If seeking me she ask “What hap
Befel him? Whither is he fled,
My friend, my poor unhappy friend?”
Then softly answer “He is dead.”
Yet no! May never pang so keen
Be hers, and I the giver! Say,
If word be spoken, this alone,
“Weeping for you he went his way.”
THE CORN-CRAKE
I
Here let the bliss of summer and her night
Be on my heart as wide and pure as heaven;
Now while o’er earth the tide of young delight
Brims to the full, calm’d by the wizard Seven,
And their high mistress, yon enchanted Moon;
The air is faint, yet fresh as primrose buds,
And dim with weft of honey-colour’d beams,
A bride-robe for the new espousèd June,
Who lies white-limbed among her flowers, nor dreams,
Such a divine content her being floods.
II
Awake, awake! The silence hath a voice;
Not thine, thou heart of fire, palpitating
Until all griefs change countenance and rejoice,
And all joys ache o’er-ripe since thou dost sing,
Not thine this voice of the dry meadow-lands,
Harsh iteration! note untuneable!
Which shears the breathing quiet with a blade
Of ragged edge! Say, wilt thou ne’er be still
Crier in June’s high progress, whose commands
Upon no heedless drowzed heart are laid?
III
Nay, cease not till thy breast disquieted
Hath won a term of ease; the dewy grass
Trackless at morn betrays not thy swift tread,
And through smooth-closing air thy call-notes pass,
To faint on yon soft-bosom’d pastoral steep
Thee bird the Night accepts; and I, through thee,
Reach to embalmèd hearts of summers dead,
Feel round my feet old, inland meadows deep,
And bow o’er flowers that not a leaf have shed,
Nor once have heard moan of an alien sea.