I wrote a Name upon the river sands
With her who bore it standing by my side,
Her large dark eyes lit up with gentle pride,
And leaning on my arm with claspèd hands,
To burning words of mine she thus replied,
"Nay, writ not on thy heart. This tablet frail
Fitteth as frail a vow. Fantastic bands
Will scarce confine these limbs." I turned love-pale,
I gazed upon the river'd landscape wide,
And thought how little it would all avail
Without her love. 'Twas on a morn of May,
Within a month I stood upon the sand,
Gone was the name I traced with trembling hand,—
And from my heart 'twas also gone away.
Like clouds or streams we wandered on at will,
Three glorious days, till, near our journey's end,
As down the moorland road we straight did wend,
To Wordsworth's "Inversneyd," talking to kill
The cold and cheerless drizzle in the air,
'Bove me I saw, at pointing of my friend,
An old fort like a ghost upon the hill,
Stare in blank misery through the blinding rain,
So human-like it seemed in its despair—
So stunned with grief—long gazed at it we twain.
Weary and damp we reached our poor abode,
I, warmly seated in the chimney-nook,
Still saw that old Fort o'er the moorland road
Stare through the rain with strange woe-wildered look.
Sheath'd is the river as it glideth by,
Frost-pearl'd are all the boughs in forests old,
The sheep are huddling close upon the wold,
And over them the stars tremble on high.
Pure joys these winter nights around me lie;
'Tis fine to loiter through the lighted street
At Christmas time, and guess from brow and pace
The doom and history of each one we meet,
What kind of heart beats in each dusky case;
Whiles startled by the beauty of a face
In a shop-light a moment. Or instead,
To dream of silent fields where calm and deep
The sunshine lieth like a golden sleep—
Recalling sweetest looks of Summers dead.
London:—Printed by G. Barclay, Castle St. Leicester Sq.