Sonnets and Lyrics

Primavera Mia

As kings who see their little life-day pass, Take off the heavy ermine and the crown, So had the trees that autumn-time laid down Their golden garments on the faded grass, When I, who watched the seasons in the glass Of mine own thoughts, saw all the autumn's brown Leap into life and don a sunny gown Of leafage such as happy April has. Great spring came singing upward from the south; For in my heart, far carried on the wind, Your words like winged seeds took root and grew, And all the world caught music from your mouth; I saw the light as one who had been blind, And knew my sun and song and spring were you.

Soul's Birth

When you were born, beloved, was your soul New made by God to match your body's flower, And were they both at one same precious hour Sent forth from heaven as a perfect whole? Or had your soul since dim creation burned, A star in some still region of the sky, That leaping earthward, left its place on high And to your little new-born body yearned? No words can tell in what celestial hour God made your soul and gave it mortal birth, Nor in the disarray of all the stars Is any place so sweet that

such a flower Might linger there until thro' heaven's bars, It heard God's voice that bade it down to earth.

Love and Death

Shall we, too, rise forgetful from our sleep, And shall my soul that lies within your hand Remember nothing, as the blowing sand Forgets the palm where long blue shadows creep When winds along the darkened desert sweep? Or would it still remember, tho' it spanned A thousand heavens, while the planets fanned The vacant ether with their voices deep? Soul of my soul, no word shall be forgot, Nor yet alone, beloved, shall we see The desolation of extinguished suns, Nor fear the void wherethro' our planet runs, For still together shall we go and not Fare forth alone to front eternity.

For the Anniversary of John Keats' Death

(February 23, 1821)

At midnight when the moonlit cypress trees Have woven round his grave a magic shade, Still weeping the unfinished hymn he made, There moves fresh Maia like a morning breeze Blown over jonquil beds when warm rains cease. And stooping where her poet's head is laid, Selene weeps while all the tides are stayed And swaying seas are darkened into peace. But they who wake the meadows and the tides Have hearts too kind to bid him wake from sleep Who murmurs sometimes when his dreams are deep, Startling the Quiet Land where he abides, And charming still, sad- eyed Persephone With visions of the sunny earth and sea.

Silence

(To Eleonora Duse)

We are anhungered after solitude, Deep stillness pure of any speech or sound, Soft quiet hovering over pools profound, The silences that on the desert brood, Above a windless hush of empty seas, The broad unfurling banners of the dawn, A faery forest where there sleeps a Faun; Our souls are fain of solitudes like these. O woman who divined our weariness, And set the crown of silence on your art, From what undreamed-of depth within your heart Have you sent forth the hush that makes us free To hear an instant, high above earth's stress, The silent music of infinity?

The Return

I turned the key and opened wide the door To enter my deserted room again, Where thro' the long hot months the dust had lain. Was it not lonely when across the floor No step was heard, no sudden song that bore My whole heart upward with a joyous pain? Were not the pictures and the volumes fain To have me with them always as before? But Giorgione's Venus did not deign To lift her lids, nor did the subtle smile Of Mona Lisa deepen.Madeleine Still wept against the glory of her hair, Nor did the lovers part their lips the while, But kissed unheeding that I watched them there.

Fear

I am afraid, oh I am so afraid! The cold black fear is clutching me to- night As long ago when they would take the light And leave the little child

who would have prayed, Frozen and sleepless at the thought of death. My heart that beats too fast will rest too soon; I shall not know if it be night or noon, -- Yet shall I struggle in the dark for breath? Will no one fight the Terror for my sake, The heavy darkness that no dawn will break? How can they leave me in that dark alone, Who loved the joy of light and warmth so much, And thrilled so with the sense of sound and touch, -- How can they shut me underneath a stone?

Anadyomene

The wide, bright temple of the world I found, And entered from the dizzy infinite That I might kneel and worship thee in it; Leaving the singing stars their ceaseless round Of silver music sound on orbed sound, For measured spaces where the shrines are lit, And men with wisdom or with little wit Implore the gods that mercy may abound. Ah, Aphrodite, was it not from thee My summons came across the endless spaces? Mother of Love, turn not thy face from me Now that I seek for thee in human faces; Answer my prayer or set my spirit free Again to drift along the starry places.

