WHEREIN NIGHT WITH HER GIFT OF SLEEP VISITS ALL SAVE HIM

It is the vigil dark-eyed silence keeps
By earth and heaven: each bird, each beast in chains
Of silk reposes; Night's black chariot reins
Glitter with stars; the waveless water sleeps.
I wake, brood, burn, shed tears: and though love weeps,
Its one dear reason still the heart retains;
War is the portion no grief, no wrath drains,
But in the thought of her a solace creeps.
Ah me! that sweet and bitter nourishment,
Strange twins, from one bright quenchless fountain come;

WHEREIN HE IS PREPARED TO SUFFER IF ONLY HE MAY NOT OFFEND HIS LADY

O Love, to whom my heart lies open wide —
No thought obscure, each hard pang manifest —
Explore this flaming and unbolted breast,
Behold what from your fierce eyes cannot hide.
Thou knowest for thy sake what trials betide;
Me still from day to day, from plain to crest
Thou drivest, with no heed, while I protest
As on my tortured feet new thorns are tried.
True, I discern the distant beacon light
Toward which, by dark paths, thou goadest me;

WHEREIN HE ENVIES WHATSOEVER OF LOVELY IN NATURE HER PRESENCE MAKES LOVELIER

O rich and happy flowers forever apart
On which my pensive Lady puts her heel!
O golden acres privileged to feel
Her phrase, her footprint pressed upon your heart!
Trees silver green with April's earliest art;
Pale passionate violets; dark grove that can steal
Only so much of sun as may reveal
Your swarthy steeples in a radiant dart!
O comely landscape! O translucent stream
Mirroring her pure face, her intense eyes
And seizing all alive their bluest beam!

WHEREIN HE PROCLAIMS HIS PERILOUS STATE

O straying steps! O blind and busy dreams!
O constant memory! O keen desire!
O passion strong! Heart weak with its own fire!
O eyes, not eyes, but salt and living streams!
O laurel boughs whose difficult garland seems
Guerdon enough to which lords may aspire!
O haunted life! Mirage I must admire
Or wallow else in little sluggard schemes!
O glamorous face where Love has hoarded well
His lash and spur to prick the heart and move
The mind at will — nor heart nor mind to spare!

WHEREIN HER EVERY GESTURE IS DIVINE

Love and I, both filled with marvelling,
As one who sees a thing incredible,
Look on this one that laughs or casts a spell
Of speech, this lovely and unrivalled thing.
From the sweet brows that spread a perfect wing
So gleam my stars they make a Heaven of Hell,
Give the blind lamps, the deaf a silver bell,
The mute a tongue to blow Love trumpeting!
What miracle it is when on the grass
She sits like some white flower, or to her brave
Unsullied bosom will some green spray press!

WHEREIN HE PRAISES THE LOVELINESS AND VIRTUE OF LAURA

In what bright realm, what sphere of radiant thought
Did Nature find the model whence she drew
That delicate dazzling image where we view
Here on this earth what she in heaven wrought?
What fountain-haunting nymph, what dryad, sought
In groves, such golden tresses ever threw
Upon the gust? What heart such virtues knew? —
Though her chief virtue with my death is fraught.
He looks in vain for heavenly beauty, he
Who never looked upon her perfect eyes,

WHEREIN HER IMAGE IS FIXED FOREVER IN HIS HEART

Wherever I rest or turn my tired eyes
To cool them of desires that draw them still,
Love paints the lovely Lady at his will
That passion may stay green; and, being wise,
Deep pity with sweet anguish Love applies —
For generous ardours gentle bosoms fill —
While, equally constrained, my fond ears thrill
To her soft syllables, her seraph sighs.
Love and pure Truth were both in league to tell
The virtues without fellows on this sphere,
Whose equals never charmed the stars; nor fell

WHEREIN HE RECOLLECTS HER IN HER TEARS

That always-honoured ever-bitter day
Hath so engraved her image in my breast,
That there it burns, there only is possessed
Of flame nor wit nor word can quite convey:
Such fluent grief I saw her face portray,
Such mournful soft despairs my ears confessed,
I dared not think a mortal tongue expressed
What must have gladdened God with its dismay.
Gold glowed her hair, her face glowed sun on snow,
Eyebrow and lash gleamed black, her eyes blazed stars
Whence the young bowman plied his deadly bow;

WHEREIN ALL NATURE IS THE THEATRE TO HER SORROW

I saw on earth angelic grace revealed,
Celestial charms which mortals seldom see,
Such as rejoice and rend the memory;
All else untrue, vain, trivial, repealed.
Now to dark tears I saw those bright eyes yield
That often blanched the sun with jealousy;
And from those lips a voiceless agony
To move the mountain, bid the flood be sealed.
Wit, firmness, pity, love and excellence
Knitted to grief so sweet a concert made,
As never yet struck or subdued the sense;

WHEREIN LAURA WEEPS

Never was Jupiter so set on thunder,
Nor Caesar never so resolved to shatter
But Mercy like a blast would swoop to scatter
The flame, or tear the hand and sword asunder.
Milady wept: my Lord said (O sweet blunder!)
That I should see her, hear her sorrows flatter
My soul with listening, and thrill to the matter
And very marrow of my bones with wonder.
To me Love pointed, carved into my breast
That bright and silver tear, those mysteries
Cut with a diamond at Love's behest,