For a long march rudely caparisoned;
And at its side a gentle mountaineer,
Who to their grief lent neither eye nor ear.
'Hear me once more, Olympia! Must we part?
Is Heaven so stern, and can a gentle breast
Inflict, and sooth endure so keen a smart,
When pity's voice could lull our pain to rest?
Is there no common Eden of the heart,
Where each fond bosom is a welcome guest?
No comprehensive Paradise, to hold
All loving souls in one celestial fold?
'For Love is older far than all the Gods,
And will survive both Gods and men, and be
The sovran ruler still, when Nature nods,
And the scared stars through misty chaos flee.
Take love away, and we are brutish clods,
Blind, spelling out our fate without the key;
Belated wanderers stumbling through the night,
Cheered by no gleam of home or hope in sight.
'But they who in this cold contentious sphere
Deep in their hearts foster Love's vestal fire,
Can smile at pain, and all that mortals fear,
And tranquil keep when time and death conspire.
Though fickle winds should vex, they do not veer;
No threats can daunt them, weary waitings tire;
Their feet are planted on the clouds; their eyes,
Glare cannot blind, scan the eternal skies.
'This is my creed, and that the Heaven I seek,
Which even here, Olympia! may be ours,
Unless my lips, or else thine ears be weak,
Or we have outraged the Supernal Powers.
Oh! but that cannot be. Would Nature wreak
Her wrath on thee, the tenderest of her flowers?
The sin, if sin there be, is mine, is mine;
Wrong never was, can pain be ever, thine?
'Here 'twixt the mountains and the sea I swear,
That I thy Faith will reverence as thy soul,
And as on that bright morning when thy fair,
Entrancing form upon my senses stole,
Still every dewy dawn fresh gifts will bear
Unto Madonna's shrine, that happy goal
Where our first journey ended, and I fain
Would have this end, not snapped, as now, in pain!'
The foam-fringe at their feet was not more white
Than her pale cheek as, downcast, she replied:
'No, Godfrid! no! Farewell, farewell! You might
Have been my star; a star once fell by pride;
But since you furl your wings, and veil your light,
I cling to Mary and Christ crucified.
Leave me, nay leave me, ere it be too late!
Better part here than part at Heaven's gate!'
Thereat he kissed her forehead, she his hand,
And on the mule he mounted her, and then,
Along the road that skirts the devious strand,
Watched her, until she vanished from his ken.
Tears vainly dropped as water upon sand
Or words of grace on hearts of hardened men,
Coursed down her cheeks, while, half her grief divined,
The mountain guide walked sadly mute behind.
But never more as in the simple days
When prayer was all her thought, her heart shall be;
For she is burdened with the grief that stays,
And by a shadow vexed that will not flee.
Pure, but not spared, she passes from our gaze,
Victim, not vanquisher of Love. And he?
Once more a traveller o'er land and main:
Ah! Life is sad, and scarcely worth the pain!
THE DEATH OF GODFRID AND OLYMPIA.
Too few to guard each passage, and thus ta'en
In rear and flank, the rebel band faced round,
Their one sole thought to slay before being slain,
And with lowered points fired blank across the ground,
At foes that, blind as they, flashed deadly rain
Direct on all their level barrels found
Standing erect; and, when these fell, to glut
Ire too soon fed, made mangled mounds their butt.
And Godfrid had but time, at last!-to fling
His arms around the form he had loved so well,
Thinking to save, and she to him to cling,
When, 'twixt the madness of the two they fell:
He pierced by ball that fought for faiths of old,
She by their shafts who 'gainst old faiths rebel;
Albeit so close was this their first, last troth,
One well-aimed bullet would have served for both.
Thus were they found, when, rummaging among
Mixed heaps of slain, the victors came to save
The corpses of their brethren, ere was flung
The refuse in one contumelious grave.
And seeing that one who wore Christ's habit, clung,
Even in death, to form so worldly brave,
They touched them not, but prayed that priest or nun
Would come and say what meet 't were to be done.
Then quickly from the Convent thither sped
The reverend mother, with two daughters dear;
Who, when she saw this bridal of the dead,
Weeping, commanded, 'Put them on one bier,
And bear them after me with gentle tread.'
And straight she sent for him who many a year
To them had been Heaven's helpmate in that place,
A venerable man, with prayer-lit face.
To him, in hearing of them all, she told
The story she herself had learnt when first,
Six brief weeks gone, Olympia joined their fold,
And next, how Godfrid, aiding her, had nursed
The wounded she with deeper balm consoled;
But from their ears withholding not the worst,
His strange sad unbelief, which still had kept
The pair apart, till one in death they slept.
The agèd pastor, thus wise as she spake,
In silence listened, and then slowly said:
'My children! These two souls, for Truth's pure sake, Divided were, since Faith, in him, was dead.
Who knows? Perchance it did in death awake:
And 't was to save the lost Christ breathed and bled.
Doubt watered by such prayers must somewhere bud;
And see! he hath the baptism of blood.
'Therefore I dare not say Christ vainly died
Even for him. And since the twain would lie,
Methinks at Spiaggiascura side by side,
Heaven will not earth's infirmity deny.
So let us there one grave for both provide,
In consecrated ground beneath the sky.
She needs no epitaph; so let his plea,
Dilexit multum, sole inscription be!'
LOVE, will thou love me still when wintry streak
Steals on the tresses of autumnal brow;
When the pale rose hath perished in my cheek,
And those are wrinkles that are dimples now?
Wilt thou, when this fond arm that here I twine
Round thy dear neck to help thee in thy need,
Droops faint and feeble, and hath need of thine,
Be then my prop, and not a broken reed?
When thou canst only glean along the Past,
And garner in thy heart what Time doth leave,
O, wilt thou then to me, love, cling as fast
As nest of April to December eave;
And, while my beauty dwindles and decays,
Still warm thee by the embers of my gaze?
COME, let us go into the lane, love mine,
And mark and gather what the Autumn grows:
The creamy elder mellowed into wine,
The russet hip that was the pink-white rose;
The amber woodbine into rubies turned,
The blackberry that was the bramble born;
Nor let the seeded clematis be spurned,
Nor pearls, that now are corals, of the thorn.
Look! what a lovely posy we have made
From the wild garden of the waning year.
So when, dear love, your summer is decayed,
Beauty more touching than is clustered here
Will linger in your life, and I shall cling
Closely as now, nor ask if it be Spring.
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