Galahad in the Castle of the Maidens

(To the maiden with the hidden face in Abbey's painting)

The other maidens raised their eyes to him Who stumbled in before them when the fight Had left him victor, with a victor's right. I think his eyes with quick hot tears grew dim; He scarcely saw her swaying white and slim, And trembling slightly, dreaming of his might, Nor knew he touched her hand, as strangely light As a wan wraith's beside a river's rim. The other maidens raised their eyes to see And only she has hid her face

away, And yet I ween she loved him more than they, And very fairly fashioned was her face. Yet for Love's shame and sweet humility, She dared not meet him with their queenlike grace.

To an Aeolian Harp

The winds have grown articulate in thee, And voiced again the wail of ancient woe That smote upon the winds of long ago: The cries of Trojan women as they flee, The quivering moan of pale Andromache, Now lifted loud with pain and now brought low. It is the soul of sorrow that we know, As in a shell the soul of all the sea. So sometimes in the compass of a song, Unknown to him who sings, thro' lips that live, The voiceless dead of long-forgotten lands Proclaim to us their heaviness and wrong In sweeping sadness of the winds that give Thy strings no rest from weariless wild hands.

To Erinna

Was Time not harsh to you, or was he kind, O pale Erinna of the perfect lyre, That he has left no word of singing fire Whereby you waked the dreaming Lesbian wind, And kindled night along the lyric shore? O girl whose lips Erato stooped to kiss, Do you go sorrowing because of this In fields where poets sing forevermore? Or are you glad and is it best to be A silent music men have never heard, A dream in all our souls that we may say: "Her voice had all the rapture of the sea, And all the clear cool quiver of a bird Deep in a forest at the break of day"?

To Cleis

"I have a fair daughter with a form like a golden flower,Cleis, the beloved." Sapphic fragment.

When the dusk was wet with dew,Cleis, did the muses nineListen in a silent line While your mother sang to you?

Did they weep or did they smileWhen she crooned to still your cries,She, a muse in human guise, Who forsook her lyre awhile?

Did you feel her wild heart beat?Did the warmth of all the sunThro' your little body run When she kissed your hands and feet?

Did your fingers, babywise,Touch her face and touch her hair,Did you think your mother fair, Could you bear her burning eyes?

Are the songs that soothed your fearsVanished like a vanished flame,Save the line where shines your name Starlike down the graying years?

Cleis speaks no word to me,For the land where she has goneLieth mute at dusk and dawn Like a windless tideless sea.

Paris in Spring

The city's all a-shiningBeneath a fickle sun, A gay young wind's a- blowing,The little shower is done. But the rain-drops still are clingingAnd falling one by one -- Oh it's Paris, it's Paris,And spring-time has begun.

I know the Bois is twinklingIn a sort of hazy sheen, And down the Champs the gray old archStands cold and still between. But the walk is flecked with sunlightWhere the great acacias lean, Oh it's Paris, it's Paris,And the leaves are growing green.

The sun's gone in, the sparkle's dead,There falls a dash of rain, But who would care when such an airComes blowing up the Seine? And still Ninette sits sewingBeside her window-pane, When it's Paris, it's Paris,And

spring-time's come again.

Madeira from the Sea

Out of the delicate dream of the distance an emerald emerges Veiled in the violet folds of the air of the sea; Softly the dream grows awakening -- shimmering white of a city, Splashes of crimson, the gay bougainvillea, the palms. High in the infinite blue of its heaven a quiet cloud lingers, Lost and forgotten of winds that have fallen asleep, Fallen asleep to the tune of a Portuguese song in a garden.

City Vignettes

1. Dawn

The greenish sky glows up in misty reds,The purple shadows turn to brick and stone, The dreams wear thin, men turn upon their beds,And hear the milk-cart jangle by alone.

1. Dusk

The city's street, a roaring blackened streamWalled in by granite, thro' whose thousand eyes A thousand yellow lights begin to gleam,And over all the pale untroubled skies.

1. Rain at Night

The street-lamps shine in a yellow lineDown the splashy, gleaming street, And the rain is heard now loud now blurredBy the tread of homing feet.

