794. A Night in Italy
SWEET are the rosy memories of the lips
That first kiss'd ours, albeit they kiss no more:
Sweet is the sight of sunset-sailing ships,
Altho' they leave us on a lonely shore:
Sweet are familiar songs, tho' Music dips
Her hollow shell in Thought's forlornest wells:
And sweet, tho' sad, the sound of midnight bells
When the oped casement with the night-rain drips.
There is a pleasure which is born of pain:
The grave of all things hath its violet.
Else why, thro' days which never come again,
Roams Hope with that strange longing, like Regret?
Why put the posy in the cold dead hand?
Why plant the rose above the lonely grave?
Why bring the corpse across the salt sea-wave?
Why deem the dead more near in native land?
Thy name hath been a silence in my life
So long, it falters upon language now,
O more to me than sister or than wife
Once … and now—nothing! It is hard to know
That such things have been, and are not; and yet
Life loiters, keeps a pulse at even measure,
And goes upon its business and its pleasure,
And knows not all the depths of its regret….
Ah, could the memory cast her spots, as do
The snake's brood theirs in spring! and be once more
Wholly renew'd, to dwell i' the time that 's new,
With no reiterance of those pangs of yore.
Peace, peace! My wild song will go wandering
Too wantonly, down paths a private pain
Hath trodden bare. What was it jarr'd the strain?
Some crush'd illusion, left with crumpled wing
Tangled in Music's web of twined strings—
That started that false note, and crack'd the tune
In its beginning. Ah, forgotten things
Stumble back strangely! and the ghost of June
Stands by December's fire, cold, cold! and puts
The last spark out.—How could I sing aright
With those old airs haunting me all the night
And those old steps that sound when daylight shuts?
For back she comes, and moves reproachfully,
The mistress of my moods, and looks bereft
(Cruel to the last!) as tho' 'twere I, not she,
That did the wrong, and broke the spell, and left
Memory comfortless.—Away! away!
Phantoms, about whose brows the bindweed clings,
Hopeless regret! In thinking of these things
Some men have lost their minds, and others may.
Yet, O for one deep draught in this dull hour!
One deep, deep draught of the departed time!
O for one brief strong pulse of ancient power,
To beat and breathe thro' all the valves of rhyme!
Thou, Memory, with thy downward eyes, that art
The cup-bearer of gods, pour deep and long,
Brim all the vacant chalices of song
With health! Droop down thine urn. I hold my heart
One draught of what I shall not taste again
Save when my brain with thy dark wine is brimm'd,—
One draught! and then straight onward, spite of pain,
And spite of all things changed, with gaze undimm'd,
Love's footsteps thro' the waning Past to explore
Undaunted; and to carve in the wan light
Of Hope's last outposts, on Song's utmost height,
The sad resemblance of an hour or more.
Midnight, and love, and youth, and Italy!
Love in the land where love most lovely seems!
Land of my love, tho' I be far from thee,
Lend, for love's sake, the light of thy moonbeams,
The spirit of thy cypress-groves and all
Thy dark-eyed beauty for a little while
To my desire. Yet once more let her smile
Fall o'er me: o'er me let her long hair fall….