Part 9

Princes, and ye whom pleasure quickeneth, Heed well this rhyme before your pleasure tire; For life is sweet, but after life is death. This is the end of every man's desire.

RONDEL

Kissing her hair I sat against her feet, Wove and unwove it, wound and found it sweet; Made fast therewith her hands, drew down her eyes, Deep as deep flowers and dreamy like dim skies; With her own tresses bound and found her fair, Kissing her hair.

Sleep were no sweeter than her face to me, Sleep of cold sea-bloom under the cold sea; What pain could get between my face and hers? What new sweet thing would love not relish worse? Unless, perhaps, white death had kissed me there, Kissing her hair?

BEFORE THE MIRROR

(VERSES WRITTEN UNDER A PICTURE)

INSCRIBED TO J. A. WHISTLER

I

White rose in red rose-garden Is not so white; Snowdrops that plead for pardon And pine for fright Because the hard East blows Over their maiden rows Grow not as this face grows from pale to bright.

Behind the veil, forbidden, Shut up from sight, Love, is there sorrow hidden, Is there delight? Is joy thy dower or grief, White rose of weary leaf, Late rose whose life is brief, whose loves are light?

Soft snows that hard winds harden Till each flake bite Fill all the flowerless garden Whose flowers took flight Long since when summer ceased, And men rose up from feast, And warm west wind grew east, and warm day night.

II

"Come snow, come wind or thunder High up in air, I watch my face, and wonder At my bright hair; Nought else exalts or grieves The rose at heart, that heaves With love of her own leaves and lips that pair.

"She knows not loves that kissed her She knows not where. Art thou the ghost, my sister, White sister there, Am I the ghost, who knows? My hand, a fallen rose, Lies snow-white on white snows, and takes no care.

"I cannot see what pleasures Or what pains were; What pale new loves and treasures New years will bear; What beam will fall, what shower, What grief or joy for dower; But one thing-knows the flower; the flower is fair."

III

Glad, but not flushed with gladness, Since joys go by; Sad, but not bent with sadness, Since sorrows die; Deep in the gleaming glass She sees all past things pass, And all sweet life that was lie down and lie.

There glowing ghosts of flowers Draw down, draw nigh; And wings of swift spent hours Take flight and fly; She sees by formless gleams, She hears across cold streams, Dead mouths of many dreams that sing and sigh.

Face fallen and white throat lifted, With sleepless eye She sees old loves that drifted, She knew not why, Old loves and faded fears Float down a stream that hears The flowing of all men's tears beneath the sky.

EROTION

Sweet for a little even to fear, and sweet, O love, to lay down fear at love's fair feet; Shall not some fiery memory of his breath Lie sweet on lips that touch the lips of death? Yet leave me not; yet, if thou wilt, be free; Love me no more, but love my love of thee. Love where thou wilt, and live thy life; and I, One thing I can, and one love cannot--die. Pass from me; yet thine arms, thine eyes, thine hair, Feed my desire and deaden my despair. Yet once more ere time change us, ere my cheek Whiten, ere hope be dumb or sorrow speak, Yet once more ere thou hate me, one full kiss; Keep other hours for others, save me this. Yea, and I will not (if it please thee) weep, Lest thou be sad; I will but sigh, and sleep. Sweet, does death hurt? thou canst not do me wrong: I shall not lack thee, as I loved thee, long. Hast thou not given me above all that live Joy, and a little sorrow shalt not give? What even though fairer fingers of strange girls Pass nestling through thy beautiful boy's curls As mine did, or those curled lithe lips of thine Meet theirs as these, all theirs come after mine; And though I were not, though I be not, best, I have loved and love thee more than all the rest. O love, O lover, loose or hold me fast, I had thee first, whoever have thee last; Fairer or not, what need I know, what care? To thy fair bud my blossom once seemed fair. Why am I fair at all before thee, why At all desired? seeing thou art fair, not I. I shall be glad of thee, O fairest head, Alive, alone, without thee, with thee, dead; I shall remember while the light lives yet, And in the night-time I shall not forget. Though (as thou wilt) thou leave me ere life leave, I will not, for thy love I will not, grieve; Not as they use who love not more than I, Who love not as I love thee though I die; And though thy lips, once mine, be oftener prest To many another brow and balmier breast, And sweeter arms, or sweeter to thy mind, Lull thee or lure, more fond thou wilt not find.

