Oh pleasant is the gaze of life
And sad is death's blind head;
But awful are the living eyes

In the face of one thought dead!

'In God's name, Janet, is it me
Thy ghost has come to seek?'
'Nay, wait another hour, Lord Sands, -
Be sure my ghost shall speak.'

A moment stood he as a stone,
Then grovelled to his knee.
'O Janet, O my love, my love,

Rise up and come with me!'
'O once before you bade me come,

And it's here you have brought me!

'O many's the sweet word, Lord Sands,
You've spoken oft to me;

But all that I have from you to-day
Is the rain on my body.

'And many's the good gift, Lord Sands, You've promised oft to me;

But the gift of yours I keep to-day
Is the babe in my body.

'O it's not in any earthly bed
That first my babe I'll see;
For I have brought my body here
That the flood may cover me.'

His face was close against her face,
His hands of hers were fain:

O her wet cheeks were hot with tears,
Her wet hands cold with rain.

'They told me you were dead, Janet,
How could I guess the lie?'
'They told me you were false, Lord Sands,
What could I do but die?'

'Now keep you well, my brother Giles,
Through you I deemed her dead!
As wan as your towers be to-day,
To-morrow they'll be red.

'Look down, look down, my false mother,
That bade me not to grieve:
You'll look up when our marriage fires
Are lit to-morrow eve.

'O more than one and more than two
The sorrow of this shall see:
But it's to-morrow, love, for them,
To-day's for thee and me.'

He's drawn her face between his hands
And her pale mouth to his :
No bird that was so still that day
Chirps sweeter than his kiss.

The flood was creeping round their feet. 'O Janet, come away!

The hall is warm for the marriage-rite,
The bed for the birthday.'

He's wrapped her in a green mantle
And set her softly in;

Her hair was wet upon her face,

Her face was gray and thin;
And 'Oh!' she said, 'lie still, my babe,
It's out you must not win!'

But woe's my heart for Father John!
As hard as he might pray,
There seemed no help but Noah's ark
Or Jonah's fish that day.

The first strokes that the oars struck
Were over the broad leas;
The next strokes that the oars struck
They pushed beneath the trees;

The last stroke that the oars struck,
The good boat's head was met,
And there the gate of the kirkyard
Stood like a ferry-gate.

He's set his hand upon the bar

And lightly leaped within :
He's lifted her to his left shoulder,
Her knees beside his chin.

The graves lay deep beneath the flood
Under the rain alone;

And when the foot-stone made him slip,
He held by the head-stone.

The empty boat thrawed i' the wind,
Against the postern tied.

'Hold still, you've brought my love with

me,

You shall take back my bride.'

But woe's my heart for Father John
And the saints he clamored to!
There's never a saint but Christopher

Might hale such buttocks through!

And 'Oh!' she said, 'on men's shoulders
I well had thought to wend,
And well to travel with a priest,

But not to have cared or ken'd.

'And oh!' she said, 'it's well this way
That I thought to have fared, -
Not to have lighted at the kirk
But stopped in the kirkyard.

'For it's oh and oh I prayed to God,
Whose rest I hoped to win.
That when to-night at your board-head
You'd bid the feast begin,
This water past your window-sill
Might bear my body in.'

Now make the white bed warm and soft
And greet the merry morn.

The night the mother should have died The young son shall be born.

THE CARD-DEALER

[Composed 1819. Published 1852.]

COULD you not drink her gaze like wine? Yet though its splendor swoon

Into the silence languidly

As a tune into a tune,

Those eyes unravel the coiled night

And know the stars at noon.

The gold that's heaped beside her hand, In truth rich prize it were;

And rich the dreams that wreathe her brows

With magic stillness there;
And he were rich who should unwind
That woven golden hair.

Around her, where she sits, the dance
Now breathes its eager heat;
And not more lightly or more true
Fall there the dancers' feet
Than fall her cards on the bright board
As 'twere an heart that beat.