By the Sea

Beside an ebbing northern sea While stars awaken one by one, We walk together, I and he.

He woos me with an easy grace That proves him only half sincere; A light smile flickers on his face.

To him love-making is an art, And as a flutist plays a flute, So does he play upon his heart

A music varied to his whim. He has no use for love of mine, He would not have me answer him.

To hide my eyes within the night I watch the changeful lighthouse gleam Alternately with red and white.

My laughter smites upon my ears, So one who cries and wakes from sleep Knows not it is himself he hears.

What if my voice should let him know The mocking words were all a sham, And lips that laugh could tremble so?

What if I lost the power to lie, And he should only hear his name In one low, broken cry?

On the Death of Swinburne

He trod the earth but yesterday, And now he treads the stars.He left us in the April timeHe praised so often in his rhyme, He left the singing and the lyre and went his way.

He drew new music from our tongue, A music subtly wrought,And moulded words to his desire,As wind doth mould a wave of fire; From strangely fashioned harps slow golden tones he wrung.

1. think the singing understands That he who sang is still,And Iseult

   cries that he is dead, --Does not Dolores bow her head And Fragoletta weep and wring her little hands?

New singing now the singer hears To lyre and lute and harp;Catullus waits to welcome him,And thro' the twilight sweet and dim, Sappho's forgotten songs are falling on his ears.

Triolets

I

Love looked back as he took his flight,And lo, his eyes were filled with tears. Was it for love of lost delight Love looked back as he took his flight? Only I know while day grew night,Turning still to the vanished years, Love looked back as he took his flight,And lo, his eyes were filled with tears.

1. (Written in a copy of "La Vita Nuova".For M. C. S.)

If you were Lady BeatriceAnd I the Florentine, I'd never waste my time like this -- If you were Lady Beatrice I'd woo and then demand a kiss,Nor weep like Dante here, I ween, If you were Lady BeatriceAnd I the Florentine.

1. (Written in a copy of "The Poems of Sappho".)

Beyond the dim Hesperides,The girl who sang them long ago Could never dream that over seas, Beyond the dim Hesperides, The wind would blow such songs as these --I wonder now if she can know, Beyond the dim Hesperides,The girl who sang them long ago?

IV

Dead leaves upon the streamAnd dead leaves on the air -- All of my lost hopes seem Dead leaves upon the stream; I watch them in a dream,Going I know not where, Dead leaves upon the streamAnd dead leaves on the air.

Vox Corporis

The beast to the beast is calling,And the soul bends down to wait; Like the stealthy lord of the jungle,The white man calls his mate.

The beast to the beast is calling,They rush through the twilight sweet, But the soul is a wary hunter,He will not let them meet.

A Ballad of Two Knights

Two knights rode forth at early dawnA-seeking maids to wed, Said one, "My lady must be fair,With gold hair on her head."

Then spake the other knight-at-arms:"I care not for her face, But she I love must be a doveFor purity and grace."

And each knight blew upon his hornAnd went his separate way, And each knight found a lady-loveBefore the fall of day.

But she was brown who should have hadThe shining yellow hair -- I ween the knights forgot their wordsOr else they ceased to care.

For he who wanted purityBrought home a wanton wild, And when each saw the other knightI ween that each knight smiled.

Christmas Carol

The kings they came from out the south,All dressed in ermine fine, They bore Him gold and chrysoprase,And gifts of precious wine.

The shepherds came from out the north,Their coats were brown and old, They brought Him little new-born lambs --They had not any gold.

The wise-men came from out the east,And they were wrapped in white; The star that led them all the wayDid glorify the night.

The angels came from heaven high,And they were clad with wings; And lo, they brought a joyful songThe host of heaven sings.

The kings they knocked upon the door,The wise-men entered in, The shepherds followed after themTo hear the song begin.

And Mary held the little childAnd sat upon the ground; She looked up, she looked down,She looked all around.

The angels sang thro' all the nightUntil the rising sun, But little Jesus fell asleepBefore the song was done.

The Faery Forest

The faery forest glimmeredBeneath an ivory moon, The silver grasses shimmeredAgainst a faery tune.