IN MEMORY OF WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR

Back to the flower-town, side by side, The bright months bring, New-born, the bridegroom and the bride, Freedom and spring.

The sweet land laughs from sea to sea, Filled full of sun; All things come back to her, being free; All things but one.

In many a tender wheaten plot Flowers that were dead Live, and old suns revive; but not That holier head.

By this white wandering waste of sea, Far north, I hear One face shall never turn to me As once this year:

Shall never smile and turn and rest On mine as there, Nor one most sacred hand be prest Upon my hair.

I came as one whose thoughts half linger, Half run before; The youngest to the oldest singer That England bore.

I found him whom I shall not find Till all grief end, In holiest age our mightiest mind, Father and friend.

But thou, if anything endure, If hope there be, O spirit that man's life left pure, Man's death set free,

Not with disdain of days that were Look earthward now; Let dreams revive the reverend hair, The imperial brow;

Come back in sleep, for in the life Where thou art not We find none like thee. Time and strife And the world's lot

Move thee no more; but love at least And reverent heart May move thee, royal and released, Soul, as thou art.

And thou, his Florence, to thy trust Receive and keep, Keep safe his dedicated dust, His sacred sleep.

So shall thy lovers, come from far, Mix with thy name As morning-star with evening-star His faultless fame

A SONG IN TIME OF ORDER. 1852

Push hard across the sand, For the salt wind gathers breath; Shoulder and wrist and hand, Push hard as the push of death.

The wind is as iron that rings, The foam-heads loosen and flee; It swells and welters and swings, The pulse of the tide of the sea.

And up on the yellow cliff The long corn flickers and shakes; Push, for the wind holds stiff, And the gunwale dips and rakes.

Good hap to the fresh fierce weather, The quiver and beat of the sea! While three men hold together, The kingdoms are less by three.

Out to the sea with her there, Out with her over the sand; Let the kings keep the earth for their share! We have done with the sharers of land.

They have tied the world in a tether, They have bought over God with a fee; While three men hold together, The kingdoms are less by three.

We have done with the kisses that sting, The thief's mouth red from the feast, The blood on the hands of the king And the lie at the lips of the priest.

Will they tie the winds in a tether, Put a bit in the jaws of the sea? While three men hold together, The kingdoms are less by three.

Let our flag run out straight in the wind! The old red shall be floated again When the ranks that are thin shall be thinned, When the names that were twenty are ten;

When the devil's riddle is mastered And the galley-bench creaks with a Pope, We shall see Buonaparte the bastard Kick heels with his throat in a rope.

While the shepherd sets wolves on his sheep And the emperor halters his kine, While Shame is a watchman asleep And Faith is a keeper of swine,

Let the wind shake our flag like a feather, Like the plumes of the foam of the sea! While three men hold together, The kingdoms are less by three.

All the world has its burdens to bear, From Cayenne to the Austrian whips; Forth, with the rain in our hair And the salt sweet foam in our lips;

In the teeth of the hard glad weather, In the blown wet face of the sea; While three men hold together, The kingdoms are less by three.

A SONG IN TIME OF REVOLUTION. 1860

The heart of the rulers is sick, and the high-priest covers his head: For this is the song of the quick that is heard in the ears of the dead.

The poor and the halt and the blind are keen and mighty and fleet: Like the noise of the blowing of wind is the sound of the noise of their feet.

The wind has the sound of a laugh in the clamour of days and of deeds: The priests are scattered like chaff, and the rulers broken like reeds.

