| THIS English Thames is holier far than Rome, | |
| Those harebells like a sudden flush of sea | |
| Breaking across the woodland, with the foam | |
| Of meadow-sweet and white anemone | |
| To fleck their blue waves,—God is likelier there, | 5 |
| Than hidden in that crystal-hearted star the pale monks bear! | |
| |
| Those violet-gleaming butterflies that take | |
| Yon creamy lily for their pavilion | |
| Are monsignores, and where the rushes shake | |
| A lazy pike lies basking in the sun | 10 |
| His eyes half-shut,—He is some mitred old | |
| Bishop in partibus! look at those gaudy scales all green and gold. | |
| |
| The wind the restless prisoner of the trees | |
| Does well for Palæstrina, one would say | |
| The mighty master’s hands were on the keys | 15 |
| Of the Maria organ, which they play | |
| When early on some sapphire Easter morn | |
| In a high litter red as blood or sin the Pope is borne | |
| |
| From his dark House out to the Balcony | |
| Above the bronze gates and the crowded square, | 20 |
| Whose very fountains seem for ecstasy | |
| To toss their silver lances in the air, | |
| And stretching out weak hands to East and West | |
| In vain sends peace to peaceless lands, to restless nations rest. | |
| |
| Is not yon lingering orange afterglow | 25 |
| That stays to vex the moon more fair than all | |
| Rome’s lordliest pageants! strange, a year ago | |
| I knelt before some crimson Cardinal | |
| Who bare the Host across the Esquiline, | |
| And now—those common poppies in the wheat seem twice as fine. | 30 |
| |
| The blue-green beanfields yonder, tremulous | |
| With the last shower, sweeter perfume bring | |
| Through this cool evening than the odorous | |
| Flame-jewelled censers the young deacons swing, | |
| When the grey priest unlocks the curtained shrine, | 35 |
| And makes God’s body from the common fruit of corn and vine. | |
| |
| Poor Fra Giovanni bawling at the mass | |
| Were out of tune now, for a small brown bird | |
| Sings overhead, and through the long cool grass | |
| I see that throbbing throat which once I heard | 40 |
| On starlit hills of flower-starred Arcady, | |
| Once where the white and crescent sand of Salamis meets sea. | |
| |
| Sweet is the swallow twittering on the eaves | |
| At daybreak, when the mower whets his scythe, | |
| And stock-doves murmur, and the milkmaid leaves | 45 |
| Her little lonely bed, and carols blithe | |
| To see the heavy-lowing cattle wait | |
| Stretching their huge and dripping mouths across the farmyard gate. | |
| |
| And sweet the hops upon the Kentish leas, | |
| And sweet the wind that lifts the new-mown hay, | 50 |
| And sweet the fretful swarms of grumbling bees | |
| That round and round the linden blossoms play; | |
| And sweet the heifer breathing in the stall, | |
| And the green bursting figs that hang upon the red-brick wall. | |
| |
| And sweet to hear the cuckoo mock the spring | 55 |
| While the last violet loiters by the well, | |
| And sweet to hear the shepherd Daphnis sing | |
| The song of Linus through a sunny dell | |
| Of warm Arcadia where the corn is gold | |
| And the slight lithe-limbed reapers dance about the wattled fold. | 60 |
| |
| And sweet with young Lycoris to recline | |
| In some Illyrian valley far away, | |
| Where canopied on herbs amaracine | |
| We too might waste the summer-trancèd day | |
| Matching our reeds in sportive rivalry, | 65 |
| While far beneath us frets the troubled purple of the sea. | |
| |
| But sweeter far if silver-sandalled foot | |
| Of some long-hidden God should ever tread | |
| The Nuneham meadows, if with reeded flute | |
| Pressed to his lips some Faun might raise his head | 70 |
| By the green water-flags, ah! sweet indeed | |
| To see the heavenly herdsman call his white-fleeced flock to feed. | |
| |
| Then sing to me thou tuneful chorister, | |
| Though what thou sing’st be thine own requiem! | |
| Tell me thy tale thou hapless chronicler | 75 |
| Of thine own tragedies! do not contemn | |
| These unfamiliar haunts, this English field, | |
| For many a lovely coronal our northern isle can yield, | |
| |
| Which Grecian meadows know not, many a rose, | |
| Which all day long in vales Æolian | 80 |
| A lad might seek in vain for, overgrows | |
| Our hedges like a wanton courtezan | |
| Unthrifty of her beauty, lilies too | |
| Ilissus never mirrored star our streams, and cockles blue | |
| |
| Dot the green wheat which, though they are the signs | 85 |
| For swallows going south, would never spread | |
