So would I, when my hour has come for sleep,
Lie watching where the twilight shades grow grey;
Far sooner would I share with him the Night
Than pass without him to the Splendid Day.
THEN AND NOW
“πάντα ῤει καἰ ούδένα μένει”
Once the black pine-trees on the mountain side,
The river dancing down the valley blue,
And strange brown grasses swaying with the tide,
All spoke to me of you.
But now the sullen streamlet creeping slow,
The moaning tree-tops dark above my head,
The weeds where once the grasses used to grow
Tell me that you are dead.
MAY MORNING
(Note.—At Oxford on May 1st a Latin hymn is sung at sunrise by the Magdalen choristers from the top of the tower.)
The rising sun shone warmly on the tower,
Into the clear pure Heaven the hymn aspired
Piercingly sweet. This was the morning hour
When life awoke with Spring’s creative power,
And the old City’s grey to gold was fired.
Silently reverent stood the noisy throng;
Under the bridge the boats in long array
Lay motionless. The choristers’ far song
Faded upon the breeze in echoes long.
Swiftly I left the bridge and rode away.
Straight to a little wood’s green heart I sped,
Where cowslips grew, beneath whose gold withdrawn
The fragrant earth peeped warm and richly red;
All trace of Winter’s chilling touch had fled,
And song-birds ushered in the year’s bright morn.