The high-priest sick from qualms, with his raiment bloodily dashed; The thief with branded palms, and the liar with cheeks abashed.

They are smitten, they tremble greatly, they are pained for their pleasant things: For the house of the priests made stately, and the might in the mouth of the kings.

They are grieved and greatly afraid; they are taken, they shall not flee: For the heart of the nations is made as the strength of the springs of the sea.

They were fair in the grace of gold, they walked with delicate feet: They were clothed with the cunning of old, and the smell of their garments was sweet.

For the breaking of gold in their hair they halt as a man made lame: They are utterly naked and bare; their mouths are bitter with shame.

Wilt thou judge thy people now, O king that wast found most wise? Wilt thou lie any more, O thou whose mouth is emptied of lies?

Shall God make a pact with thee, till his hook be found in thy sides? Wilt thou put back the time of the sea, or the place of the season of tides?

Set a word in thy lips, to stand before God with a word in thy mouth: That "the rain shall return in the land, and the tender dew after drouth."

But the arm of the elders is broken, their strength is unbound and undone: They wait for a sign of a token; they cry, and there cometh none.

Their moan is in every place, the cry of them filleth the land: There is shame in the sight of their face, there is fear in the thews of their hand.

They are girdled about the reins with a curse for the girdle thereon: For the noise of the rending of chains the face of their colour is gone.

For the sound of the shouting of men they are grievously stricken at heart: They are smitten asunder with pain, their bones are smitten apart.

There is none of them all that is whole; their lips gape open for breath; They are clothed with sickness of soul, and the shape of the shadow of death.

The wind is thwart in their feet; it is full of the shouting of mirth; As one shaketh the sides of a sheet, so it shaketh the ends of the earth.

The sword, the sword is made keen; the iron has opened its mouth; The corn is red that was green; it is bound for the sheaves of the south.

The sound of a word was shed, the sound of the wind as a breath, In the ears of the souls that were dead, in the dust of the deepness of death;

Where the face of the moon is taken, the ways of the stars undone, The light of the whole sky shaken, the light of the face of the sun:

Where the waters are emptied and broken, the waves of the waters are stayed; Where God has bound for a token the darkness that maketh afraid;

Where the sword was covered and hidden, and dust had grown in its side, A word came forth which was bidden, the crying of one that cried:

The sides of the two-edged sword shall be bare, and its mouth shall be red, For the breath of the face of the Lord that is felt in the bones of the dead.

TO VICTOR HUGO

In the fair days when God By man as godlike trod, And each alike was Greek, alike was free, God's lightning spared, they said, Alone the happier head Whose laurels screened it; fruitless grace for thee, To whom the high gods gave of right Their thunders and their laurels and their light.

Sunbeams and bays before Our master's servants wore, For these Apollo left in all men's lands; But far from these ere now And watched with jealous brow Lay the blind lightnings shut between God's hands, And only loosed on slaves and kings The terror of the tempest of their wings.

Born in those younger years That shone with storms of spears And shook in the wind blown from a dead world's pyre, When by her back-blown hair Napoleon caught the fair And fierce Republic with her feet of fire, And stayed with iron words and hands Her flight, and freedom in a thousand lands:

Thou sawest the tides of things Close over heads of kings, And thine hand felt the thunder, and to thee Laurels and lightnings were As sunbeams and soft air Mixed each in other, or as mist with sea Mixed, or as memory with desire, Or the lute's pulses with the louder lyre.

For thee man's spirit stood Disrobed of flesh and blood, And bare the heart of the most secret hours; And to thine hand more tame Than birds in winter came High hopes and unknown flying forms of powers, And from thy table fed, and sang Till with the tune men's ears took fire and rang.

Even all men's eyes and ears With fiery sound and tears Waxed hot, and cheeks caught flame and eyelid light, At those high songs of thine That stung the sense like wine, Or fell more soft than dew or snow by night, Or wailed as in some flooded cave Sobs the strong broken spirit of a wave.

