| I | 1 | Was it for you the aching past alone Lived, that on you might fall the shadow of it? For you, for you kings climbed a ravished throne, And all these menacing, quenched fires were lit. Wars that have left no more than a grey trace, Where are they? Scattered foam, blown dust — ah, me! How have they found their way into your face? The new day is not yours, you only see A battle raging in a desert place, And blood-stained warriors seeking Sanctuary. |
| 2 | I cannot love you in the street; I met You in the street once and turned my head away, But I will meet you where the red sunset With forlorn fire flashes the leaping spray. We are too old, too old for all this noise, No wine of such new vintage shall control Us who have known, what passionate joys Once in some far, dark City of the Soul. We are kings still and have, as kings, the choice To spurn the proffered half and claim the whole. | |
| 3 | Let us find out a new way; for it is plain That all these old, worn, trodden roads suffice Only those who will return again Seeking shelter in their homes from Paradise. Oh! let us find some solitary, green Forgotten garden, where the sunrays fall All blind and blurred and indistinct between Cypresses lofty as earth's boundary wall; Beneath whose shade shall glimmer forth half seen Your face through the soft darkness when I call. | |
| II | 1 | If one, with visionary pen, should write The love which might be ours, how would he call These strange, perplexing fires veiled servants light Down the dark vistas of our empty hall? That love which might be ours, how would he name That love? No bitter leaving of the brine, No white or fading blossom twined like flame Round any brow, Christian or Erycine, Not all those loves blown to a windy fame Shall find their counterpart in yours and mine. |
| 2 | Not Tristram, not Isolde, wild shades which dip Their pinions like blown gulls in a waste sea, Nor those mute lovers, who still, lip on lip, Float on for ever, though they have ceased to be, Not any of those who loved once; — far apart We wander; the years have made us weak, we fail To rush together with a single heart, And we shall meet at last, only as pale Autumnal mists no sun's shaft cleaves apart When all the winds are still and no ships sail. | |
| III | 1 | Yet we shall meet — it may be we shall meet And count our days up-gathered, one by one, Like poppies plucked among the burnished wheat, Beneath the red gaze of the August sun; And all our scattered dreams shall flutter home At last. Oh! silent, age-long wandering What since your setting forth have ye become? What gift from those far waters do ye bring? — A splash of rain, salt taste of frozen foam, Green sea-weed trailing from a broken wing. |
| 2 | Or we shall find each other — on the brink Of sleep some day, when the cool evening airs Blow bubbles round the pool where wood-birds drink; Or in the common Inn of wayfarers: Both weary, both beside the wide fireplace Drowsing, till at some sudden spark up-blown Shall each awake to find there face to face You and I very tired and alone; And lo! your welcome from my eyes shall gaze And in your eyes there shall I find my own. | |
| 3 | I will pursue thee down these solitudes Therefore, and thou shalt yet escape me not. I will set traps for thee of subtle moods And wound thee with the arrows of my thought. In thickest forest ways though thou lie hid, Or in some autumn vale of Brocelinde, Or in whatever place of magic forbid, I will pierce through the woven branches like a wind, And drag thee from thy hiding-place amid The secret laughter of the fairy-kind. | |
| 4 | Oh, triumph still delaying! I must pass Lonely a long time yet, for I know well No fugitive fair dream that ever was Left anywhere traces where her footprints fell. I, lonely hunter in the woods of sleep. The hunt is up — away! I ride, I ride On a white steed, where black-boughed fir-trees keep Watch and the kindly world is shut outside. I am afraid, the haunted woods are deep! I am afraid — afraid! Where dost thou hide? |
[W. Kean Seymour]
Fruitage
For her the proud stars bend, she sees,
As never yet, dim sorceries
Breaking in silver magic wide
On the blue midnight's swirling tide,
With arrowy mist and spearing flame
That out of central beauty came.
The innumerate splendours of the skies
Are thronging in her shining eyes;
Her body is a fount of light
In the plumed garden of the night;
Her lily breasts have known the bliss
Of the cool air's unfaltering kiss.
She is made one with loveliness,
Enfranchised from the world's distress,
Given utterly to joy, a bride
With a bride's hunger satisfied.
Now, though she heavily walk, and know
The sharp premonitory throe
And the life leaping in the gloom
Of her most blessed and chosen womb,
It is as though foot never was
So light upon the glimmering grass.
She is shot through with the stars' light,
Helped by their calm, unwavering might.
In tall, lone-swaying gravity
Stoops to her there the eternal tree
Whose myriad fruitage ripens on
Beneath the light of moon and sun.