Beneath the silken silenceThe crystal branches slept, And dreaming thro' the dew-fallThe cold white blossoms wept.

A Fantasy

Her voice is like clear waterThat drips upon a stone In forests far and silentWhere Quiet plays alone.

Her thoughts are like the lotusAbloom by sacred streams Beneath the temple archesWhere Quiet sits and dreams.

Her kisses are the rosesThat glow while dusk is deep In Persian garden closesWhere Quiet falls asleep.

A Minuet of Mozart's

Across the dimly lighted roomThe violin drew wefts of sound,Airily they wove and wound And glimmered gold against the gloom.

I watched the music turn to light,But at the pausing of the bow,The web was broken and the glow Was drowned within the wave of night.

Twilight

Dreamily over the roofsThe cold spring rain is falling, Out in the lonely treeA bird is calling, calling.

Slowly over the earthThe wings of night are falling; My heart like the bird in the treeIs calling, calling, calling.

The Prayer

My answered prayer came up to me,And in the silence thus spake he: "O you who prayed for me to come,Your greeting is but cold and dumb."

My heart made answer:"You are fair,But I have prayed too long to care.

Why came you not when all was new,And I had died for joy of you."

Two Songs for a Child

I Grandfather's Love

They said he sent his love to me,They wouldn't put it in my hand, And when I asked them where it wasThey said I couldn't understand.

1. thought they must have hidden it,I hunted for it all the day, And

   when I told them so at nightThey smiled and turned their heads away.

They say that love is something kind,That I can never see or touch. I wish he'd sent me something else,I like his cough-drops twice as much.

1. The Kind Moon

I think the moon is very kindTo take such trouble just for me. He came along with me from homeTo keep me company.

He went as fast as I could run;I wonder how he crossed the sky? I'm sure he hasn't legs and feetOr any wings to fly.

Yet here he is above their roof;Perhaps he thinks it isn't right For me to go so far alone,Tho' mother said I might.

On the Tower

Under the leaf of many a Fable lies the Truth for those who look for it.

Jami.

On the Tower

(A play in one act.)

The Knight. The Lady.

Voices of men and women on the ground at the foot of the tower. The voice of the Knight's Page.

The top of a high battlemented tower of a castle.A stone ledge,which serves as a seat, extends part way around the parapet.Small clouds float by in the blue sky, and occasionally a swallow passes.Entrance R. from an unseen stairway which is supposed to extend aroundthe outside of the tower.

The Lady (unseen).Oh do not climb so fast, for I am faintWith looking down the tower to where the earthLies dreaming in the sun.I fear to fall.

The Knight (unseen).Lean on me, love, my love, and look not down.

L.Call me not "love", call me your conquered foe,That now, since you have battered down her gates,Gives you the keys that lock the highest towerAnd mounts with you to prove her homage true;Oh bid me go no farther lest I fall,My foot has slipped upon the rain-worn stones,Why are the stairs so narrow and so steep?Let us go back, my lord.

K.Are you afraid,Who were so dauntless till the walls gave

way?Courage, my sweet.I would that I could climbA thousand times by wind-swept stairs like these,That lead so near to heaven.

L.Sir, you may,You are a knight and very valorous;I am a woman.I shall never comeThis way but once.(The Knight and the Lady appear on the top of the tower.)

K.Kiss me at last, my love.

L.Oh, my sweet lord, I am too tired to kiss.Look how the earth is like an emerald,With rivers veined and flawed with fallow fields.

K.(Lifting her veil)Then I kiss you, a thousand thousand kissesFor all the days ere I had won to youBeyond the walls and gates you barred so close.Call me at last your love, your castle's lord.

L.(After a pause)I love you.

(She kisses him.Her veil blows away like a white butterflyover the parapet.Faint cries and laughter from men and womenunder the tower.)

Men and Women.The veil, the lady's veil! (The knight takes the lady in his arms.)

L.My lord, I pray you loose me from your armsLest that my people see how much we love.

K.May they not see us?All of them have loved.