But we, our master, we Whose hearts, uplift to thee, Ache with the pulse of thy remembered song, We ask not nor await From the clenched hands of fate, As thou, remission of the world's old wrong; Respite we ask not, nor release; Freedom a man may have, he shall not peace.

Though thy most fiery hope Storm heaven, to set wide ope The all-sought-for gate whence God or Chance debars All feet of men, all eyes-- The old night resumes her skies, Her hollow hiding-place of clouds and stars, Where nought save these is sure in sight; And, paven with death, our days are roofed with night.

One thing we can; to be Awhile, as men may, free; But not by hope or pleasure the most stern Goddess, most awful-eyed, Sits, but on either side Sit sorrow and the wrath of hearts that burn, Sad faith that cannot hope or fear, And memory grey with many a flowerless year.

Not that in stranger's wise I lift not loving eyes To the fair foster-mother France, that gave Beyond the pale fleet foam Help to my sires and home, Whose great sweet breast could shelter those and save Whom from her nursing breasts and hands Their land cast forth of old on gentler lands.

Not without thoughts that ache For theirs and for thy sake, I, born of exiles, hail thy banished head; I whose young song took flight Toward the great heat and light On me a child from thy far splendour shed, From thine high place of soul and song, Which, fallen on eyes yet feeble, made them strong.

Ah, not with lessening love For memories born hereof, I look to that sweet mother-land, and see The old fields and fair full streams, And skies, but fled like dreams The feet of freedom and the thought of thee; And all between the skies and graves The mirth of mockers and the shame of slaves.

She, killed with noisome air, Even she! and still so fair, Who said "Let there be freedom," and there was Freedom; and as a lance The fiery eyes of France Touched the world's sleep and as a sleep made pass Forth of men's heavier ears and eyes Smitten with fire and thunder from new skies.

Are they men's friends indeed Who watch them weep and bleed? Because thou hast loved us, shall the gods love thee? Thou, first of men and friend, Seest thou, even thou, the end? Thou knowest what hath been, knowest thou what shall be? Evils may pass and hopes endure; But fate is dim, and all the gods obscure.

O nursed in airs apart, O poet highest of heart, Hast thou seen time, who hast seen so many things? Are not the years more wise, More sad than keenest eyes, The years with soundless feet and sounding wings? Passing we hear them not, but past The clamour of them thrills us, and their blast.

Thou art chief of us, and lord; Thy song is as a sword Keen-edged and scented in the blade from flowers; Thou art lord and king; but we Lift younger eyes, and see Less of high hope, less light on wandering hours; Hours that have borne men down so long, Seen the right fail, and watched uplift the wrong.

But thine imperial soul, As years and ruins roll To the same end, and all things and all dreams With the same wreck and roar Drift on the dim same shore, Still in the bitter foam and brackish streams Tracks the fresh water-spring to be And sudden sweeter fountains in the sea.

As once the high God bound With many a rivet round Man's saviour, and with iron nailed him through, At the wild end of things, Where even his own bird's wings Flagged, whence the sea shone like a drop of dew, From Caucasus beheld below Past fathoms of unfathomable snow;

So the strong God, the chance Central of circumstance, Still shows him exile who will not be slave; All thy great fame and thee Girt by the dim strait sea With multitudinous walls of wandering wave; Shows us our greatest from his throne Fate-stricken, and rejected of his own.

Yea, he is strong, thou say'st, A mystery many-faced, The wild beasts know him and the wild birds flee; The blind night sees him, death Shrinks beaten at his breath, And his right hand is heavy on the sea: We know he hath made us, and is king; We know not if he care for anything.

Thus much, no more, we know; He bade what is be so, Bade light be and bade night be, one by one; Bade hope and fear, bade ill And good redeem and kill, Till all men be aweary of the sun And his world burn in its own flame And bear no witness longer of his name.

Yet though all this be thus, Be those men praised of us Who have loved and wrought and sorrowed and not sinned For fame or fear or gold, Nor waxed for winter cold, Nor changed for changes of the worldly wind; Praised above men of men be these, Till this one world and work we know shall cease.

