Shapen, half-shapen, mis-shapen, unshapen,
They are the shadowy creatures which youth dreams
Live in the world embodied, but are not,
Save in the mind’s, which is the mightier one.
They are the names of things which we believe in,
Ideas not embodied, alas, not!
And the sad fate which many of those meet
Whom the youth loves and quits, means nought so ill
As the betrayer’s sin, salvationless
Almost: it is but desertion, not betrayal;
And forced on him according to a promise,
Made at the first unto him, and to be
Wrought out in brief time; and the same fair souls
Saved, stand for our desires made pure in Heaven.
Let us work out our natures; we can do
No wrong in them, they are divine, eterne:
I follow my attraction, and obey
Nature, as earth does, circling round her source
Of life and light, and keeping true in Heaven,
Though not perfect in round, which nothing is.
’Twas the heart-book of love, well nigh all grief.
For the heart leaves its likeness best in that
Overwhelming sorrow which burns up and buries,
Like to the eloquent impression left
In lava, of Pompeian maiden’s bosom.
All passions, and all pleasures, and all powers
Of man’s heart, are brought in, and mind and frame.
He made this work the business of his life;
It was his mission; and was laid on him.
He was a labourer on the ways of God,
And had his hire in peace and power to work.
He wrote it not in the contempt of rule,
And not in hate; but in the self made rule
That there was none to him, but to himself
He was his sole rule, and had right to be.
The faults are faults of nature, and prove art
Man’s nature, that a thing of art, like it,
Should be so pure in kind.
I do believe
The world is a forged thing, and hath not got
The die of God upon it. It will not pass
In Heaven, I tell ye.
How shouldst thou know aught
Of Heaven, unless by contrast?
Pray now cease;
Ye two are jarring ever, though as with
The bickering beauty of two swords, whose strife,
Though deadly, maketh music, I could listen,
Did not each stab, whichever way, pain me.
Oh, I could stand and rend myself with rage
To think I am so weak, that all are so;
Mere minims in the music made from us—
While I would be a hand to sweep from end
To end, from infinite to infinite,
The world’s great chord. The beautiful of old
Had but to say some god had been with them,
And their worst fault was hallowed to their best deed.
That was to live. Could we uproot the past,
Which grows and throws its chilling shade o’er us,
Lengthening every hour and darkening it;
Or could we plant the future where we would,
And make it flourish, that, too, were to live.
But it is not more true that what is, is,
Than that what is not, is not. It is enough
To bear the ever present, as we do.
The city of the past is laid in ruins;
Its echo-echoing walls at a whisper fall:
The coming is not yet built; nor as yet
Its deep foundations laid; but seems, at once,
Like the air city, goodly and well watered,
Which the dry wind doth dream of on the sands
Where he dies away with his wanderings:
While we enjoy the hope thereof, and perish;
Not seeing that the desert present is
Our end.
The brightest natures oft have darkest
End, as fire smoke.
I will read the book in the hope
Of learning somewhat from it.
Thou may’st learn
A hearty thanksgiving for blessings here,
And proud prediction of a state to come,
Of love, and life, and power unlimited;
And uttered in a sound and homely tongue,
Fit to be used by all who think while speaking.
With here and there some old, hard uncouth words
Which have withal a quaint and meaning richness,
As stones make more the power of the soil.
The world hath said its say for and against;
And after praise and blame cometh the truth.
Living men look on all who live askance.
Were he a cold grey ghost, he would have honour;
And though as man he must have mixed with men,
Yet the true bard doth make himself ghost-like;
He lives apart from men; he wakes and walks
By nights; he puts himself into the world
Above him; and he is what but few see.
He knows, too, to the old hid treasure, truth;
And the world wonders, shortly, how some one
Hath come so rich of soul; it little dreams
Of the poor ghost that made him. Yet he comes
To none save of his own blood, and lets pass
Many a generation till his like
Turns up; moreover, this same genius
Comes, ghost-like, to those only who are lonely
In life and in desire; never to crowds:
And it can make its way through every thing,
And is never happy till it tells its secret;
But pale and pressed down with the inward weight
Of unborn works, it sickens nigh to death,
Often; but who like happy at a birth?
Say what a poet ought to do and be.
Though it may scarce become me, knowing little,
Yet what I have thought out upon that theme,
And deem true, I will tell thee.
Now I know
You two will talk of nothing else all night;
So I will to my music. Sweet! I come.
Art thou not glad to see me? What a time
Since I have touched thine eloquent white fingers.
Hast thou forgot me? Mind, now? Know’st thou not
My greeting? Ah! I love thee. Talk away!
Never mind me; I shall not you.
Agreed!
By the sweet muse of music, I could swear
I do believe it smiles upon me; see it
Full of unuttered music, like a bird;
Rich in invisible treasures, like a bud
Of unborn sweets, and thick about the heart
With ripe and rosy beauty—full to trembling.
I love it like a sister. Hark!—its tones;
They melt the soul within one like a sword,
Albeit sheathed, by lightning. Talk to me,
Lovely one! Answer me, thou beauty!
Hear her!
Experience and imagination are
Mother and sire of song—the harp and hand.
The bard’s aim is to give us thoughts: his art
Lieth in giving them as bright as may be.
And even when their looks are earthy, still
If opened, like geoids, they may be
