Ah! fair face gone from sight,
With all its light
Of eyes, that pierced the deep
Of human night!
Ah! fair face calm in sleep.
Ah! fair lips hushed in death!
Now their glad breath
Breathes not upon our air
Music, that saith
Love only, and things fair.
Ah! lost brother! Ah! sweet
Still hands and feet!
May those feet haste to reach,
Those hands to greet,
Us, where love needs no speech.
1886.
III.
Sea-gulls, wheeling, swooping, crying,
Crying over Maes Garmon side!
Cold is the wind for your white wings' flying:
Cold and dim is our gray springtide.
But an hundred miles and more away,
In the old, sweet city,
Birds of spring are singing to the May,
Their old, sweet ditty.
There he lies, whom I loved so well,
And lies, whom I love so dearly:
At thought of his youth, our buds will swell;
Of his face, our sun shine clearly.
Sea-gulls, wheeling, swooping, crying,
Crying over Maes Garmon side!
Spirits of fire with him are flying,
Souls of flame, to the Crucified.
Yet, far away from the ancient places,
Ancient pleasures, and ancient days:
He too thinks of our exiled faces,
Far away from his whiter ways.