And still they strove and wrangled: and she grieved "Then I fixt My wistful eyes on two fair images, Both crown'd with stars and high among the stars, - -- Clung to the mother, and sent out a cry dreams? Yours came but from the breaking of a glass, "Child? No!" said he, "but this tide's roar, and his, Our Boanerges with his threats of doom, Went both to make your dream: but if there were Sphere-music such as that you dream'd about, One shriek of hate would jar all the hymns of heaven: True Devils with no ear, they howl in tune With nothing but the Devil!" "True' indeed! One of our town, but later by an hour Here than ourselves, spoke with me on the shore; While you were running down the sands, and made The dimpled flounce of the sea-furbelow flap, Good man, to please the child. She brought strange news. Why were you silent when I spoke to-night? "Dead! who is dead ?" "The man your eye pursued. A little after you had parted with him, He suddenly dropt dead of heart-disease." "Dead? he? of heart-disease? what heart had he To die of? dead!" "Ah, dearest, if there be A devil in man, there is an angel too, And if he did that wrong you charge him with, Saying this, The woman half turn'd round from him she loved, VOL. II. What does little birdie say 13 Birdie, rest a little longer, What does little baby say, "She sleeps: let us too, let all evil, sleep. Then the man, "His deeds yet live, the worst is yet to come. Yet let your sleep for this one night be sound: I do forgive him f” "Thanks, my love," she said, "Your own will be the sweeter," and they slept. TITHONUS. THE Woods decay, the woods decay and fall, Consumes I wither slowly in thine arms, A white-hair'd shadow roaming like a dream Far-folded mists, and gleaming halls of morn. Alas! for this gray shadow, once a man Then didst thou grant mine asking with a smile, And all I was, in ashes. Can thy love, Where all should pause, as is most meet for all? A soft air fans the cloud apart; there comes A glimpse of that dark world where I was born. Once more the old mysterious glimmer steals From thy pure brows, and from thy shoulders pure, And bosom beating with a heart renew'd. Thy cheek begins to redden thro' the gloom, Thy sweet eyes brighten slowly close to mine, Ere yet they blind the stars, and the wild team Which love thee, yearning for thy yoke, arise, And shake the darkness from their loosen'd manes, And beat the twilight into flakes of fire. Lo! ever thus thou growest beautiful In silence, then before thine answer given Why wilt thou ever scare me with thy tears, Ay me! ay me! with what another heart In days far-off, and with what other eyes I used to watch - - if I be he that watch'dThe lucid outline forming round thee; saw The dim curls kindle into sunny rings; Changed with thy mystic change, and felt my blood Glow with the glow that slowly crimson'd all Thy presence and thy portals, while I lay, Mouth, forehead, eyelids, growing dewy-warm With kisses balmier than half-opening buds Of April, and could hear the lips that kiss'd Whispering I knew not what of wild and sweet, Like that strange song I heard Apollo sing, While Ilion like a mist rose into towers. Yet hold me not forever in thine East: How can my nature longer mix with thine? Coldly thy rosy shadows bathe me, cold Are all thy lights, and cold my wrinkled feet Upon thy glimmering thresholds, when the steam Floats up from those dim fields about the homes Of happy men that have the power to die, And grassy barrows of the happier dead. Release me, and restore me to the ground; Thou seest all things, thou wilt see my grave: Thou wilt renew thy beauty morn by morn; I earth in earth forget these empty courts, And thee returning on thy silver wheels. |