English

I SAID , “The bitterness of grief is gone;
Henceforward I will only think of her
As one too glad for selfish tears to stir—
A saint who touched and blessed me and passed on;
My angel evermore to bend and take
My broken prayers to God for love's dear sake.”

“The bitterness of grief is passed,” I said;
Then turned and saw about me everywhere
The dear, accustomed things her touch made fair;
Her books—the little pillow for her head,
The pen her hand had dropped, the simple song

Hirmophrodite in sense in Art a monster
as by your railing rimes the world may Conster
Your spitefull words against a harmless booke
shews that an ass much like the Sire doth looke
Men truly noble fear no touch of Blood
Nor question make of others much more good
Can such comparisons seeme the want of witt
When oysters have enflamd your blood with it
But it appeares your guiltiness gapt wide
And filld with Dirty doubt your brains swolne tide
Both frind and foe in deed you use alike
And your madd witt in sherry aequall strike

I stood in Paris at the tomb
Of him who crossed the bleak Alps' ridge,
And charged o'er Lodi's bloody bridge,
Till Europe heard his cannons' boom:

Who made the haughty Hapsburg yield,
Who watched the flames from Kremlin's tower,
Who Elba fled, but fell from power
On Waterloo's tremendous field.

He was a dreamer in his youth,
His eyes were dull, his face was pale;
But, knowing no such word as fail,
He wrought his visions into truth.

Second alone to him of Rome
He sits within the halls of fame;

We are desert leagues apart;
Time is misty ages now
Since the warmth of heart to heart
Chased the shadows from my brow.

Oh, I am so old, meseems
I am next of kin to Time,
The historian of her dreams
From the long-forgotten prime.

You have come a path of flowers.
What a way was mine to roam!
Many a fallen empire's towers,
Many a ruined heart my home.

No, there is no comfort, none.
All the dewy tender breath
Idly falls when life is done
On the starless brow of death.

So far as I conceive the world's rebuke
To him address'd who would recast her new,
Not from herself her fame of strength she took,
But from their weakness who would work her rue.

‘Behold,’ she cries, so many rages lull'd,
So many fiery spirits quite cool'd down;
Look how so many valours, long undull'd,
After short commerce with me, fear my frown!

‘Thou too, when thou against my crimes wouldst cry,
Let thy foreboded homage check thy tongue!’—
The world speaks well; yet might her foe reply:

Ah, brief is Life,
Love's short, sweet way,
With dreamings rife,
And then—Good-day!

And Life is vain—
Hope's vague delight,
Grief's transient pain,
And then—Good-night!

When evening comes
I will leave the door open beforehand and then wait
For him who said he would come
To meet me in my dreams.

What am I to do with my Sister?
Whom, like the Judas-tree
Which grows in the moon,
I may see with my eyes
But not touch with my hands?

Unknown love
Is as bitter a thing
As the maiden-lily
Which grows in the thickets
Of the summer moor.

I perished, slain
By love's fierce bliss;
Buried I lay
Her arms within;
I lived again
By her sweet kiss,
And in her eyes
A heaven did win!