Her fingers let them softly through,
Smooth polished silent things;
And each one as it falls reflects
In swift light-shadowings,

Blood-red and purple, green and blue,
The great eyes of her rings.

Whom plays she with? With thee, who lov'st

Those gems upon her hand;

With me, who search her secret brows;
With all men, bless'd or bann'd.
We play together, she and we,
Within a vain strange land:

A land without any order,-
Day even as night, (one saith,)
Where who lieth down ariseth not
Nor the sleeper awakeneth;

A land of darkness as darkness itself
And of the shadow of death.

What be her cards, you ask? Even these:-
The heart, that doth but crave
More, having fed; the diamond,

Skilled to make base seem brave;
The club, for smiting in the dark;
The spade, to dig a grave.

And do you ask what game she plays?
With me 'tis lost or won;
With thee it is playing still; with him
It is not well begun;

But 'tis a game she plays with all
Beneath the sway o' the sun.

Thou seest the card that falls, she knows
The card that followeth :

Her game in thy tongue is called Life,
As ebbs thy daily breath:

When she shall speak, thou'lt learn her

tongue

And know she calls it Death.

MY SISTER'S SLEEP
[Composed 1847-49.- Published 1850.]

SHE fell asleep on Christmas Eve:
At length the long-ungranted shade
Of weary eyelids overweigh'd
The pain nought else might yet relieve.

Our mother, who had leaned all day

Over the bed from chime to chime, Then raised herself for the first time, And as she sat her down, did pray.

Her little work-table was spread

With work to finish. For the glare Made by her candle, she had care To work some distance from the bed.

Without there was a cold moon up,
Of winter radiance sheer and thin;
The hollow halo it was in
Was like an icy crystal cup.

Through the small room, with subtle sound
Of flame, by vents the fireshine drove
And reddened. In its dim alcove
The mirror shed a clearness round.

I had been sitting up some nights,
And my tired mind felt weak and blank;
Like a sharp strengthening wine it drank
The stillness and the broken lights.

Twelve struck. That sound, by dwindling

years

Heard in each hour, crept off; and then The ruffled silence spread again,

Like water that a pebble stirs.

Our mother rose from where she sat :
Her needles, as she laid them down,
Met lightly, and her silken gown
Settled: no other noise than that.

'Glory unto the Newly Born!'

So, as said angels, she did say; Because we were in Christmas Day, Though it would still be long till morn.

Just then in the room over us

There was a pushing back of chairs,
As some who had sat unawares
So late, now heard the hour, and rose.

With anxious softly-stepping haste

Our mother went where Margaret lay, Fearing the sounds o'er head - should they

Have broken her long watched-for rest!
She stooped an instant, calm, and turned;
But suddenly turned back again;
And all her features seemed in pain
With woe, and her eyes gazed and yearned.

For my part, I but hid my face,

And held my breath, and spoke no word: There was none spoken; but I heard The silence for a little space.

Our mother bowed herself and wept:

And both my arms fell, and I said, 'God knows I knew that she was dead.' And there, all white, my sister slept.

Then kneeling upon Christmas morn
A little after twelve o'clock

We said, ere the first quarter struck, 'Christ's blessing on the newly born!'

THE BALLAD OF DEAD LADIES (From François Villon) [Composed 1869. - Published 1869.] TELL me now in what hidden way is Lady Flora the lovely Roman? Where's Hipparchia, and where is Thais, Neither of them the fairer woman? Where is Echo, beheld of no man, Only heard on river and mere,

She whose beauty was more than human? ..

But where are the snows of yester-year?

Where's Héloise, the learned nun,

For whose sake Abeillard, I ween, Lost manhood and put priesthood on? (From Love he won such dule and teen!) And where, I pray you, is the Queen Who willed that Buridan should steer Sewed in a sack's mouth down the Seine?

