Shee whose faire flowrs no autumne makes decay,
Whose hue celestiall, earthly hues doth staine,
Into a pleasant odoriferous plaine
Did walke alone, to braue the pride of Maye;
And whilst through checkred lists shee made her way,
Which smil'd about her sight to entertaine,
Loe, vnawares, where Loue did hid remaine,
Shee spide, and sought to make of him her prey;
For which, of golden lockes a fairest haire,
To binde the boy, she tooke; but hee, afraid
At her approach, sprang swiftly in the aire,

Is't not enough, aye mee! mee thus to see
Like some heauen-banish'd ghost still wailing goe,
A shadow which your rayes doe only show?
To vexe mee more, vnlesse yee bid mee die,
What could yee worse allotte vnto your foe?
But die will I, so yee will not denie
That grace to mee which mortall foes euen trie,
To chuse what sort of death should ende my woe.
One time I found when as yee did me kisse,
Yee gaue my panting soule so sweet a touch,
That halfe I sown'd in midst of all my blisse;
I doe but craue my death's wound may bee such;

When as shee smiles I finde
More light before mine eyes,
Nor when the sunne from Inde
Brings to our world a flowrie Paradise:
But when shee gently weepes,
And powres foorth pearlie showres
On cheekes' faire blushing flowres,
A sweet melancholie my senses keepes.
Both feede so my disease,
So much both doe me please,
That oft I doubt, which more my heart doth burne,
Like loue to see her smile, or pitie mourne.

Who hath not seene into her saffron bed
The morning's goddesse mildly her repose,
Or her, of whose pure bloud first sprang the rose,
Lull'd in a slumber by a mirtle shade?
Who hath not seene that sleeping white and red
Makes Phaebe look so pale, which shee did close
In that Ionian hill, to ease her woes,
Which only liues by nectare kisses fed?
Come but and see my ladie sweetly sleepe,
The sighing rubies of those heauenly lips,
The Cupids which brest's golden apples keepe,
Those eyes which shine in midst of their ecclipse,

Sublime, where traffic's billows beat
A nation's wealth about his feet,
He stands; upon the surging street
He looks benignly down.
He hears the distant, wall-hid sea,
The silver chime of Trinity,
And, voicing passion, grief, or glee,
Our million-throated town.

And, up and down, our tasks we ply
With rapid step and heedless eye,
Alert alone to sell and buy;
But when the day grows dim,
When evening brings its sweet release
From toil and care, when tumults cease,
When twilight crowns his brow with peace,

The Hyperborean hills, Ceraunus' snow,
Or Arimaspus cruell, first thee bred,
The Caspian tigers with their milke thee fed,
And Faunes did humane bloud on thee bestow;
Fierce Orithya's louer in thy bed
Thee lull'd asleepe, where he enrag'd doth blow;
Thou didst not drinke the flouds which here doe flow,
But teares, or those by ycie Tanais' hed.
Sith thou disdaines my loue, neglects my griefe,
Laughs at my grones, and still affects my death,
Of thee, nor heauen, I'll seeke no more reliefe,
Nor longer entertaine this loathsome breath,

Too long have I dreamed
Of a broken body and sullen brain,
Blind eyes that wept to heaven in vain,
And trembling endeavour,
Of lips that could never
Utter the pain
Of a soul that was dumb.

I am become
As a little child again,
For wonder and love are all that remain
Of the dream I used to be —
Sailing out to sea,
On the ebbing silence that rises and falls,
To the cadence of silver trumpet-calls,
Sounding from eternity —

Dead sorrow lies
Where the sunset dies —
O steadfast stars,

I muse and read, from day to day,
Of human thought's far-widening sway.
Its gradual exodus I note
From shadowy periods remote.

I see false faiths in ruin lie,
Whose thronging towers once cleft the sky.
I mark, amid the past's renown,
Colossal bigotries flung down!

And yet from history's feeblest youth
I watch in joy how deathless truth
Has striven to make, with stoic breast,
Her immortality manifest!

And now, since they that love her strive
To strip the last barbaric gyve
Off limbs that such rude furrows mar, —

I'll have thee greet me in thine early hours;
The dew of morning thrilling in thy words,
And the first music of the wakened birds
That pant at noon, and hang their heads at even;
Thou, radiant in the first surprise of heaven,
And the sweet shock of re-created powers,
Shalt welcome me, with thought and hope returning,
Ere Day has set his weary task of learning,
While, on the breezy vantage, standing free,
Thou renderest glad obeisance to the Sun;
Thus shalt thou meet th' impulsive bound of one
Who, thanking God for life, forgets not thee.

She beckoned me over the misty rise
Her radiant feet were bare,
The grey-blue dawn was in her eyes
Stars glimmered in her hair:
She murmured the spell of Paradise
— And Paradise was there:


" O follow me Love, wherever I will,
And lose thy soul with me
Deep in the shadowy scrub, where still
Broods grey-winged mystery,
And strange dim flowers are dreaming till
I waken them for thee. "

We fled where the forest was silent and sere,
And shadows filled the shade,
And sudden pinions swooped a-near,