Of lusts and vanities and senseless joys.
We planted love, and you have gathered food
Of every bitter herb which fills and cloys.
Your meat is loud excitement and mad noise,
Your wine the unblest ambition of command
O’er hearts of men, of dotards, idiots, boys.
These are the playthings fitted to your hand,
These are your happiness. You weep no more,
But I must weep. My Heaven has been defiled.
My sin has found me out and smites me sore,
And folly, justified of her own child,
Rules all the empire where love reigned of yore,
Folly red–cheeked but rotten to the core.
Till thirty years were written to your name.
A wife, a mother, these the titles were
Which conquered for you the world’s fairest fame.
In all things you were wise but in this one,
That of your wisdom you yourself did doubt.
Youth spent like age, no joy beneath the sun.
Your glass of beauty vainly running out.
Then suddenly again, ere well you knew,
Love looked upon you tenderly, yet sad:
“Are these wise follies, then, enough for you?”
He said;–“Love’s wisdom were itself less mad.”
And you: “What wouldst thou of me?” “My bare due,
In token of what joys may yet be had.”
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You watched him go, and lips apart to speak.
He left you, and once more the sun did rise
And the sun set, and week trod close on week
And month on month, till you had reached the goal
Of forty years, and life’s full waters grew
To bitterness and flooded all your soul,
Making you loathe old things and pine for new.
And you into the wilderness had fled,
And in your desolation loud did cry,
“Oh for a hand to turn these stones to bread!”
Then in your ear Love whispered scornfully,
“Thou too, poor fool, thou, even thou,” he said,
“Shalt taste thy little honey ere thou die.”
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Youth, with its pleasures, is a tale soon told.
We grow a little poorer day by day.
Old friendships falter. Loves grow strangely cold.
In vain we shift our hearts to a new hold
And barter joy for joy, the less for less.
We doubt our strength, our wisdom, and our gold.
We stand alone, as in a wilderness
Of doubts and terrors. Then, if we be wise,
We make our terms with fate and, while we may,
Sell our life’s last sad remnant for a hope.
And it is wisdom thus to close our eyes.
But for the foolish, those who cannot pray,
What else remains of their dark horoscope
But a tall tree and courage and a rope?
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Has yet in store for us; what abject fears
Even for the best of us; what fights for breath;
What sobs, what supplications, what wild tears;
What impotence of soul against despairs
Which blot out reason?–The last trembling thought
Of each poor brain, as dissolution nears,
Is not of fair life lost, of Heaven bought
And glory won. ‘Tis not the thought of grief;
Of friends deserted; loving hearts which bleed;
Wives, sisters, children who around us weep.
But only a mad clutching for relief
From physical pain, importunate Nature’s need;
The search as for a womb where we may creep
Back from the world, to hide,–perhaps to sleep.
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A silent highwayman, and take his all
And leave him naked, when the night should fall
And all the road was conjured in a mist.
Too well thou keepedst thy unholy tryst,
As long ago that eastern seneschal
Rode all day long to meet at evenfall
Him he had fled ere yet the sun uprist.
–But I have spent me like a prodigal
The treasure of my youth, and, long ago,
Have eaten husks among the hungry swine,
And when I meet thee I will straightway fall
Upon thy neck, and if the tears shall flow,
They shall be tears of love for thee and thine.
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They gave thee love who measured out thy skies,
And, when they found for thee another star,
Who made a festival and straightway hung
The jewel on thy neck. O merry world,
Hast thou forgot the glory of those eyes
Which first looked love in thine? Thou hast not furled
One banner of thy bridal car for them.
O world, in very truth thou art too young.
There was a voice which sang about thy Spring,
Till Winter froze the sweetness of his lips,
And lo, the worms had hardly left his tongue
Before thy nightingales were come again.
O world, what courage hast thou thus to sing?
Say, has thy merriment no secret pain
No sudden weariness that thou art young?
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With trembling heart, and eyes grown strangely dim,
A part thyself and parcel of the frieze
Of that colossal temple raised to Time,
To gaze on horror, till, as in a crime,
Thou and the rocks become accomplices.
There is no voice, no life ‘twixt thee and them.
No life! Yet, look, far down upon the breeze
Something has passed across the bosom bare
Of the red rocks, a leaf, a shape, a shade.
A living shadow! Ay, above thee there,
Weaving majestic circles overhead,
Others are watching.–This is the sublime
To be alone, with eagles in the air.
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Which here shall die with you in sacrifice,
Flowers from the empty fields which once were yours
And now are mine. No gold, nor myrrh, nor spice,
Nor any dead man’s offering may suffice.
I love not flowers: but thus to deck a grave
Which has no need of things of greater price.
Life is the only tribute death would have.
–Ah, thou art dead. Mine is this fair domain
With all its living beauty and brave shows
Of lawn, and lake, and garden; mine the increase
Of the year’s harvest, the slow growth of trees,
And that fair natural wealth we loved in vain,
Flowers, which shall never more adorn my house.
