The day that’s gone for ever, and the glen that’s far away;

I shall mind me, be it Rhine or Rhone, Italian land or France,

Of the laughings and the whispers, of the pipings and the dance;

I shall see thy soft brown eyes dilate to wakening woman thought,

And whiter still the white cheek grow to which the blush was brought;

And oh, with mine commixing I thy breath of life shall feel,

And clasp thy shyly passive hands in joyous Highland reel;

I shall hear, and see, and feel, and in sequence sadly true,

Shall repeat the bitter-sweet of the lingering last adieu;

I shall seem as now to leave thee, with the kiss upon the brow,

And the fervent benediction of—Ὁ Θεὸς μετὰ σοῦ!

Ah me, my Highland lassie! though in winter drear and long

Deep arose the heavy snows, and the stormy winds were strong,

Though the rain, in summer’s brightest, it were raining every day,

With worldly comforts few and far, how glad were I to stay!

I fall to sleep with dreams of life in some black bothie spent,

Coarse poortith’s ware thou changing there to gold of pure content,

With barefoot lads and lassies round, and thee the cheery wife,

In the braes of old Lochaber a laborious homely life;

But I wake—to leave thee, smiling, with the kiss upon the brow,

And the peaceful benediction of—Ὁ Θεὸς μετὰ σοῦ!

WIRKUNG IN DER FERNE.

When the dews are earliest falling,

When the evening glen is grey,

Ere thou lookest, ere thou speakest,

My beloved,

I depart, and I return to thee,—

Return, return, return.

Dost thou watch me while I traverse

Haunts of men, beneath the sun—

Dost thou list while I bespeak them

With a voice whose cheer is thine?

O my brothers! men, my brothers,

You are mine, and I am yours;

I am yours to cheer and succour,

I am yours for hope and aid:

Lo, my hand to raise and stay you,

Lo, my arm to guard and keep,

My voice to rouse and warn you,

And my heart to warm and calm;

My heart to lend the life it owes

To her that is not here,

In the power of her that dwelleth

Where you know not—no, nor guess not—

Whom you see not; unto whom,—

Ere the evening star hath sunken,

Ere the glow-worm lights its lamp,

Ere the wearied workman slumbers,—

I return, return, return.

ἐπὶ Λάτμῳ.

On the mountain, in the woodland,

In the shaded secret dell,

I have seen thee, I have met thee!

In the soft ambrosial hours of night,

In darkness silent sweet

I beheld thee, I was with thee,

I was thine, and thou wert mine!

When I gazed in palace-chambers,

When I trod the rustic dance,

Earthly maids were fair to look on,

Earthly maidens’ hearts were kind:

Fair to look on, fair to love:

But the life, the life to me,

’Twas the death, the death to them,

In the spying, prying, prating

Of a curious cruel world.

At a touch, a breath they fade,

They languish, droop, and die;

Yea, the juices change to sourness,

And the tints to clammy brown;

And the softness unto foulness,

And the odour unto stench.

Let alone and leave to bloom;

Pass aside, nor make to die,

—In the woodland, on the mountain,

Thou art mine, and I am thine.

So I passed.—Amid the uplands,

In the forests, on whose skirts

Pace unstartled, feed unfearing

Do the roe-deer and the red,

While I hungered, while I thirsted,

While the night was deepest dark,

Who was I, that thou shouldst meet me?

Who was I, thou didst not pass?

Who was I, that I should say to thee

Thou art mine, and I am thine?

To the air from whence thou camest

Thou returnest, thou art gone;

Self-created, discreated,

Re-created, ever fresh,

Ever young!——

As a lake its mirrored mountains

At a moment, unregretting,

Unresisting, unreclaiming,

Without preface, without question,

On the silent shifting levels

Lets depart,

Shows, effaces and replaces!

For what is, anon is not;

What has been, again ’s to be;

Ever new and ever young

Thou art mine, and I am thine.

Art thou she that walks the skies,

That rides the starry night?

I know not——

For my meanness dares not claim the truth

Thy loveliness declares.

But the face thou show’st the world is not

The face thou show’st to me;

And the look that I have looked in

Is of none but me beheld.

I know not; but I know

I am thine, and thou art mine.

And I watch: the orb behind

As it fleeteth, faint and fair

In the depth of azure night,

In the violet blank, I trace

By an outline faint and fair

Her whom none but I beheld.

By her orb she moveth slow,

Graceful-slow, serenely firm,

Maiden-Goddess! while her robe

The adoring planets kiss.

And I too cower and ask,

Wert thou mine, and was I thine?

Hath a cloud o’ercast the sky?

Is it cloud upon the mountain-sides

Or haze of dewy river-banks

Below?—

Or around me,

To enfold me, to conceal,

Doth a mystic magic veil,

A celestial separation,

As of curtains hymeneal,

Undiscerned yet all excluding,

Interpose?

For the pine-tree boles are dimmer,

And the stars bedimmed above;

In perspective brief, uncertain,

Are the forest-alleys closed,

And to whispers indistinctest

The resounding torrents lulled.

Can it be, and can it be?

Upon Earth and here below,

In the woodland at my side

Thou art with me, thou art here.

’Twas the vapour of the perfume

Of the presence that should be,

That enwrapt me?

That enwraps us,

O my Goddess, O my Queen!

And I turn

At thy feet to fall before thee;

And thou wilt not:

At thy feet to kneel and reach and kiss thy finger-tips;

And thou wilt not:

And I feel thine arms that stay me,

And I feel——

O mine own, mine own, mine own,

I am thine, and thou art mine!

