English

All day I gazed at pictures — passionate eyes
Flashed from the canvas. Prisoned in pure stone
I heard Diana's laugh and Daphne's sighs:
Venus enthralled me from her timeless throne.

I worshipped those whose ever-living Art
Could make the marble breathe, the canvas glow;
The spirit who spake through Raphael's hand and heart,
The God who wrought through Michael Angelo.

Lost in my dream of ages past and dead
I heeded not the chariot of the sun, —
Till all the western sky gleamed weird and red.

Children with heather in hand,
Passing along through the Strand,

Where have you been through the day?
In what far meads at play?

Your hands are filled with fern,
And your faces tingle and burn.

Was not the country sweet
And fresh to tired young feet?

Were not the grasses green
And the wonderful skies serene?

The wonderful miles of sky
That made you on fire to fly;

That made you long to be birds
Or gambol, like fleet-foot herds.

Now you are tired; your feet

" Give me the dark sky's windy gates, "
I said:
" The doors at which the sunset waits
With threatening robes of lurid red.

" I love the beating of the storm's
Black wing;
With its own hues pale grief informs
The world, and poisons with its sting.

" When through the wet leaves pours the hail
Malign,
I love the cold darts that assail
The timorous rose, the shivering vine.

To thee far-off on sunlit land,
'Mid fragrant meads, 'neath blossomy tree,
I send this gift to heart and hand,
This song, O love, to thee.

Here, where the green waves curve and curl
And where the wide-winged winds are free,
I think of one far-off, a girl
Whose eyes are as the sea.

The sea's strange light within them shines,
The light whose gleam may never be
'Mid forests green, 'mid oaks or pines,
But only on the sea.

Here, where the sun's gold arrows dart
On waves to windward and to lee,

To thee the flower-bright season brings
Glad thoughts of days and years unknown.
Thou see'st not summer's restless wings;
Thou see'st his light alone.

The thought of summers lying dead
With quiet hands most still and white
Comes not, when summer's rose blooms red
And summer's sun flames bright.

Before thee Love, superb and fair,
With summoning eyes that seek thee stands.
No ghost-love, sister to despair,
Wrings pale and piteous hands.

The lilies all, arrayed in white

From fields made bright with flowers in bloom
A young girl turned
And sought a darkling London room,
Wherein one gas-jet burned.

She left the blossoming meads behind,
The silent nooks
Where fragrant violets wooed the wind
Or whispered to the brooks:

She passed through streets where wild wheels roar
And dust-wreaths race, —
Brought sunshine to a sunless door,
Light to a weary face:

She left the golden furze to scent
The soft air's wing;
Made for one hour one heart content,

Blue skies, bright, clear,
Another year,
But ah! the dear dead child:
Another bloom
Has sought the tomb
With pure step undefiled;
Another flower
In death's dim bower
Has smiled.

The days advance
With flower-bright lance
Of chestnut blossoms piled
Upon the stems
Like diadems;
The green woods kiss the mild
Soft-kissing breeze;
The leaping seas
Are wild.

All things aglow
Forget the snow,
The chill of winter's hand;
With yellow crown,

I dreamed I stood beneath a golden sunset,
With idle breakers leaping on the sand
In silver irresistible slow onset —
I watched the waving of my lady's hand,
And sweet locks loosened in so many a band
Fell over shoulders white as mountain snows
Or the silver ripples sliding in to land;
Her mouth was as the glory of a rose
The day before its full refulgence blows,
And all her figure seemed like some fair lily
Rising and falling in a soft repose
At even, swept by winds from regions hilly,

I.

“Leave him to me, ye roses which he sought,
And all ye hills and vales,—
And all ye green-robed dales
Made lovelier now for ever by his thought.

II.

“Leave this dead poet unto me,” God said:
“And all ye women fair
Whose sweet breath and whose hair
Round him for passion's aureole was shed.

III.

“Ye understood him not: the waves he sang
Were deaf and mute and blind
And soulless, and mankind

In the fair days of youth I did behold
One standing on the sea-shore, and her face
Smote me with sudden rapture. Then that place
O'er which the sea-wind travelled gaunt and cold
Became as a sweet palace wrought of gold
And chiselled into cunning lines of grace;
And in its heart a fountain I could trace,
And many a pillar of no mortal mould.

And still, when I am wandering by the sea
The wild winds beckon with a sudden tune,
Bringing that palace back again to me,
And the early crescent of love's rising moon: