WHEREIN HER DEATH IS INCREDIBLE, BUT, IF TRUE, LIFE WITHOUT HER IS EQUALLY SO

O misery! O portent shaped of terror!
Can it be true, then, that the sweet light goes
Before its time, my refuge from all woes,
Life of my will, physician to my error?
If so, why are not all things bleaker, barer
With one inclusive curse? Ah, God well knows
Nor He nor Nature could that chapter close,
Fulfill dark fears, blast hopes as fair — or fairer!
It still enchants my heart to wish once more
For the dear advent of that lovely vision,

WHEREIN, IN A VISION, LAURA REVEALS HE WILL NEVER SEE HER AGAIN

Distant in time and space, I could console me
With reveries of one whose look was Heaven;
Now apprehension haunts me like a raven
Perched on my mind — shadows and dreads control me:
For though in sleep her eyes some pity dole me,
Yet the four winds from seas that number seven
Will wail like some old lover's ghost bereaven,
Scourging away those hopes that might cajole me:
" That last dark dusk, " she cries, " do you remember?
When to those fervent glances I rose crying

WHEREIN HE RECALLS HIS FOREBODINGS AT FAREWELL

How paints my mind with sickening agitation
The day I left her — grave, disconsolate,
My heart with my Madonna and my fate —
That day comes back with strange intoxication:
I see her move amid a constellation
Of ladies liquid-eyed and intricate,
A rose, the brightest there, the least ornate,
Upon her brow a pensive resignation.
Then sings in light her inner sprightliness,
Her pearls, her chaplets and her rich robe moving;
Her song, her laugh, her gentle No and Yes —

WHEREIN SHE MUST BE SEEN BEFORE JEALOUS TIME CANCELS HER INCREDIBLE BEAUTY

He that desires to see the height of Nature
And Heaven as well, let him regard my Sun,
Sole luminary, not in my song alone,
But to the world — that blind enamoured creature!
But swift! For Death upon the loveliest feature
Fastens his beak, yet loathsome things will shun;
Heaven grows impatient for this paragon,
And bright things build in Time the briefest stature.
O hasten and behold! lest Time repeal
Virtue and beauty and a royal mind

WHEREIN TO SEE IS TO BELIEVE

Perhaps my style may strike some as too florid
Extolling my pure guardian of delight,
The sovereign of her sex: with virtue bright,
Most wise and sweet, her chaste and liberal forehead
Outdazzling Heaven! Nay, though my soul wax torrid
With praise, I fear she will dismiss as slight
My music, since she walks a starrier height...
Ah, let the skeptic stare! His heart is arid
Who will not say, " She that is heart's-desire
Is one whose grace and valour might extend

WHEREIN HE HOPES HE MAY DIE BEFORE LAURA

The gentle wind that with its delicate sigh
Flutters green laurel, flutters golden tresses,
Persuades with its infrequent suave caresses
The gazer's spirit from the flesh to fly.
A sweet and snow-white rose in thorns set high!
Where in the world match her whose grace surpasses
Eve's own? The glory of our age confesses
No equal! O let Laura never die!
Let me die first, so the large public theft
Escape me, the blind earth to darkness left,
And these eyes desolated and bereft,

CONCERNING THE TWO ROSES

Two glowing roses, fresh from Paradise,
That there, on May-Day morning, leaped in light —
Sweet gift sent by a lover wise and white
With age to two young loves in equal wise:
Whereat, so soft the speech, and to the eyes
So excellent his mien (a savage might
Have softened), the same lustre glimmered bright
In both and on their cheeks burned the swift dyes.
" Never had sun looked on a lovelier two, "
Said he, as with a smile and sigh he spoke,
Pressing their ardent palms and turning away.

WHEREIN HE URGES A FRIEND, IN EQUAL CASE, TO LIFT UP HIS SOUL TO GOD

Evil oppresses me and worse dismay,
To which a plain and ample path I find;
Frenzied like thee, I stagger wild and blind,
Whipped by harsh thoughts, like thee I run astray,
Not knowing if for war or peace to pray:
To war is loss, to peace contempt assigned.
But why brood longer? What the Highest Mind
Ordains I do not question, but obey.
However ill thy difficult honour sit
Upon me — whom the error of Love sways
That often will the sound eye subtly cheat —

WHEREIN HE FELICITATES HIS HEART THAT IT STAYS WITH HER

Fresh, shadowed hill, with flowers and foliage crowned!
Where, in dear silences or music sweet,
A heavenly spirit upon celestial feet
Honours the earth who has all honour found!
Forsaking me, my fond heart to her bound —
Wiser, if there it keep its constant seat —
Notes now the turf her starry footprints greet,
Now where her eyes pour glory all around:
Then murmurs throbbing, as they range and rove,
" Ah, were he here, that man removed from grace,

WHEREIN, COMMANDING HIS HEART RETURN TO LAURA, HE DISCOVERS THAT IT HAD NEVER COME AWAY P.

Gaze on that hill, O Heart with folly fretted!
Last night we left her who began to proffer
Some recognition for the pangs we suffer;
Now for new floods of pain we stand indebted
To her. Go back alone, I, still unnetted,
Remain. Who knows what slave the day may offer
To soften agony, what golden buffer,
Prophet that felt and partner that abetted! H.

O slave, in whom vain fancies boil and blunder!