Yea, one thing more than this, We know that one thing is, The splendour of a spirit without blame, That not the labouring years Blind-born, nor any fears, Nor men nor any gods can tire or tame; But purer power with fiery breath Fills, and exalts above the gulfs of death.

Praised above men be thou, Whose laurel-laden brow, Made for the morning, droops not in the night; Praised and beloved, that none Of all thy great things done Flies higher than thy most equal spirit's flight; Praised, that nor doubt nor hope could bend Earth's loftiest head, found upright to the end.

BEFORE DAWN

Sweet life, if life were stronger, Earth clear of years that wrong her, Then two things might live longer, Two sweeter things than they; Delight, the rootless flower, And love, the bloomless bower; Delight that lives an hour, And love that lives a day.

From evensong to daytime, When April melts in Maytime, Love lengthens out his playtime, Love lessens breath by breath, And kiss by kiss grows older On listless throat or shoulder Turned sideways now, turned colder Than life that dreams of death.

This one thing once worth giving Life gave, and seemed worth living; Sin sweet beyond forgiving And brief beyond regret: To laugh and love together And weave with foam and feather And wind and words the tether Our memories play with yet.

Ah, one thing worth beginning, One thread in life worth spinning, Ah sweet, one sin worth sinning With all the whole soul's will; To lull you till one stilled you, To kiss you till one killed you, To feed you till one filled you, Sweet lips, if love could fill;

To hunt sweet Love and lose him Between white arms and bosom, Between the bud and blossom, Between your throat and chin; To say of shame--what is it? Of virtue--we can miss it, Of sin--we can but kiss it, And it's no longer sin:

To feel the strong soul, stricken Through fleshly pulses, quicken Beneath swift sighs that thicken, Soft hands and lips that smite; Lips that no love can tire, With hands that sting like fire, Weaving the web Desire To snare the bird Delight.

But love so lightly plighted, Our love with torch unlighted, Paused near us unaffrighted, Who found and left him free; None, seeing us cloven in sunder, Will weep or laugh or wonder; Light love stands clear of thunder, And safe from winds at sea.

As, when late larks give warning Of dying lights and dawning, Night murmurs to the morning, "Lie still, O love, lie still;" And half her dark limbs cover The white limbs of her lover, With amorous plumes that hover And fervent lips that chill;

As scornful day represses Night's void and vain caresses, And from her cloudier tresses Unwinds the gold of his, With limbs from limbs dividing And breath by breath subsiding; For love has no abiding, But dies before the kiss;

So hath it been, so be it; For who shall live and flee it? But look that no man see it Or hear it unaware; Lest all who love and choose him See Love, and so refuse him; For all who find him lose him, But all have found him fair.

DOLORES

(NOTRE-DAME DES SEPT DOULEURS)

Cold eyelids that hide like a jewel Hard eyes that grow soft for an hour; The heavy white limbs, and the cruel Red mouth like a venomous flower; When these are gone by with their glories, What shall rest of thee then, what remain, O mystic and sombre Dolores, Our Lady of Pain?

Seven sorrows the priests give their Virgin; But thy sins, which are seventy times seven, Seven ages would fail thee to purge in, And then they would haunt thee in heaven: Fierce midnights and famishing morrows, And the loves that complete and control All the joys of the flesh, all the sorrows That wear out the soul.

O garment not golden but gilded, O garden where all men may dwell, O tower not of ivory, but builded By hands that reach heaven from hell; O mystical rose of the mire, O house not of gold but of gain, O house of unquenchable fire, Our Lady of Pain!

O lips full of lust and of laughter, Curled snakes that are fed from my breast, Bite hard, lest remembrance come after And press with new lips where you pressed. For my heart too springs up at the pressure, Mine eyelids too moisten and burn; Ah, feed me and fill me with pleasure, Ere pain come in turn.