A PROTEST.

Light words they were, and lightly, falsely said:

She heard them, and she started,—and she rose,

As in the act to speak; the sudden thought

And unconsidered impulse led her on.

In act to speak she rose, but with the sense

Of all the eyes of that mixed company

Now suddenly turned upon her, some with age

Hardened and dulled, some cold and critical;

Some in whom vapours of their own conceit,

As moist malarious mists the heavenly stars,

Still blotted out their good, the best at best

By frivolous laugh and prate conventional

All too untuned for all she thought to say—

With such a thought the mantling blood to her cheek

Flushed-up, and o’er-flushed itself, blank night her soul

Made dark, and in her all her purpose swooned.

She stood as if for sinking. Yet anon

With recollections clear, august, sublime,

Of God’s great truth, and right immutable,

Which, as obedient vassals, to her mind

Came summoned of her will, in self-negation

Quelling her troublous earthy consciousness,

She queened it o’er her weakness. At the spell

Back rolled the ruddy tide, and leaves her cheek

Paler than erst, and yet not ebbs so far

But that one pulse of one indignant thought

Might hurry it hither in flood. So as she stood

She spoke. God in her spoke and made her heard.

1845

SIC ITUR.

As, at a railway junction, men

Who came together, taking then

One the train up, one down, again

Meet never! Ah, much more as they

Who take one street’s two sides, and say

Hard parting words, but walk one way:

Though moving other mates between,

While carts and coaches intervene,

Each to the other goes unseen;

Yet seldom, surely, shall there lack

Knowledge they walk not back to back,

But with an unity of track,

Where common dangers each attend,

And common hopes their guidance lend

To light them to the self-same end.

Whether he then shall cross to thee,

Or thou go thither, or it be

Some midway point, ye yet shall see

Each other, yet again shall meet

Ah, joy! when with the closing street,

Forgivingly at last ye greet!

1845

PARTING.

O tell me, friends, while yet we part,

And heart can yet be heard of heart,

O tell me then, for what is it

Our early plan of life we quit;

From all our old intentions range,

And why does all so wholly change?

O tell me, friends, while yet we part!

O tell me, friends, while yet we part,—

The rays that from the centre start

Within the orb of one warm sun,

Unless I err, have once begun,—

Why is it thus they still diverge?

And whither tends the course they urge?

O tell me, friends, while yet we part!

O tell me, friends, while yet ye hear,—

May it not be, some coming year,

These ancient paths that here divide

Shall yet again run side by side,

And you from there, and I from here,

All on a sudden reappear?

O tell me, friends, while yet ye hear!

O tell me, friends, ye hardly hear,—

And if indeed ye did, I fear

Ye would not say, ye would not speak,—

Are you so strong, am I so weak,

And yet, how much so e’er I yearn,

Can I not follow, nor you turn?

O tell me, friends, ye hardly hear!

O tell me, friends, ere words are o’er!

There’s something in me sad and sore

Repines, and underneath my eyes

I feel a somewhat that would rise,—

O tell me, O my friends, and you,

Do you feel nothing like it too?

O tell me, friends, ere words are o’er!

O tell me, friends that are no more,

Do you, too, think ere it is o’er

Old times shall yet come round as erst,

And we be friends, as we were first?

Or do you judge that all is vain,

Except that rule that none complain?

O tell me, friends that are no more!

QUA CURSUM VENTUS.

As ships, becalmed at eve, that lay

With canvas drooping, side by side,

Two towers of sail at dawn of day

Are scarce long leagues apart descried;

When fell the night, upsprung the breeze,

And all the darkling hours they plied,

Nor dreamt but each the self-same seas

By each was cleaving, side by side:

E’en so—but why the tale reveal

Of those, whom year by year unchanged,

Brief absence joined anew to feel,

Astounded, soul from soul estranged?

At dead of night their sails were filled,

And onward each rejoicing steered—

Ah, neither blame, for neither willed,

Or wist, what first with dawn appeared!

To veer, how vain! On, onward strain,

Brave barks! In light, in darkness too,

Through winds and tides one compass guides—

To that, and your own selves, be true.

But O blithe breeze; and O great seas,

Though ne’er, that earliest parting past,

On your wide plain they join again,

Together lead them home at last.

One port, methought, alike they sought,

One purpose hold where’er they fare,—

O bounding breeze, O rushing seas!

At last, at last, unite them there!

‘WEN GOTT BETRÜGT, IST WOHL BETROGEN.’

Is it true, ye gods, who treat us

As the gambling fool is treated;

O ye, who ever cheat us,

And let us feel we’re cheated!

Is it true that poetical power,

The gift of heaven, the dower

Of Apollo and the Nine,

The inborn sense, ‘the vision and the faculty divine,’

All we glorify and bless

In our rapturous exaltation,

All invention, and creation,

Exuberance of fancy, and sublime imagination,

All a poet’s fame is built on,

The fame of Shakespeare, Milton,

Of Wordsworth, Byron, Shelley,

Is in reason’s grave precision,

Nothing more, nothing less,

Than a peculiar conformation,

Constitution, and condition

Of the brain and of the belly?

Is it true, ye gods who cheat us?

And that’s the way ye treat us?

Oh say it, all who think it,

Look straight, and never blink it!

If it is so, let it be so,

And we will all agree so;

But the plot has counterplot,

It may be, and yet be not.