But where are the snows of yester-year? White Queen Blanche, like a queen of lilies, With a voice like any mermaiden, Bertha Broadfoot, Beatrice, Alice,

And Ermengarde the lady of Maine, And that good Joan whom Englishmen At Rouen doomed and burned her there, Mother of God, where are they then? But where are the snows of yester-year? Nay, never ask this week, fair lord,

Where they are gone, nor yet this year, Except with this for an overword, But where are the snows of yester-year?

LOVE-LILY

[Composed 1869. Published 1870.] BETWEEN the hands, between the brows, Between the lips of Love-Lily,

A spirit is born whose birth endows
My blood with fire to burn through me;
Who breathes upon my gazing eyes,

Who laughs and murmurs in mine ear,
At whose least touch my color flies,
And whom my life grows faint to hear.
Within the voice, within the heart,

Within the mind of Love-Lily, A spirit is born who lifts apart

His tremulous wings and looks at me; Who on my mouth his finger lays,

And shows, while whispering lutes confer,

That Eden of Love's watered ways

Whose winds and spirits worship her. Brows, hands, and lips, heart, mind, and voice,

Kisses and words of Love-Lily, Oh! bid me with your joy rejoice

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 loves restore
In death's despite,

And day and night yield one delight once more?

A LITTLE WHILE

[Composed 1859. Published 1870.]

A LITTLE while a little love

The hour yet bears for thee and me
Who have not drawn the veil to see
If still our heaven be lit above.
Thou merely, at the day's last sigh,

Hast felt thy soul prolong the tone;
And I have heard the night-wind cry

And deemed its speech mine own.

A little while a little love

The scattering autumn hoards for us
Whose bower is not yet ruinous
Nor quite unleaved our songless grove.
Only across the shaken boughs

We hear the flood-tides seek the sea,
And deep in both our hearts they rouse
One wail for thee and me.

A little while a little love

May yet be ours who have not said
The word it makes our eyes afraid
To know that each is thinking of.
Not yet the end: be our lips dumb
In smiles a little season yet:
I'll tell thee, when the end is come,
How we may best forget.

PENUMBRA

[Composed 1853. Published 1870.]

I DID not look upon her eyes,
(Though scarcely seen, with no surprise,
'Mid many eyes a single look,)
Because they should not gaze rebuke,
At night, from stars in sky and brook.

I did not take her by the hand,
(Though little was to understand
From touch of hand all friends might take,)
Because it should not prove a flake
Burnt in my palm to boil and ache.

I did not listen to her voice.
(Though none had noted, where at choice
All might rejoice in listening.)
Because no such a thing should cling
In the wood's moan at evening.

THE HONEYSUCKLE
[Composed 1853. Published 1870.]

I PLUCKED a honeysuckle where
The hedge on high is quick with thorn,
And climbing for the prize, was torn,
And fouled my feet in quag-water;
And by the thorns and by the wind
The blossom that I took was thinn'd,
And yet I found it sweet and fair.

Thence to a richer growth I came,
Where, nursed in mellow intercourse,
The honeysuckles sprang by scores,
Not harried like my single stem,
All virgin lamps of scent and dew.
So from my hand that first I threw,
Yet plucked not any more of them.

THE SEA-LIMITS

[Composed 1845. Published 1870.]

CONSIDER the sea's listless chime:
Time's self it is, made audible,
The murmur of the earth's own shell.
Secret continuance sublime

Is the sea's end: our sight may pass No furlong further. Since time was, This sound hath told the lapse of time.

No quiet, which is death's, it hath
The mournfulness of ancient life,
Enduring always at dull strife.

As the world's heart of rest and wrath,
Its painful pulse is in the sands.
Last utterly, the whole sky stands,
Gray and not known, along its path.
Listen alone beside the sea,

Listen alone among the woods;
Those voices of twin solitudes
Shall have one sound alike to thee:

Hark where the murmurs of thronged