fairer resting-place a man could find.
“Here let us halt,” said Merlin then; and she
Nodded, and tied her palfrey to a tree.
They sate them down together, and a sleep
Fell upon Merlin, more like death, so deep.
Her finger on her lips, then Vivian rose,
And from her brown-lock’d head the wimple throws,
And takes it in her hand, and waves it over
The blossom’d thorn-tree and her sleeping lover.
Nine times she wav’d the fluttering wimple round,
And made a little plot of magic ground.
And in that daised circle, as men say,
Is Merlin prisoner till the judgement-day;
But she herself whither she will can rove,
For she was passing weary of his love.
Youth and Calm
’Tis death! and peace, indeed, is here,
And ease from shame, and rest from fear.
There’s nothing can dismarble now
The smoothness of that limpid brow.
But is a calm like this, in truth,
The crowning end of life and youth,
And when this boon rewards the dead,
Are all debts paid, has all been said?
And is the heart of youth so light,
Its step so firm, its eye so bright,
Because on its hot brow there blows
A wind of promise and repose
From the far grave, to which it goes;
Because it hath the hope to come,
One day, to harbour in the tomb?
Ah no, the bliss youth dreams is one
For daylight, for the cheerful sun,
For feeling nerves and living breath—
Youth dreams a bliss on this side death!
It dreams a rest, if not more deep,
More grateful than this marble sleep.
It hears a voice within it tell:
“Calm’s not life’s crown, though calm is well.”
’Tis all perhaps which man acquires,
But ’tis not what our youth desires.
Memorial Verses23
April, 1850
Goethe in Weimar sleeps, and Greece,
Long since, saw Byron’s struggle cease.
But one such death remain’d to come;
The last poetic voice is dumb.
What shall be said o’er Wordsworth’s tomb?
When Byron’s eyes were shut in death,
We bow’d our head and held our breath.
He taught us little: but our soul
Had felt him like the thunder’s roll.
With shivering heart the strife we saw
Of Passion with Eternal Law;
And yet with reverential awe
We watch’d the fount of fiery life
Which serv’d for that Titanic strife.
When Goethe’s death was told, we said—
Sunk, then, is Europe’s sagest head.
Physician of the Iron Age,
Goethe has done his pilgrimage.
He took the suffering human race,
He read each wound, each weakness clear—
And struck his finger on the place,
And said—Thou ailest here, and here.
—
He look’d on Europe’s dying hour
Of fitful dream and feverish power;
His eye plung’d down the weltering strife,
The turmoil of expiring life;
He said—The end is everywhere:
Art still has truth, take refuge there.
And he was happy, if to know
Causes of things, and far below
His feet to see the lurid flow
Of terror, and insane distress,
And headlong fate, be happiness.24
And Wordsworth!—Ah, pale Ghosts, rejoice!
For never has such soothing voice
Been to your shadowy world convey’d,
Since erst, at morn, some wandering shade
Heard the clear song of Orpheus come
Through Hades, and the mournful gloom.
Wordsworth has gone from us—and ye,
Ah, may ye feel his voice as we!
He too upon a wintry clime
Had fallen—on this iron time
Of doubts, disputes, distractions, fears.
He found us when the age had bound
Our souls in its benumbing round;
He spoke, and loos’d our heart in tears.
He laid us as we lay at birth
On the cool flowery lap of earth;
Smiles broke from us and we had ease.
The hills were round us, and the breeze
Went o’er the sun-lit fields again:
Our foreheads felt the wind and rain.
Our youth return’d: for there was shed
On spirits that had long been dead,
Spirits dried up and closely furl’d,
The freshness of the early world.
Ah, since dark days still bring to light
Man’s prudence and man’s fiery might,
Time may restore us in his course
Goethe’s sage mind and Byron’s force:
But where will Europe’s latter hour
Again find Wordsworth’s healing power?
Others will teach us how to dare,
And against fear our breast to steel:
Others will strengthen us to bear—
But who, ah who, will make us feel?
The cloud of mortal destiny,
Others will front it fearlessly—
But who, like him, will put it by?
Keep fresh the grass upon his grave
O Rotha! with thy living wave.
Sing him thy best! for few or none
Hears thy voice right, now he is gone.
Faded Leaves
I
The River
Still glides the stream, slow drops the boat
Under the rustling poplars’ shade;
Silent the swans beside us float:
None speaks, none heeds—ah, turn thy head.
Let those arch eyes now softly shine,
That mocking mouth grow sweetly bland:
Ah, let them rest, those eyes, on mine;
On mine let rest that lovely hand.
My pent-up tears oppress my brain,
My heart is swoln with love unsaid:
Ah, let me weep, and tell my pain,
And on thy shoulder rest my head.
Before I die, before the soul,
Which now is mine, must re-attain
Immunity from my control,
And wander round the world again:
Before this teas’d o’erlabour’d heart
For ever leaves its vain employ,
Dead to its deep habitual smart,
And dead to hopes of future joy.
II
Too Late
Each on his own strict line we move,
And some find death ere they find love.
So far apart their lives are thrown
From the twin soul which halves their own.
And sometimes, by still harder fate,
The lovers meet, but meet too late.
—Thy heart is mine!—True, true! ah, true!
—Then, love, thy hand!—Ah no! adieu!
III
Separation
Stop—Not to me, at this bitter departing,
Speak of the sure consolations of Time.
Fresh be the wound, still-renew’d be its smarting,
So but thy image endure in its prime.
But, if the steadfast commandment of Nature
Wills that remembrance should always decay;
If the lov’d form and the deep-cherish’d feature
Must, when unseen, from the soul fade away—
Me let no half-effac’d memories cumber!
Fled, fled at once, be all vestige of thee—
Deep be the darkness, and still be the slumber—
Dead be the Past and its phantoms to me!
Then, when we meet, and thy look strays toward me,
Scanning my face and the changes wrought there—
Who
, let me say, is this Stranger regards me,
With the grey eyes, and the lovely brown hair?
