Puslapio vaizdai
PDF
„ePub“

Ever the words of the gods resound;
But the porches of man's ear
Seldom in this low life's round
Are unsealed, that he may hear.

Wandering voices in the air,
And murmurs in the wold,
Speak what I cannot declare,
Yet cannot all withhold.

When the shadow fell on the lake,

The whirlwind in ripples wrote

Air-bells of fortune that shine and break, And omens above thought.

But the meanings cleave to the lake,
Cannot be carried in book or urn;
Go thy ways now, come later back,
On waves and hedges still they burn.

These the fates of men forecast,
Of better men than live to-day;
If who can read them comes at last
He will spell in the sculpture, Stay.'

MAIDEN SPEECH OF THE EOLIAN HARP.

SOFT and softlier hold me, friends!

Thanks if your genial care

Unbind and give me to the air.
Keep your lips or finger-tips

For flute or spinnet's dancing chips;
I await a tenderer touch,

I ask more or not so much:

Give me to the atmosphere,

Where is the wind my brother, — where?

Lift the sash, lay me within,

Lend me your ears, and I begin.
For gentle harp to gentle hearts
The secret of the world imparts;

And not to-day and not to-morrow
Can drain its wealth of hope and sorrow;
But day by day, to loving ear

Unlocks new sense and loftier cheer.
I've come to live with you, sweet friends,
This home my minstrel journeying ends.
Many and subtle are my lays,

The latest better than the first,
For I can mend the happiest days,

And charm the anguish of the worst.

FRIENDSHIP.

A RUDDY drop of manly blood
The surging sea outweighs,

The world uncertain comes and goes,
The lover rooted stays.

I fancied he was fled,

[ocr errors]

And, after many a year,
Glowed unexhausted kindliness,
Like daily sunrise there.

My careful heart was free again,
O friend, my bosom said,

Through thee alone the sky is arched,

Through thee the rose is red;

All things through thee take nobler form,

And look beyond the earth,

The mill-round of our fate appears

A sun-path in thy worth.
Me too thy nobleness has taught
To master my despair;

The fountains of my hidden life
Are through thy friendship fair.

BEAUTY.

WAS never form and never face
So sweet to SEYD as only grace
Which did not slumber like a stone,
But hovered gleaming and was gone.
Beauty chased he everywhere,

In flame, in storm, in clouds of air.
He smote the lake to feed his eye
With the beryl beam of the broken wave;
He flung in pebbles well to hear
The moment's music which they gave.
Oft pealed for him a lofty tone
From nodding pole and belting zone.
He heard a voice none else could hear
From centred and from errant sphere.
The quaking earth did quake in rhyme,
Seas ebbed and flowed in epic chime.
In dens of passion, and pits of woe,
He saw strong Eros struggling through,
To sun the dark and solve the curse,
And beam to the bounds of the universe.
While thus to love he gave his days
In loyal worship, scorning praise,
How spread their lures for him in vain
Thieving Ambition and paltering Gain!
He thought it happier to be dead,
To die for Beauty, than live for bread.

MANNERS.

GRACE, Beauty, and Caprice
Build this golden portal;

Graceful women, chosen men,

Dazzle every mortal.

Their sweet and lofty countenance

His enchanted food;

He need not go to them, their forms Beset his solitude.

He looketh seldom in their face,

His eyes explore the ground,
The green grass is a looking-glass
Whereon their traits are found.
Little and less he says to them,
So dances his heart in his breast;
Their tranquil mien bereaveth him
Of wit, of words, of rest.

Too weak to win, too fond to shun
The tyrants of his doom,

The much-deceived Endymion
Slips behind a tomb.

« AnkstesnisTęsti »