| Their azure tents between the Attic vines; | |
| Even that little weed of ragged red, | |
| Which bids the robin pipe, in Arcady | |
| Would be a trespasser, and many an unsung elegy | 90 |
| |
| Sleeps in the reeds that fringe our winding Thames | |
| Which to awake were sweeter ravishment | |
| Than ever Syrinx wept for, diadems | |
| Of brown bee-studded orchids which were meant | |
| For Cytheræa’s brows are hidden here | 95 |
| Unknown to Cytheræa, and by yonder pasturing steer | |
| |
| There is a tiny yellow daffodil, | |
| The butterfly can see it from afar, | |
| Although one summer evening’s dew could fill | |
| Its little cup twice over ere the star | 100 |
| Had called the lazy shepherd to his fold | |
| And be no prodigal, each leaf is flecked with spotted gold | |
| |
| As if Jove’s gorgeous leman Danaé | |
| Hot from his gilded arms had stooped to kiss | |
| The trembling petals, or young Mercury | 105 |
| Low-flying to the dusky ford of Dis | |
| Had with one feather of his pinions | |
| Just brushed them!—the slight stem which bears the burden of its suns | |
| |
| Is hardly thicker than the gossamer, | |
| Or poor Arachne’s silver tapestry,— | 110 |
| Men say it bloomed upon the sepulchre | |
| Of One I sometime worshipped, but to me | |
| It seems to bring diviner memories | |
| Of faun-loved Heliconian glades and blue nymph-haunted seas, | |
| |
| Of an untrodden vale at Tempe where | 115 |
| On the clear river’s marge Narcissus lies, | |
| The tangle of the forest in his hair, | |
| The silence of the woodland in his eyes, | |
| Wooing that drifting imagery which is | |
| No sooner kissed than broken, memories of Salmacis | 120 |
| |
| Who is not boy or girl and yet is both, | |
| Fed by two fires and unsatisfied | |
| Through their excess, each passion being loth | |
| For love’s own sake to leave the other’s side | |
| Yet killing love by staying, memories | 125 |
| Of Oreads peeping through the leaves of silent moon-lit trees, | |
| |
| Of lonely Ariadne on the wharf | |
| At Naxos, when she saw the treacherous crew | |
| Far out at sea, and waved her crimson scarf | |
| And called false Theseus back again nor knew | 130 |
| That Dionysos on an amber pard | |
| Was close behind her, memories of what Maeonia’s bard | |
| |
| With sightless eyes beheld, the wall of Troy, | |
| Queen Helen lying in the carven room, | |
| And at her side an amorous red-lipped boy | 135 |
| Trimming with dainty hand his helmet’s plume, | |
| And far away the moil, the shout, the groan, | |
| As Hector shielded off the spear and Ajax hurled the stone; | |
| |
| Of wingèd Perseus with his flawless sword | |
| Cleaving the snaky tresses of the witch, | 140 |
| And all those tales imperishably stored | |
| In little Grecian urns, freightage more rich | |
| Than any gaudy galleon of Spain | |
| Bare from the Indies ever! these at least bring back again, | |
| |
| For well I know they are not dead at all, | 145 |
| The ancient Gods of Grecian poesy, | |
| They are asleep, and when they hear thee call | |
| Will wake and think ’t is very Thessaly, | |
| This Thames the Daulian waters, this cool glade | |
| The yellow-irised mead where once young Itys laughed and played. | 150 |
| |
| If it was thou dear jasmine-cradled bird | |
| Who from the leafy stillness of thy throne | |
| Sang to the wondrous boy, until he heard | |
| The horn of Atalanta faintly blown | |
| Across the Cumner hills, and wandering | 155 |
| Through Bagley wood at evening found the Attic poets’ spring,— | |
| |
| Ah! tiny sober-suited advocate | |
| That pleadest for the moon against the day! | |
| If thou didst make the shepherd seek his mate | |
| On that sweet questing, when Proserpina | 160 |
| Forgot it was not Sicily and leant | |
| Across the mossy Sandford stile in ravished wonderment,— | |
| |
| Light-winged and bright-eyed miracle of the wood! | |
| If ever thou didst soothe with melody | |
| One of that little clan, that brotherhood | 165 |
| Which loved the morning-star of Tuscany | |
| More than the perfect sun of Raphael | |
| And is immortal, sing to me! for I too love thee well, | |
| |
| Sing on! sing on! let the dull world grow young, | |
| Let elemental things take form again, | 170 |
| And the old shapes of Beauty walk among | |
| The simple garths and open crofts, as when | |
| The son of Leto bare the willow rod, | |
| And the soft sheep and shaggy goats followed the boyish God. | |
| |
| Sing on! sing on! and Bacchus will be here | 175 |
| Astride upon his gorgeous Indian throne, | |
