I SUDDEN LIGHT. HAVE been here before, But when or how I cannot tell : I know the grass beyond the door, The sweet keen smell, The sighing sound, the lights around the shore. You have been mine before,— How long ago I may not know: But just when at that swallow's soar Your neck turned so, Some veil did fall,-I knew it all of yore. Has this been thus before? And shall not thus time's eddying flight Still with our lives our love restore In death's despite, And day and night yield one delight once more? DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI. MADE another garden, yea, I left the dead rose where it lay Why did the summer not begin? She entered with her weary smile, She looked around a little while, And shivered at the cold. Her passing touch was death to all, And turned the red rose white. Her pale robe, clinging to the grass, That bit the grass and ground, alas! She went up slowly to the gate; She turned back at the last to wait, And say farewell once more. ARTHUR O'SHAUGHNESSY. H! were I rich and mighty, I wonder, could I bear To leave you pining there? Or, if I were an angel, Or, dear, if I were only Would know no pain or smart ? LEWIS MORRIS. MISCONCEPTIONS. I. HIS is a spray the Bird clung to, Oh, what a hope beyond measure Was the poor spray's, which the flying feet hung to,So to be singled out, built in, and sung to! II. This is the heart the Queen leant on, Thrilled in a minute erratic, Ere the true bosom she bent on, Meet for love's regal dalmatic, Oh what a fancy ecstatic Was the poor heart's, ere the wanderer went on,— Love to be saved for it, proffered to, spent on! ROBERT BROWNING. |