Fragment I.

***** * * * * * * * * * * * *

***** * * * * * * * * * * * *

Truss with your falsehoods, ye dogmatic fools!
Refuse of colleges, and dregs of schools!
Why buds the olive, and why grows the vine?
To glad our hearts, and make our faces shine:
In vain before us has th' Almighty plac'd
Delicious viands, if we dare not taste;
If 'tis damnation to admire the fair,
Why has he deck'd them with such curious care?
Their graceful limbs in nice proportion drest,

( " Ah! je le tiens enfin. " )

T HURLOW communicates the intention of Parliament to offer C ROMWELL the crown .
C ROMWELL . And is it mine? And have my feet at length
Attained the summit of the rock i' the sand?
T HURLOW . And yet, my lord, you have long reigned.
C ROM . Nay, nay!
Power I have 'joyed, in sooth, but not the name.
Thou smilest, Thurlow. Ah, thou little know'st
What hole it is Ambition digs i' th' heart!

When morning comes, the last pale star
Must crowd all sail and flee:
The wave that leaps the harbour-bar
Says " Farewell " to the sea.
The violet in the hollow lane
May long to linger there:
Nay, it must pass! The golden grain
Must leave the furrows bare.

" Farewell! " they say, " Adieu! " they cry,
All sweet sad earthly things:
The loveliest sun-kissed rose must die;
The swallow spreads her wings.
The crocus with its golden smile
Must vanish from the grass:
The tulip tarries for awhile,
And then it too must pass.

No friend shall follow and face the burning glare
Of thought, in those fierce realms towards which I lead:
No lesser love shall triumph, or succeed
In breathing that divine sun-stricken air.
Yet well and tenderly my sweet shall fare; —
She shall not thirst, — her white foot shall not bleed, —
She shall not pant for brook or flowery mead:
Love is enough, — and Love's fount shall be there.

Love's silver waters tender and divine
Shall spring around us at this staff of mine, —
The stroke of this my living staff of song:

Let other youths dissolve in am'rous fires,
And breathe in melting lays their soft desires;
With songs of wit, and sonnets void of care,
Gay as their hopes, and as their hearts sincere;
To spotless charms unfading trophies raise,
Of real love and undissembled praise:
Be theirs the blessings which they pant to prove,
The garland gather'd from the myrtle grove;
The gracious glance of condescending maids;
Love long to last, and fame that never fades:
For them may Venus light the genial bed,
By hallow'd Hymen honourable made;

Gray twilight had begun her dusky reign,
Veiling the glories of the vernal year;
The meads, the groves, the glades, and glitt'ring lawns,
One dark-brown scene of dun disorder lay:
When from the village, his frequented walk,
Pensive and slow, the youthful D AMON stray'd,
Along the windings of his native stream;
Whose drowsy wave, with closing willows crown'd,
Flow'd lazy, murm'ring thro' the misty vale.

His downcast visage, clouded, pale, and wan,
Confess'd a bosom pierc'd with pining woe;
The jocund look, the joyous smile, were fled,

The sun streamed over vale and hill,
How joyous all things seemed!
Far in the distance, clear and still,
The yellow cornfields gleamed.
Fair was the summer land;
I held in mine your hand;
Your eyes drew mine, and in their depths I dreamed,
Holding in mine your hand!

Then, on another golden day,
Among the wildwood bowers,
Love had its golden word to say
The while we gathered flowers.
" O love, my heart is thine;
Be thou for ever mine;
Life's loveliest purest gifts will all be ours,
If thou art ever mine! "

A tuft of mignonette, a withered rose!
Numberless foolish hearts have treasured such.
Now, as I lift them from their long repose,
They turn to dust and crumble at a touch —
Poor flowers that meant so much!

They meant — pure love and limitless belief
In summer's faithfulness, in sunny skies:
They mean — one lonely pang of silent grief,
Just one true tear that in a moment dries,
For even sorrow dies.

So with the millions who have hoarded flowers:
The frail love-token lasts, the heart's love goes.
Man's vaunted strength and woman's boasted powers

I.

Say, what is life? A bubble and a dream;
 A bulrush shaken by the northern blast;
The broken surface of a troubled stream;
 A joyless journey in a barren waste:
(Hope's cheating meteor hangs on the extreme,
 Decoys us forward, and misleads at last).
Blessed, I ween, the fav'rite happy sew,
Who get the easiest and the soonest thro'!

II.

Say, what is virtue?—'Tis a faithful friend;
 “A friend that sticketh closer than a brother;”
When life, and time, and vanity shall end,
 Air, earth and water mix with one another;

The true possession is the holy sense
Of love and of ecstatic victory.
Such true possession, love, was given to me:—
A glory of triumph tenderly intense.
A passion without envy or offence
Was mine,—and that clear passion's blest reward
Was the achievement of a golden sword
That severed all the barriers dark and dense.

One night when thou wast reading of my love,
My yearning drew thee,—and thy spirit came,
Like a white-winged and golden-crested dove,
With plumage touched by passion as by flame: