TWO IN THE CAMPAGNA
[1855.]

I WONDER do you feel to-day

As I have felt, since, hand in hand,
We sat down on the grass, to stray
In spirit better through the land,
This morn of Rome and May?

For me, I touched a thought, I know,
Has tantalized me many times.
(Like turns of thread the spiders throw
Mocking across our path) for rhymes
To catch at and let go.

Help me to hold it! First it left

The yellowing fennel, run to seed There, branching from the brickwork's cleft,

Some old tomb's ruin; yonder weed Took up the floating weft,

Among the honey-meal: and last,
Everywhere on the grassy slope
I traced it. Hold it fast!

The champaign with its endless fleece
Of feathery grasses everywhere!
Silence and passion, joy and peace,
An everlasting wash of air-
Rome's ghost since her decease.

Such life there, through such lengths of hours,

Such miracles performed in play,
Such primal naked forms of flowers,
Such letting Nature have her way
While Heaven looks from its towers!

How say you? Let us, O my dove,
Let us be unashamed of soul,

As earth lies bare to heaven above!
How is it under our control
To love or not to love?

I would that you were all to me,
You that are just so much, no more.
Nor yours, nor mine, nor slave nor free!
Where does the fault lie? what the core
Of the wound, since wound must be?

I would I could adopt your will,
See with your eyes, and set my heart
Beating by yours, and drink my fill

At your soul's springs, - your part, my part

In life, for good and ill.

No. I yearn upward, touch you close, Then stand away. I kiss your cheek, Catch your soul's warmth, I pluck the

rose

And love it more than tongue can speak— Then the good minute goes.

Already how am I so far

Out of that minute? Must I go Still like the thistle-ball, no bar,

Onward, whenever light winds blow,
Fixed by no friendly star?

Just when I seemed about to learn!
Where is the thread now? Off again!
The old trick! Only I discern
Infinite passion, and the pain
of finite hearts that yearn.

MISCONCEPTIONS
[1855.]

THIS is a spray the Bird clung to,
Making it blossom with pleasure,
Ere the high tree-top she sprung to,
Fit for her nest and her treasure.
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!

This is a 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!

A SERENADE AT THE VILLA

[1855.]

THAT was I, you heard last night
When there rose no moon at all,
Nor, to pierce the strained and tight
Tent of heaven, a planet small:
Life was dead, and so was light.

Not a twinkle from the fly,

Not a glimmer from the worm. When the crickets stopped their cry, When the owls forbore a term, You heard music; that was I. Earth turned in her sleep with pain, Sultrily suspired for proof: In at heaven and out again,

Lightning! where it broke the roof, Bloodlike, some few drops of rain.

What they could my words expressed, O my Love, my All, my One! Singing helped the verses best,

And when singing's best was done,
To my lute I left the rest.

So wore night; the East was grey,
White the broad-faced hemlock-flowers;
There would be another day;

Ere its first of heavy hours

Found me, I had passed away.

What became of all the hopes,

Words and song and lute as well?

Say, this struck you- 'When life gropes Feebly for the path where fell

Light last on the evening slopes,

'One friend in that path shall be

To secure my steps from wrong: One to count night day for me.

Patient through the watches long, Serving most with none to see.'

Never say -as something bodes -
'So, the worst has yet a worse!
When life halts 'neath double loads,
Better the taskmaster's curse
Than such music on the roads!

ONE WAY OF LOVE
[1855.]

ALL June I bound the rose in sheaves.
Now, rose by rose, I strip the leaves
And strew them where Pauline may pass.
She will not turn aside? Alas!
Let them lie. Suppose they die?
The chance was they might take her eye.

How many a month I strove to suit
These stubborn fingers to the lute!
To-day I venture all I know.
She will not hear my music? So!
Break the string; fold music's wing:
Suppose Pauline had bade me sing!

My whole life long I learned to love.
This hour my utmost art I prove
And speak my passion. Heaven or Hell?
She will not give me Heaven? 'Tis well!
Lose who may I still can say,
Those who win Heaven, blest are they!

ANOTHER WAY OF LOVE
[1855.]

JUNE was not over,

Though past the full,

And the best of her roses
Had yet to blow,

When a man I know
(But shall not discover,

Since ears are dull,
And time discloses)

Turned him and said with a man's true air,
Half sighing a smile in a yawn, as 't were-
If I tire of your June, will she greatly
care?'

While I am I, and you are you,

So long as the world contains us both, Me the loving and you the loath,

While the one eludes, must the other pursue.

My life is a fault at last, I fear:

It seems too much like a fate, indeed! Though I do my best I shall scarce succeed.

But what if I fail of my purpose here?
It is but to keep the nerves at strain,

To dry one's eyes and laugh at a fall, And baffled, get up and begin again,

So the chase takes up one's life, that's all. While, look but once from your farthest bound

At me so deep in the dust and dark, No sooner the old hope goes to ground Than a new one, straight to the selfsame mark,

I shape me— Ever Removed!