| And over whimpering tigers shake the spear | |
| With yellow ivy crowned and gummy cone, | |
| While at his side the wanton Bassarid | |
| Will throw the lion by the mane and catch the mountain kid! | 180 |
| |
| Sing on! and I will wear the leopard skin, | |
| And steal the moonéd wings of Ashtaroth, | |
| Upon whose icy chariot we could win | |
| Cithæron in an hour e’er the froth | |
| Has overbrimmed the wine-vat or the Faun | 185 |
| Ceased from the treading! ay, before the flickering lamp of dawn | |
| |
| Has scared the hooting owlet to its nest, | |
| And warned the bat to close its filmy vans, | |
| Some Mænad girl with vine-leaves on her breast | |
| Will filch their beechnuts from the sleeping Pans | 190 |
| So softly that the little nested thrush | |
| Will never wake, and then with shrilly laugh and leap will rush | |
| |
| Down the green valley where the fallen dew | |
| Lies thick beneath the elm and count her store, | |
| Till the brown Satyrs in a jolly crew | 195 |
| Trample the loosestrife down along the shore, | |
| And where their hornèd master sits in state | |
| Bring strawberries and bloomy plums upon a wicker crate! | |
| |
| Sing on! and soon with passion-wearied face | |
| Through the cool leaves Apollo’s lad will come, | 200 |
| The Tyrian prince his bristled boar will chase | |
| Adown the chestnut-copses all a-bloom, | |
| And ivory-limbed, grey-eyed, with look of pride, | |
| After yon velvet-coated deer the virgin maid will ride. | |
| |
| Sing on! and I the dying boy will see | 205 |
| Stain with his purple blood the waxen bell | |
| That overweighs the jacinth, and to me | |
| The wretched Cyprian her woe will tell, | |
| And I will kiss her mouth and streaming eyes, | |
| And lead her to the myrtle-hidden grove where Adon lies! | 210 |
| |
| Cry out aloud on Itys! memory | |
| That foster-brother of remorse and pain | |
| Drops poison in mine ear,—O to be free, | |
| To burn one’s old ships! and to launch again | |
| Into the white-plumed battle of the waves | 215 |
| And fight old Proteus for the spoil of coral-flowered caves! | |
| |
| O for Medea with her poppied spell! | |
| O for the secret of the Colchian shrine! | |
| O for one leaf of that pale asphodel | |
| Which binds the tired brows of Proserpine, | 220 |
| And sheds such wondrous dews at eve that she | |
| Dreams of the fields of Enna, by the far Sicilian sea, | |
| |
| Where oft the golden-girdled bee she chased | |
| From lily to lily on the level mead, | |
| Ere yet her sombre Lord had bid her taste | 225 |
| The deadly fruit of that pomegranate seed, | |
| Ere the black steeds had harried her away | |
| Down to the faint and flowerless land, the sick and sunless day. | |
| |
| O for one midnight and as paramour | |
| The Venus of the little Melian farm! | 230 |
| O that some antique statue for one hour | |
| Might wake to passion, and that I could charm | |
| The Dawn at Florence from its dumb despair | |
| Mix with those mighty limbs and make that giant breast my lair! | |
| |
| Sing on! sing on! I would be drunk with life, | 235 |
| Drunk with the trampled vintage of my youth, | |
| I would forget the wearying wasted strife, | |
| The riven vale, the Gorgon eyes of Truth, | |
| The prayerless vigil and the cry for prayer, | |
| The barren gifts, the lifted arms, the dull insensate air! | 240 |
| |
| Sing on! sing on! O feathered Niobe, | |
| Thou canst make sorrow beautiful, and steal | |
| From joy its sweetest music, not as we | |
| Who by dead voiceless silence strive to heal | |
| Our too untented wounds, and do but keep | 245 |
| Pain barricadoed in our hearts, and murder pillowed sleep. | |
| |
| Sing louder yet, why must I still behold | |
| The wan white face of that deserted Christ, | |
| Whose bleeding hands my hands did once enfold, | |
| Whose smitten lips my lips so oft have kissed, | 250 |
| And now in mute and marble misery | |
| Sits in his lone dishonoured House and weeps, perchance for me. | |
| |
| O memory cast down thy wreathèd shell! | |
| Break thy hoarse lute O sad Melpomene! | |
| O sorrow sorrow keep thy cloistered cell | 255 |
| Nor dim with tears this limpid Castaly! | |
| Cease, cease, sad bird, thou dost the forest wrong | |
| To vex its sylvan quiet with such wild impassioned song! | |
| |
| Cease, cease, or if ’tis anguish to be dumb | |
| Take from the pastoral thrush her simpler air, | 260 |
| Whose jocund carelessness doth more become | |
| This English woodland than thy keen despair, | |
| Ah! cease and let the northwind bear thy lay | |
