You go a long and lovely journey,
For all the stars, like burning dew,
Are luminous and luring footprints
Of souls adventurous as you.
Oh, if you lived on earth elated,
How is it now that you can run
Free of the weight of flesh and faring
Far past the birthplace of the sun?
In this old garden, fair, I walk to-day
Heart-charmed with all the beauty of the scene:
The rich, luxuriant grasses' cooling green,
The wall's environ, ivy-decked and gray,
The waving branches with the wind at play,
The slight and tremulous blooms that show between,
Sweet all: and yet my yearning heart doth lean
Toward Love's Egyptian fleshpots far away.
Beside the wall, the slim Laburnum grows
And flings its golden flow'rs to every breeze.
But e'en among such soothing sights as these,
A MAN I praise that once in Tara's Hals
Said to the woman on his knees, 'Lie still.
My hundredth year is at an end. I think
That something is about to happen, I think
That the adventure of old age begins.
To many women I have said, ''Lie still,''
And given everything a woman needs,
A roof, good clothes, passion, love perhaps,
But never asked for love; should I ask that,
I shall be old indeed.'
Thereon the man
Went to the Sacred House and stood between
The golden plough and harrow and spoke aloud
WHEN pearl and gold, o'er deeps of musk,
The moon curves, silvering the dusk,—
As in a garden, dreaming,
A lily slips its dewy husk
A firefly in its gleaming,—
I of my garden am a guest;
My garden, that, in beauty dressed
Of simple shrubs and oldtime flowers,
Chats with me of the perished hours,
When she companioned me in life,
Living remote from care and strife.
It says to me: 'How sad and slow
The hours of daylight come and go,
Until the Night walks here again
With moon and starlight in her train,
In the dim counties
we take the long calm
Lilting no haziness,
sequel or psalm.
The little street wenches,
The holy and clean,
Live as good neighbours live
under the green.
Malice of sunbeam or
menace of moon
Piping shall leave us
no taste of a tune.
In the dim counties
the eyelids are dumb,
To the lean citizens
Love cannot come.
Love in the yellowing,
Love at the turn,
Love o' the cooing lip—
how should he burn?
IN wood-hollows mate the swallows,
On the house-tops sparrows marry;
Where's the laggard that would tarry
When the Spring is up and doing,
And the doves of Love are cooing?
O the lovers she discovers
Heart and heart together linking!
'Tis of them, perchance, you're thinking;
In this moment's rich completeness
Tasting over bygone sweetness.
Nay, you gladden not, but sadden
At the sight of such surrender
To Love's impulse, warm and tender,
As yon couple, mingling kisses,
2nd Lieut., Cinque Ports Battalion, Royal Sussex Regiment
Strong, loyal--souled, full--hearted, blithely brave,
Only remembering love knows all he gave:
Beautiful be the stars above his grave.
Ah! fair face gone from sight,
With all its light
Of eyes that pierced the deep!
Oh human night!
Ah! fair face calm in sleep!
Ah! fair lips hushed in death!
Now their glad breath
Breathes not upon our air
Music, that saith
Love only and things fair.
Ah! lost brother! Ah! sweet
Still hands and feet!
May those feet haste to reach,
Those hands to greet
Us where love needs no speech.
HER love was that full love which, like a tide,
Flows in and out life's smallest gulfs and bays,
And fills with music through long summer days
Cold hearts that else would stern and dark abide.
Her smile would cheer, her faintest look could chide;
5
No soul too outcast, none too lowly born,
For her kind ear; and none too high for scorn
Of mean pretence, or wrong, or foolish pride.
She loved all Nature; mountain, stream, and tree
To her were thoughts or language for the thought
10
Love is and was my Lord and King,
And in his presence I attend
To hear the tidings of my friend,
Which every hour his couriers bring.
Love is and was my King and Lord,
And will be, tho' as yet I keep
Within his court on earth, and sleep
Encompass'd by his faithful guard,
And hear at times a sentinel
Who moves about from place to place,
And whispers to the worlds of space,
In the deep night, that all is well.
