A weary woman tricked with gold and gem,
Wearing some strange barbaric diadem,
Scorn on her lips, and, like a hidden fire,
Within her eyes cruel unslaked desire.
Two agèd figures, poor, and blurred with tears;
Their child, a bold proud woman, sweeping by;
A hard cold face, which pities not nor fears,
And all contempt and evil in her eye.
Around a harpsichord, a blue-eyed throng
Of long-dead children, rapt in sounds devout,
In some old grange, while on that silent song
The sabbath twilight fades, and stars come out.
The end of things created; Dreadful night,
Advancing swift on sky, and earth, and sea;
But at the zenith a departing light,
A soaring countless blessed company.
THE LESSON OF TIME.
Lead thou me, Spirit of the World, and I
Will follow where thou leadest, willingly;
Not with the careless sceptic's idle mood,
Nor blindly seeking some unreal good;
For I have come, long since to that full day
Whose morning mists have fled and curled away—
That breathless afternoon-tide when the Sun
Halts, as it were, before his journey done.
Calm as a river broadening through the plain,
Which never plunges down the rocks again,
But, clearly mirrored in its tranquil deep,
Holds tower and spire and forest as in sleep.
How old and worn the metaphor appears,
Old as the tale of passing hopes and fears!
New as the springtide air, which day by day
Breathes on young lives, and speeds them on their way.