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If they returned to life. Nay, claim thine own,
And see how gladly I, thy “thankless heir,”
Will yield thee back possession of thy throne.
I am not so in love with riches grown
That such can comfort me. Alas, too long
The fields are furrowed and the wheat is sown
For my sole grief that these should do thee wrong.
I hold these things not wholly as in fee,
But thinking that perhaps some happy day
We yet may walk together, and devise
Of the old lands we loved, in Paradise,
And I shall give account, as best I may,
How I thy tenant was awhile for thee.
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And mine has been a battle. Thou didst store
Thy soul’s wealth sternly to a sure increase,
And thy revenue’s much still swelled to more.
Thou squanderedst nothing on the pomp of war,
The lust of glory. No mad covetous eyes
Were thine upon thy neighbour’s lands afar,
His wealth, his wife, his fenceless vanities.
Thou wert a brave, just man, whom all men knew
And trusted, and some loved, and thou to me
Wert as a tower of strength, a sanctuary
To which I fled from the world’s maddened crew,
Wounded by me, and there with bloodstained hands
Clung to the altar of thy innocence.
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I and another. In that hour supreme
We stood beside thy cross and gazed at thee,
Waiting till death should wake thee from thy dream.
Thy hands held both our hands and clung to them
And drew them to each other. We could see
Thy dumb lips open as to either name
And thy eyes turn to our eyes wistfully.
O eloquent eyes! Ye were not closed in vain.
Still from the grave ye speak, “Behold a son,
Behold a mother.” From that rite of pain
We two went home together bone of bone
And flesh of flesh, distinguished among men,
Thy witnesses till death shall come again.
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And smart like wounds yet green. But one there is
Which, for the cause that it was dear to you
In days which counted upon greater bliss,
Is fairer now and dearer far than these;
And this the memory is of some hours spent
One afternoon when, seated at your knees,
I made narration (it was middle Lent
And you with Judas flowers had filled your lap),
Of the wise secret of these rhymes of mine,
And gave a promise, which behold I keep,
To write them out for you, each idle line,
Throwing you all my rubbish in one heap.
Poor stuff perhaps. And yet it made you weep.
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Gone ere we knew it, while our foolish eyes,
Which should have watched its motions every one
Were looking elsewhere, at the hills, the skies,
Chasing vain thoughts, as children butterflies,
Until the hour struck and the day was done,
And we looked up in passionate surprise
To find that clouds had blotted out our sun.
Our joys are gone. And what is left to us,
Who loved not even love when it was here?
What but a voice which sobs monotonous
As these sad waves upon the rocks, the dear
Fond voice which once made music with our own,
And which our hearts now ache to think upon.
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I with my body worship thee and vow
Such service to thy needs as man can do.
I ask no nobler servitude than this.
Am I not thine, the bondsman of thy love,
Whom thou hast bought and ransomed with a price,
And therefore worthy to be ranked above
The very stars that in the heavens move?
And, Juliet, since I thus am one with you,
And kinglier than Plantagenet or Guelph,
What price were meet for my high mightiness?
What gold of joy, what hope, what heavenly pelf
Hast thou to give? Nay, sweetest, give thyself.
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Vast as all heaven! See, what glory lies
Entangled here in these base stratagems,
What virtue done to death! O glorious sighs,
Sublime beseechings, high cajoleries,
Fond wraths, brave ruptures, all that sometime was
Our daily bread of gods beneath the skies,
How are ye ended, in what utter loss!
Time was, time is, and time is yet to come,
Till even time itself shall have its end.
These were eternal. And behold, a tomb!
Come, let us laugh and eat and drink. God send
What all the world must need one day as we,
Speedy oblivion, rest for memory.
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With this all right in you, even that of tears.
If I have spoken hardly, it will show
How much I loved you. With you disappears
A glory, a romance of many years.
What you may be henceforth I will not know.
The phantom of your presence on my fears
Is impotent at length for weal or woe.
Your past, your present, all alike must fade
In a new land of dreams where love is not.
Then kiss me and farewell. The choice is made
And we shall live to see the past forgot,
If not forgiven. See, I came to curse,
Yet stay to bless. I know not which is worse.
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Dissemble further, and I suffer pain,
A palpable distinct and physical ache,
When our eyes meet by accident, and when
I hear you talk in your pathetic strain
Which always moved me. Only yesterday,
As I was standing with a crowd of men
In the long corridor, you came my way
And chanced to stop, and thus by chance I heard
A score of phrases uttered in that sad
Half–suppliant voice which once my spirit stirred
To its foundations. Yet your theme was glad–
Strangers your hearers. What was in these spells
To move me still? A trick, and nothing else!
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By my regrets and by my mocking face,
You by your laughter and mad gaiety,
And both by cruel thoughts of happier days.
Is then the world so narrow that we pace
These streets like prisoners still with eyes askance,
As bound together in the fell embrace
Of a dark chain which bars deliverance?