| Back to the rocky hills of Thrace, the stormy Daulian bay. | |
| |
| A moment more, the startled leaves had stirred, | 265 |
| Endymion would have passed across the mead | |
| Moonstruck with love, and this still Thames had heard | |
| Pan plash and paddle groping for some reed | |
| To lure from her blue cave that Naiad maid | |
| Who for such piping listens half in joy and half afraid. | 270 |
| |
| A moment more, the waking dove had cooed, | |
| The silver daughter of the silver sea | |
| With the fond gyves of clinging hands had wooed | |
| Her wanton from the chase, and Dryope | |
| Had thrust aside the branches of her oak | 275 |
| To see the lusty gold-haired lad rein in his snorting yoke. | |
| |
| A moment more, the trees had stooped to kiss | |
| Pale Daphne just awakening from the swoon | |
| Of tremulous laurels, lonely Salmacis | |
| Had bared his barren beauty to the moon, | 280 |
| And through the vale with sad voluptuous smile | |
| Antinous had wandered, the red lotus of the Nile | |
| |
| Down leaning from his black and clustering hair | |
| To shade those slumberous eyelids’ caverned bliss, | |
| Or else on yonder grassy slope with bare | 285 |
| High-tuniced limbs unravished Artemis | |
| Had bade her hounds give tongue, and roused the deer | |
| From his green ambuscade with shrill halloo and pricking spear. | |
| |
| Lie still, lie still, O passionate heart, lie still! | |
| O Melancholy, fold thy raven wing! | 290 |
| O sobbing Dryad, from thy hollow hill | |
| Come not with such desponded answering! | |
| No more thou wingèd Marsyas complain, | |
| Apollo loveth not to hear such troubled songs of pain! | |
| |
| It was a dream, the glade is tenantless, | 295 |
| No soft Ionian laughter moves the air, | |
| The Thames creeps on in sluggish leadenness, | |
| And from the copse left desolate and bare | |
| Fled is young Bacchus with his revelry, | |
| Yet still from Nuneham wood there comes that thrilling melody | 300 |
| |
| So sad, that one might think a human heart | |
| Brake in each separate note, a quality | |
| Which music sometimes has, being the Art | |
| Which is most nigh to tears and memory, | |
| Poor mourning Philomel, what dost thou fear? | 305 |
| Thy sister doth not haunt these fields, Pandion is not here, | |
| |
| Here is no cruel Lord with murderous blade, | |
| No woven web of bloody heraldries, | |
| But mossy dells for roving comrades made, | |
| Warm valleys where the tired student lies | 310 |
| With half-shut book, and many a winding walk | |
| Where rustic lovers stray at eve in happy simple talk. | |
| |
| The harmless rabbit gambols with its young | |
| Across the trampled towing-path, where late | |
| A troop of laughing boys in jostling throng | 315 |
| Cheered with their noisy cries the racing eight; | |
| The gossamer, with ravelled silver threads, | |
| Works at its little loom, and from the dusky red-eaved sheds | |
| |
| Of the lone Farm a flickering light shines out | |
| Where the swinked shepherd drives his bleating flock | 320 |
| Back to their wattled sheep-cotes, a faint shout | |
| Comes from some Oxford boat at Sandford lock, | |
| And starts the moor-hen from the sedgy rill, | |
| And the dim lengthening shadows flit like swallows up the hill. | |
| |
| The heron passes homeward to the mere, | 325 |
| The blue mist creeps among the shivering trees, | |
| Gold world by world the silent stars appear, | |
| And like a blossom blown before the breeze, | |
| A white moon drifts across the shimmering sky, | |
| Mute arbitress of all thy sad, thy rapturous threnody. | 330 |
| |
| She does not heed thee, wherefore should she heed, | |
| She knows Endymion is not far away, | |
| ’Tis I, ’tis I, whose soul is as the reed | |
| Which has no message of its own to play, | |
| So pipes another’s bidding, it is I, | 335 |
| Drifting with every wind on the wide sea of misery. | |
| |
| Ah! the brown bird has ceased: one exquisite trill | |
| About the sombre woodland seems to cling, | |
| Dying in music, else the air is still, | |
| So still that one might hear the bat’s small wing | 340 |
| Wander and wheel above the pines, or tell | |
| Each tiny dewdrop dripping from the blue-bell’s brimming cell. | |
| |
| And far away across the lengthening wold, | |
| Across the willowy flats and thickets brown, | |
| Magdalen’s tall tower tipped with tremulous gold | 345 |
| Marks the long High Street of the little town, | |
| And warns me to return; I must not wait, | |
| Hark! ’tis the curfew booming from the bell at Christ Church gate. | |
| |