A PRETTY [WOMAN][°]

That fawn-skin-dappled hair of hers,
And the blue eye
Dear and dewy,
And that infantine fresh air of hers!
To think men cannot take you, Sweet,
And infold you,
Ay, and hold you,
And so keep you what they make you, Sweet!
You like us for a glance, you know—
10 For a word's sake
Or a sword's sake:
All's the same, whate'er the chance, you know.
And in turn we make you ours, we say—
You and youth too,
Eyes and mouth too,
All the face composed of flowers, we say.
All's our own, to make the most of, Sweet—
Sing and say for,
Watch and pray for,
20Keep a secret or go boast of, Sweet!
But for loving, why, you would not, Sweet,[page 56]
Tho' we prayed you,
Paid you, brayed you
In a mortar—for you could not, Sweet!
So, we leave the sweet face fondly there,
Be its beauty
Its sole duty!
Let all hope of grace beyond, lie there!
And while the face lies quiet there,
30 Who shall wonder
That I ponder
A conclusion? I will try it there.
As,—why must one, for the love foregone
Scout mere liking?
Thunder-striking
Earth,—the heaven, we looked above for, gone!
Why, with beauty, needs there money be,
Love with liking?
Crush the fly-king
40In his gauze, because no honey-bee?
May not liking be so simple-sweet,[page 57]
If love grew there
'Twould undo there
All that breaks the cheek to dimples sweet?
Is the creature too imperfect, say?
Would you mend it
And so end it?
Since not all addition perfects aye!
Or is it of its kind, perhaps,
50 Just perfection—
Whence, rejection
Of a grace not to its mind, perhaps?
Shall we burn up, tread that face at once
Into tinder,
And so hinder
Sparks from kindling all the place at once?
Or else kiss away one's soul on her?
Your love-fancies!
—A sick man sees
60Truer, when his hot eyes roll on her!
Thus the craftsman thinks to grace the rose,—[page 58]
Plucks a mould-flower
For his gold flower,
Uses fine things that efface the rose.
Rosy rubies make its cup more rose.
Precious metals
Ape the petals,—
Last, some old king locks it up, morose!
Then how grace a rose? I know a way!
70 Leave it, rather.
Must you gather?
Smell, kiss, wear it—at last, throw away.

YOUTH AND [ART][°]

It once might have been, once only:
We lodged in a street together,
You, a sparrow on the housetop lonely,
I, a lone she-bird of his feather.
Your trade was with sticks and clay,
You thumbed, thrust, patted, and polished,
Then laughed "They will see some day,
°[8]Smith made, and Gibson[°] demolished."
My business was song, song, song;[page 59]
10 I chirped, cheeped, trilled, and twittered,
"Kate Brown's on the boards ere long,
°[12]And Grisi's[°] existence embittered!"
I earned no more by a warble
Than you by a sketch in plaster;
You wanted a piece of marble,
I needed a music-master.
We studied hard in our styles,
°[18]Chipped each at a crust like Hindoos,[°]
For air, looked out on the tiles,
20 For fun, watched each other's windows.
You lounged, like a boy of the South,
Cap and blouse—nay, a bit of beard too;
Or you got it, rubbing your mouth
With fingers the clay adhered to.
And I—soon managed to find
Weak points in the flower-fence facing,
Was forced to put up a blind
And be safe in my corset-lacing.
No harm! It was not my fault
30 If you never turned your eye's tail up
As I shook upon E in alt,[page 60]
Or ran the chromatic scale up:
For spring bade the sparrows pair.
And the boys and girls gave guesses,
And stalls in our street looked rare
With bulrush and watercresses.
Why did not you pinch a flower
In a pellet of clay and fling it?
Why did not I put a power
40 Of thanks in a look or sing it?
I did look, sharp as a lynx,
(And yet the memory rankles)
When models arrived, some minx
Tripped up stairs, she and her ankles.
But I think I gave you as good!
"That foreign fellow,—who can know
How she pays, in a playful mood,
For his tuning her that piano?"
Could you say so, and never say
50 "Suppose we join hands and fortunes,
And I fetch her from over the way,
Her, piano, and long tunes and short tunes?"
No, no: you would not be rash,[page 61]
Nor I rasher and something over;
You've to settle yet Gibson's hash,
And Grisi yet lives in clover.
But you meet the Prince at the Board,
°[58]I'm queen myself at bals-parés,[°]
I've married a rich old lord,
60 And you're dubbed knight and an R.A.
Each life unfulfilled, you see;
It hangs still, patchy and scrappy:
We have not sighed deep, laughed free,
Starved, feasted, despaired,—been happy
And nobody calls you a dunce,
And people suppose me clever;
This could but have happened once,
And we missed it, lost it forever.

