English

Interpreters supreme thine Art will find.
Not in fair France, though flower-crowned France may be
Art's soft-voiced slave, could women range round thee
So purely fair as those by heaven designed
To make thy song a garland for mankind
But chiefliest for this land that, ringed by sea,
Must ever even in Art divinely free
Abide, love-guarded, watched by wave and wind.

This all who sing, bay-wreathed in other lands,
Phillips, our English bard, may wildly long,
In vain, to win—that souls so sweet and strong

“ TIME'S FLOWERS AND FRUIT ”

This chance Life gives thee,—proudly seize it, friend:
 The chance to sound once more in English ears
 The trumpet dropped when Shakespeare and his peers
Saw their long line of mighty triumphs end.
Lift once again the trumpet, and extend
 The line of triumph. Make man's hopes and fears
 Thine own, the pangs and passions of the years
That glimmer in the past, or still impend.

Yes, England needs a singer. She requires

When I grow grey and men shall say to me,
" What was the worth of living, truly told? —
Lo! thou hast lived thy life out; thou art old;
Thou hast gathered fruit from many a green-leafed tree,
And kissed love's lips by many a summer sea,
And twined soft hands in locks of shining gold: —
But all thy days are dead days now, behold!
Life passes onward, — what is life to thee? "

Then will I answer, — as thy gracious eyes,
Love, gleam upon me from dim far-off skies, —
" Life had its endless deathless charm, — and still

When the great city sleeps amid the reeds, —
Yea, when the silent far-off centuries bring
Peace on their wing, —
When to wild toil the supreme rest succeeds, —
When linnets sing
Where now through Blackfriars Bridge the brown stream speeds, —
When Westminster is deep in water-weeds, —
Death shall be lord and king.

The Thames comes circling from wild days afar;
Once matted rushes filled the water-way
Where grand and grey
The tall-towered Abbey meets the morning-star;
From day to day

Not with the autumnal leaves so red and golden
Nor with the autumnal light
Crowned art thou, Venus, when strong suns embolden
Thy coming yet more bright.

Thou art not springlike, nor of mortal seeming,
Nor must thy bridegroom wear
The buds of April, tender, soft and gleaming,
Within gold spring-blown hair.

Thou art as summer. When thy June around thee
Burns splendid through the blue
We know that then the fervent year has found thee
Robed in thy raiment new.

And then thy bridegroom, weary of the daughters

I.

I feel towards God just as a woman might
Who hears her lord praised by the adoring crowd: —
Who hears them hymn his strength with paean loud —
His glory in thought or speech, his force in fight.
She knows him better. Through the silent night
She has watched his face beneath keen sorrow bowed;
Him she has cherished with embraces white;
She has kissed the lips that seem to men so proud.

I stood within the old wood, — and all the past
Swept through my spirit on wild storm-tossed wings: —
The past with all its pain and all its stings
And small sour fruit and endless yearning vast.
Upon white tides of woe my thought was cast,
Mid shoals round which the hoarse sea-whisper rings:
I was immersed in floods of former things,
And my brow ached at strokes of passion's blast.

And then I looked, and lo! a flower asleep, —
The plant whose plumes I gathered long ago
To mix them in a girl's locks soft and deep.

More, more, had I the power, my soul would do. —
Am I content, — till all thy soul is bright
With God's own passionate unearthly light,
And on thy forehead all God's heaven of blue
Set like a jewel? Lo! I would renew
Thy soul, long-lost amid the pathless night, —
Be thine eternal champion in the fight, —
Bring thee from false ends towards love's purpose true.

O love, thou knowest me not! My love hath lightened
From end to end of heaven, and heaven hath brightened;
It is a tender gift: — it is a sword

LIFE

A thousand dreams will draw thy feet aside
And tempt the suffrage of thy ready lyre:
Fair life will proffer thee a fair empire, —
This world's wild splendour, all its power and pride.
Seek thou the untrodden paths, where none may guide
Save thine own soul's strong star that shines like fire:
Beyond our dying century's bards aspire
With Byron, be with Shelley deified.

I struggle on through every weary day,
Well knowing that at night a rest will come:
That then I shall behold my blossom's bloom
And count her new buds, — in the twilight grey.
The hours of sunlight are to me a tomb
Most piteous; but the darkness changes all;
Then do I seek thee through the star-hung hall
Of night, soft-guided by some strange perfume.

The long days pierce me with a reckless sword;
Their wild hours hustle me, they heed not how;
Yet have I thee all anguish to allay.
An ample and most exquisite reward