A COURT LADY
Her hair was tawny with gold; her eyes with purple were dark;
Her cheeks' pale opal burnt with a red and restless spark.
Never was lady of Milan nobler in name and in race;
Never was lady of Italy fairer to see in the face.
Never was lady on earth more true as woman and wife,
Larger in judgment and instinct, prouder in manners and life.
She stood in the early morning, and said to her maidens, "Bring
That silken robe made ready to wear at the court of the King.
"Bring me the clasps of diamond, lucid, clear of the mote;
Clasp me the large at the waist, and clasp me the small at the throat.
"Diamonds to fasten the hair, and diamonds to fasten the sleeves,
Laces to drop from their rays, like a powder of snow from the eaves."
Gorgeous she entered the sunlight, which gathered her up in a flame,
While, straight in her open carriage, she to the hospital came.
In she went at the door, and gazing from end to end,--
"Many and low are the pallets; but each is the place of a friend."
Up she passed through the wards, and stood at a young man's bed;
Bloody the band on his brow, and livid the droop of his head.
"Art thou a Lombard, my brother? Happy art thou!" she cried,
And smiled like Italy on him: he dreamed in her face--and died.
Pale with his passing soul, she went on still to a second:
He was a grave hard man, whose years by dungeons were reckoned.
Wounds in his body were sore, wounds in his life were sorer.
"Art thou a Romagnole?" Her eyes drove lightnings before her.
"Austrian and priest had joined to double and tighten the cord
Able to bind thee, O strong one, free by the stroke of a sword.
"Now be grave for the rest of us, using the life overcast
To ripen our wine of the present (too new) in glooms of the past."
Down she stepped to a pallet where lay a face like a girl's,
Young, and pathetic with dying,--a deep black hole in the curls.
"Art thou from Tuscany, brother? and seest thou, dreaming in pain,
Thy mother stand in the piazza, searching the list of the slain?"
Kind as a mother herself, she touched his cheeks with her hands:
"Blessed is she who has borne thee, although she should weep as
she stands."
On she passed to a Frenchman, his arm carried off by a ball:
Kneeling: "O more than my brother! how shall I thank thee for all?
"Each of the heroes around us has fought for his land and line;
But thou hast fought for a stranger, in hate of a wrong not thine.
"Happy are all free peoples, too strong to be dispossest,
But blessed are those among nations who dare to be strong for the
rest."
Ever she passed on her way, and came to a couch where pined
One with a face from Venetia, white with a hope out of mind.
Long she stood and gazed, and twice she tried at the name;
But two great crystal tears were all that faltered and came.
Only a tear for Venice? She turned as in passion and loss,
And stooped to his forehead and kissed it, as if she were kissing
the cross.
Faint with that strain of heart, she moved on then to another,
Stern and strong in his death: "And dost thou suffer, my brother?"
Holding his hands in hers: "Out of the Piedmont lion
Cometh the sweetness of freedom! sweetest to live or to die on."
Holding his cold rough hands: "Well, oh well have ye done
In noble, noble Piedmont, who would not be noble alone."
Back he fell while she spoke. She rose to her feet with a spring.
"That was a Piedmontese! and this is the court of the King!"
THE PROSPECT
Methinks we do as fretful children do,
Leaning their faces on the window-pane
To sigh the glass dim with their own breath's stain,
And shut the sky and landscape from their view;
And thus, alas! since God the maker drew
A mystic separation 'twixt those twain,--
The life beyond us and our souls in pain,--
We miss the prospect which we are called unto
By grief we are fools to use. Be still and strong,
O man, my brother! hold thy sobbing breath,
And keep thy soul's large window pure from wrong;
That so, as life's appointment issueth,
Thy vision may be clear to watch along
The sunset consummation-lights of death.
DE PROFUNDIS
The face which, duly as the sun,
Rose up for me with life begun,
To mark all bright hours of the day
With daily love, is dimmed away--
And yet my days go on, go on.
The tongue which, like a stream, could run
Smooth music from the roughest stone,
And every morning with "Good day"
Make each day good, is hushed away--
And yet my days go on, go on.
The heart which, like a staff, was one
For mine to lean and rest upon,
The strongest on the longest day,
With steadfast love is caught away--
And yet my days go on, go on.
The world goes whispering to its own,
"This anguish pierces to the bone."
And tender friends go sighing round,
"What love can ever cure this wound?"
My days go on, my days go on.
The past rolls forward on the sun
And makes all night. O dreams begun,
Not to be ended! Ended bliss!
And life, that will not end in this!
My days go on, my days go on.
Breath freezes on my lips to moan:
As one alone, once not alone,
I sit and knock at Nature's door,
Heart-bare, heart-hungry, very poor,
Whose desolated days go on.
I knock and cry--Undone, undone!
Is there no help, no comfort--none?
No gleaning in the wide wheat-plains
Where others drive their loaded wains?
My vacant days go on, go on.
This Nature, though the snows be down,
Thinks kindly of the bird of June.
The little red hip on the tree
Is ripe for such. What is for me,
Whose days so winterly go on?
No bird am I to sing in June,
And dare not ask an equal boon.
Good nests and berries red are Nature's
To give away to better creatures--
And yet my days go on, go on.
I ask less kindness to be done--
Only to loose these pilgrim-shoon
(Too early worn and grimed) with sweet
Cool deathly touch to these tired feet,
Till days go out which now go on.
Only to lift the turf unmown
From off the earth where it has grown,
Some cubit-space, and say, "Behold,
Creep in, poor Heart, beneath that fold,
Forgetting how the days go on."
A Voice reproves me thereupon,
More sweet than Nature's, when the drone
Of bees is sweetest, and more deep,
Than when the rivers overleap
The shuddering pines, and thunder on.
God's Voice, not Nature's--night and noon
He sits upon the great white throne,
And listens for the creature's praise.
What babble we of days and days?
The Dayspring he, whose days go on!
He reigns above, he reigns alone:
Systems burn out and leave his throne:
Fair mists of seraphs melt and fall
Around him, changeless amid all--
Ancient of days, whose days go on!
He reigns below, he reigns alone--
And having life in love forgone
Beneath the crown of sovran thorns,
He reigns the jealous God. Who mourns
Or rules with HIM, while days go on?
By anguish which made pale the sun,
I hear him charge his saints that none
Among the creatures anywhere
Blaspheme against him with despair,
However darkly days go on.
Take from my head the thorn-wreath brown:
No mortal grief deserves that crown.
O supreme Love, chief misery,
The sharp regalia are for Thee,
Whose days eternally go on!
For us, ... whatever's undergone,
Thou knowest, willest what is done.
Grief may be joy misunderstood:
Only the Good discerns the good.
I trust Thee while my days go on.
Whatever's lost, it first was won!
We will not struggle nor impugn.
Perhaps the cup was broken here
That Heaven's new wine might show more clear.
I praise Thee while my days go on.
I praise Thee while my days go on;
I love Thee while my days go on!
Through dark and dearth, through fire and frost,
With emptied arms and treasure lost,
I thank Thee while my days go on!
And, having in thy life-depth thrown
Being and suffering (which are one),
As a child drops some pebble small
Down some deep well, and hears it fall
Smiling--so I! THY DAYS GO ON!
THE CRY OF THE HUMAN
"There is no God," the foolish saith,
But none, "There is no sorrow;"
And nature oft the cry of faith
In bitter need will borrow:
Eyes which the preacher could not school
By wayside graves are raised;
And lips say, "God be pitiful,"
Who ne'er said, "God be praised."
Be pitiful, O God.
The tempest stretches from the steep
The shadow of its coming;
The beasts grow tame, and near us creep,
As help were in the human:
Yet while the cloud-wheels roll and grind,
We spirits tremble under!
The hills have echoes; but we find
No answer for the thunder.
Be pitiful, O God!
The battle hurtles on the plains--
Earth feels new scythes upon her:
We reap our brothers for the wains,
And call the harvest--honor.
Draw face to face, front line to line,
One image all inherit:
Then kill, curse on, by that same sign,
Clay, clay,--and spirit, spirit.
Be pitiful, O God!
We meet together at the feast--
To private mirth betake us--
We stare down in the winecup, lest
Some vacant chair should shake us!
We name delight, and pledge it round--
"It shall be ours to-morrow!"
God's seraphs! do your voices sound
As sad in naming sorrow?
Be pitiful, O God!
We sit together, with the skies,
The steadfast skies, above us;
We look into each other's eyes,
"And how long will you love us?"
The eyes grow dim with prophecy,
The voices, low and breathless--
"Till death us part!"--O words, to be
Our best for love the deathless!
Be pitiful, dear God!
We tremble by the harmless bed
Of one loved and departed--
Our tears drop on the lips that said
Last night, "Be stronger-hearted!"
O God,--to clasp those fingers close,
And yet to feel so lonely!--
To see a light upon such brows,
Which is the daylight only!
Be pitiful, O God!
The happy children come to us,
And look up in our faces;
They ask us--Was it thus, and thus,
When we were in their places?
We cannot speak--we see anew
The hills we used to live in,
And feel our mother's smile press through
The kisses she is giving.
Be pitiful, O God!
We pray together at the kirk,
For mercy, mercy, solely--
Hands weary with the evil work,
We lift them to the Holy!
The corpse is calm below our knee--
Its spirit bright before Thee--
Between them, worse than either, we
Without the rest of glory!
Be pitiful, O God!
And soon all vision waxeth dull--
Men whisper, "He is dying;"
We cry no more, "Be pitiful!"--
We have no strength for crying:
No strength, no need! Then, Soul of mine,
Look up and triumph rather--
Lo! in the depth of God's Divine,
The Son adjures the Father--
BE PITIFUL, O GOD!