Nay, go your ways. I will not vex you more.
Make your own terms with life, while you are fair.
There is none better learned in woman’s lore.
You yet may take revenge on grief and care,
And ’twas your nature ever to be gay,
Why should I scoff? Be merry while you may.
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Had seemed to both of us a monstrous lie,
An idle boast, love’s last extravagance
Or the mere paradox of vanity.
Now it is true and yet more hideously
More strangely monstrous. I, no less than you,
Here own at length the worm which cannot die,
The burden of a pain for ever new.
This is the “pang of loss,” the bitterest
Which Hell can give. We are shut out from Heaven
And never more shall look upon Love’s face,
Being with those who perish unforgiven.
Never to see Love’s face! Ah, pain in pain,
Which we do well to weep and weep again!
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Without their limbs, their senses, maimed or deaf.
We even shall forget love, and shall thrive
And prosper and grow fat upon our grief.
You are consoled already more than half,
And wear your sorrow lightly. I will boast
No longer the refusal of relief
Than as a decent mourner of hopes crossed.
We yet shall laugh, and laughter is more loud
When following tears. The men who drive a hearse
Are not the least lighthearted of the crowd.
See, we have made love’s epitaph in verse
And fairly buried him. God’s ways are best.
Then home to pleasure and the funeral feast.
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Could heart desire for mistress or for friend?
Phoenix of friends, and most divine of women,
Skilled in all fence to venture or defend
And with love’s science at your fingers’ end,
No tears to vex, no ignorance to bore,
A fancy ripe, the zest which sorrows lend!–
I would to God we had not met before!
–I would to God! and yet to God I would
That we had never met. To see you thus
Is grief and wounds and poison to my blood.
Oh, this is sacrilege and foul abuse.
You were a thing for honour not vile use,
Not for the mad world’s wicked sinks and stews.
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In the Beaulieu woods, and how I made my peace?
It was your thirtieth birthday, and you threw
Stones like a school–girl at the chestnut trees.
The heavens were light above us and the breeze.
Your Corydon and all the merry crew
Had wandered to a distance, busier bees
Than we, who cared not where the hazels grew.
We were alone at last. I had been teasing
You with the burden of years left behind.
You were too fair to find my wit displeasing,
And I too tender to be less than kind.
Your pebbles struck me. “Wretch,” I cried. The word
Entered our hearts that instant like a sword.
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In this world or the next, if next there be,
More deep, more full, more worthy our concern
Than that first word of folly taught us? We
Had suddenly grown silent. I could see
Your cheek had lost a little of its hue,
And your lips trembled, and beseechingly
Your blue eyes turned to mine, and well I knew
Your woman’s instinct had divined my speech,
The meaning of a word so lightly spoken.
The word was a confession, clear to each,
A pledge as plain and as distinct a token
As that of Peter at his master’s knees,
“Thou knowest that I love thee more than these.”
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Loaded with vines, and with your dear pale face,
On which those thirty years so lightly sat,
And the white outline of your muslin dress.
You wore a little fichu trimmed with lace
And crossed in front, as was the fashion then,
Bound at your waist with a broad band or sash,
All white and fresh and virginally plain.
There was a sound of shouting far away
Down in the valley, as they called to us,
And you, with hands clasped seeming still to pray
Patience of fate, stood listening to me thus
With heaving bosom. There a rose lay curled.
It was the reddest rose in all the world.
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A better, kinder, truer than you were,
A gentler spirit more divinely human
Than yours with your sweet melancholy air
Of tender gaiety, which seemed like care,
And in your voice a sob as of distress
At the world’s ways, its sin and its despair,
Being yourself all strange to wickedness.
Now you are neither gentle, kind, nor good,
And you have sorrows of your own to grieve,
And in your mirth compassion has no mood;
You wear no more your heart upon your sleeve,
And if your voice still sobs ’tis with a sense
Of sorrow’s power, grief’s wealth, experience.
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I am a bitter sea, which drinketh in
The sweetness of all waters, and so thine.
Thou, like a river, pure and swift and full
And freighted with the wealth of many lands,
With hopes, and fears, and death and life, dost roll
Against the troubled ocean of my sin.
Thou doubtest not, though on these desert sands
The billows surge against thee black with brine,
Unwearied. For thy love is fixed and even
And bears thee onward, and thy faith is whole.
Though thou thyself shouldst sin, yet surely Heaven
Hath held thee guiltless and thou art forgiven.
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Or man’s device, but by our own mad will,
We who have stood together on life’s path
Through half a youth of good repute and ill,
Friends more than lovers. See, Love’s citadel
We held so stoutly ‘gainst a world in arms
Lies all dismantled now, a sight to fill
The Earth with lamentations and alarms.
Whose was the fault? I dare not ask nor say.
If there was treachery, ’tis best untold.
The price of treason we receive to–day
Is paid to both of us in evil gold.
Ay, take thy bitter freedom. ‘Tis the fee
Of love betrayed and faith’s apostasy.