L.But you have been an enemy, my lord,With walls between us and with moss-grown moats,Now on a sudden must I kiss your mouth?I who was taught before I learned to speakThat all my house was hostile unto yours,Now can I put my head against your breastHere in the sight of all who choose to come?

K.Are we not past the caring for their eyesAnd nearer to the heaven than to earth?Look up and see.

L.I only see your face.

(She touches his hair with her hands.Murmuring under the tower.)

K.Why came we here in all the noon-day lightWith only darting swallows over usTo make a speck of darkness on the sun?Let us go down where walls will shut us round.Your castle has a hundred quiet halls,A hundred chambers, where the shadows lieOn things put by, forgotten long ago.Forgotten lutes with strings that Time has slackened,We two shall

draw them close and bid them sing --Forgotten games, forgotten books still openWhere you had laid them by at vesper-time,And your embroidery, whereon half-workedWeeps Amor wounded by a rose's thorn.Shall I not see the room in which you slept,Palpitant still and breathing of your thoughts,Where maiden dreams adown the ways of sleepSwept noiselessly with damosels and knightsTo tourneys where the trumpet made no sound,Blow as he might, the scarlet trumpeter,And were the dreams not sometimes brimmed with tearsThat waked you when the night was loneliest?Will you not bring me to your oratoryWhere prayers arose like little birds set freeStill upward, upward without sound of flight?Shall I not find your turrets toward the north,Where you defied white winter armed for war;Your southern casements where the sun blows inBetween the leaf- bent boughs the wind has lifted?Shall we not see the sunrise toward the east,Watch dawn by dawn the rose of day unfoldingIts golden-hearted beauty sovereignly;And toward the west look quietly at evening?Shall I not see all these and all your treasures?In carven coffers hidden in the darkHave you not laid a sapphire lit with flameAnd amethysts set round with deep-wrought gold,Perhaps a ruby?

L.All my gems are yoursAnd all my chambers curtained from the sun.My lord shall see them all, in time, in time.

(The sun begins to sink.)

K.Shall I not see them now?To-day, to-night?

L.How could I show you in one day, my lord,My castle and my treasures and my tower?Let all the days to come suffice for thisSince all the past days made them what they are.You will not be impatient, my sweet lord.Some of the halls have long been locked and barred,And some have secret doors and hard to findTill suddenly you touch them unawares,And down a sable way runs silver light.We two will search together for the keys,But not to-day.Let us sit here to-day,Since all is yours and always will be yours.

(The stars appear faintly one by one.)

K.(After a pause.)I grow a little drowsy with the dusk.

L.(Singing.) There was a man that loved a maid, (Sleep and take your

rest) Over her lips his kiss was laid, Over her heart, his breast. (The knight sleeps.)

All of his vows were sweet to hear, Sweet was his kiss to take; Why was her breast so quick to fear, Why was her heart, to break?

Why was the man so glad to woo? (Sleep and take your rest) Why were the maiden's words so few ----

(She sees that he is asleep, and slipping off her long cloak-likeouter garment, she pillows his head upon it against the parapet,and half kneeling at his feet she sings very softly:)

I love you, I love you, I love you, I am the flower at your feet, The birds and the stars are above you, My place is more sweet.

The birds and the stars are above you, They envy the flower in the grass, For I, only I, while I love you Can die as you pass.

(Light clouds veil the stars, growing denser constantly.The castle bell rings for vespers, and rising, the lady movesto a corner of the parapet and kneels there.)

L.Ave Maria! gratia plena, Dominus ----

Voice of the Page (from the foot of the tower.)My lord, my lord, they call for you at court!

(The knight wakes.It is now quite dark.)

There is a tourney toward; your enemyHas challenged you.My lord, make haste to come!

(The knight rises and gropes his way toward the stairs.)

K.I will make haste.Await me where you are.

(To himself.)There was a lady on this tower with me ----

(He glances around hurriedly but does not see her in the darkness.) Page.My lord has far to ride before the dawn!

K.(To himself.)Why should I tarry?

(To the page.)Bring my horse and shield!

(He descends.As the noise of his footfall on the stairs dies away,the lady gropes toward the stairway, then turns suddenly, and going tothe ledge where they have sat, she throws herself over the parapet.)

CURTAIN.