A [TALE][°]

(Epilogue to "The Two Poets of Croisic.")

What a pretty tale you told me
Once upon a time
—Said you found it somewhere (scold me!)[page 62]
Was it prose or was it rhyme,
Greek or Latin? Greek, you said,
While your shoulder propped my head.
Anyhow there's no forgetting
This much if no more,
That a poet (pray, no petting!)
10 Yes, a bard, sir, famed of yore,
Went where suchlike used to go,
Singing for a prize, you know.
Well, he had to sing, nor merely
Sing but play the lyre;
Playing was important clearly
Quite as singing: I desire,
Sir, you keep the fact in mind
For a purpose that's behind.
There stood he, while deep attention
20 Held the judges round,
—Judges able, I should mention,
To detect the slightest sound
Sung or played amiss: such ears
Had old judges, it appears!
None the less he sang out boldly,[page 63]
Played in time and tune,
Till the judges, weighing coldly
Each note's worth, seemed, late or soon,
Sure to smile "In vain one tries
30Picking faults out: take the prize!"
When, a mischief! Were they seven
Strings the lyre possessed?
Oh, and afterwards eleven,
Thank you! Well, sir,—who had guessed
Such ill luck in store?—it happed
One of those same seven strings snapped.
All was lost, then! No! a cricket
(What "cicada"? Pooh!)
—Some mad thing that left its thicket
40 For mere love of music—flew
With its little heart on fire,
Lighted on the crippled lyre.
So that when (Ah joy!) our singer
For his truant string
Feels with disconcerted finger,
What does cricket else but fling
Fiery heart forth, sound the note[page 64]
Wanted by the throbbing throat?
Ay and, ever to the ending,
50 Cricket chirps at need,
Executes the hand's intending,
Promptly, perfectly,—indeed
Saves the singer from defeat
With her chirrup low and sweet.
Till, at ending, all the judges
Cry with one assent
"Take the prize—a prize who grudges
Such a voice and instrument?
Why, we took your lyre for harp,
60So it shrilled us forth F sharp!"
Did the conqueror spurn the creature
Once its service done?
That's no such uncommon feature
In the case when Music's son
°[65]Finds his Lotte's[°] power too spent
For aiding soul development.
No! This other, on returning
Homeward, prize in hand,
Satisfied his bosom's yearning:[page 65]
70 (Sir, I hope you understand!)
—Said "Some record there must be
Of this cricket's help to me!"
So, he made himself a statue:
Marble stood, life size;
On the lyre, he pointed at you,
Perched his partner in the prize;
Never more apart you found
Her, he throned, from him, she crowned.
That's the tale: its application?
80 Somebody I know
Hopes one day for reputation
Thro' his poetry that's—Oh,
All so learned and so wise
And deserving of a prize!
If he gains one, will some ticket
When his statue's built,
Tell the gazer "'Twas a cricket
Helped my crippled lyre, whose lilt
Sweet and low, when strength usurped
90Softness' place i' the scale, she chirped?
"For as victory was nighest,[page 66]
While I sang and played,—
With my lyre at lowest, highest,
Right alike,—one string that made
'Love' sound soft was snapt in twain
Never to be heard again,—
"Had not a kind cricket fluttered,
Perched upon the place
Vacant left, and duly uttered
100 'Love, Love, Love,' whene'er the bass
Asked the treble to atone
For its somewhat sombre drone."
But you don't know music! Wherefore
Keep on casting pearls
To a—poet? All I care for
Is—to tell him that a girl's
"Love" comes aptly in when gruff
Grows his singing, (There, enough!)