Two wedded lovers watched the rising moon,That with her strange mysterious beauty glowing,Over misty hills and waters flowing,Crowned the long twilight loveliness of June:And thus in me, and thus in me, they spake,The solemn secret of fist love did wake. Above the hills the blushing orb arose;Her shape encircled by a radiant bower,In which the […]

Fair and false! No dawn will greetThy waking beauty as of old;The little flower beneath thy feetIs alien to thy smile so cold;The merry bird flown up to meetYoung morning from his nest i’ the wheatScatters his joy to wood and wold,But scorns the arrogance of gold. False and fair! I scarce know why,But standing […]

Follow me, follow me,Over brake and under tree,Thro’ the bosky tanglery,Brushwood and bramble!Follow me, follow me,Laugh and leap and scramble!Follow, follow,Hill and hollow,Fosse and burrow,Fen and furrow,Down into the bulrush beds,‘Midst the reeds and osier heads,In the rushy soaking damps,Where the vapours pitch their camps,Follow me, follow me,For a midnight ramble!O! what a mighty fog,What […]

The silence of preluded song –AEolian silence charms the woods;Each tree a harp, whose foliaged stringsAre waiting for the master’s touchTo sweep them into storms of joy,Stands mute and whispers not; the birdsBrood dumb in their foreboding nests,Save here and there a chirp or tweet,That utters fear or anxious love,Or when the ouzel sends a […]

Never, O never,Since dewy sweet FloraWas ravished by Zephyr,Was such a thing heardIn the valleys so hollow!Till rosy Aurora,Uprising as ever,Bright Phosphor to follow,Pale Phoebe to sever,Was caught like a birdTo the breast of Apollo! Wildly she flutters,And flushes all overWith passionate muttersOf shame to the hushOf his amorous whispers:But O such a loverMust win […]

Take thy lute and singBy the ruined castle walls,Where the torrent-foam falls,And long weeds wave:Take thy lute and sing,O’er the grey ancestral grave!Daughter of a King,Tune thy string. Sing of happy hours,In the roar of rushing time;Till all the echoes chimeTo the days gone by;Sing of passing hoursTo the ever-present sky; –Weep–and let the showersWake […]

When buds of palm do burst and spreadTheir downy feathers in the lane,And orchard blossoms, white and red,Breathe Spring delight for Autumn gain;And the skylark shakes his wings in the rain; O then is the season to look for a bride!Choose her warily, woo her unseen;For the choicest maids are those that hideLike dewy violets […]

I How sweet on sunny afternoons,For those who journey light and well,To loiter up a hilly riseWhich hides the prospect far beyond,And fancy all the landscape lyingBeautiful and still; Beneath a sky of summer blue,Whose rounded cloudlets, folded soft,Gaze on the scene which we awaitAnd picture from their peacefulness;So calmly to the earth incliningFloat those […]

Under boughs of breathing May,In the mild spring-time I lay,Lonely, for I had no love;And the sweet birds all sang for pity,Cuckoo, lark, and dove. Tell me, cuckoo, then I cried,Dare I woo and wed a bride?I, like thee, have no home-nest;And the twin notes thus tuned their ditty, –‘Love can answer best.’ Nor, warm […]

There stands a singer in the street,He has an audience motley and meet;Above him lowers the London night,And around the lamps are flaring bright. His minstrelsy may be unchaste –‘Tis much unto that motley taste,And loud the laughter he provokesFrom those sad slaves of obscene jokes. But woe is many a passer byWho as he […]

Musing on the fate of Daphne,Many feelings urged my breast,For the God so keen desiring,And the Nymph so deep distrest. Never flashed thro’ sylvan valleyVisions so divinely fair!He with early ardour glowing,She with rosy anguish rare. Only still more sweet and lovelyFor those terrors on her brows,Those swift glances wild and brilliant,Those delicious panting vows. […]

I cannot lose thee for a day,But like a bird with restless wingMy heart will find thee far away,And on thy bosom fall and sing,My nest is here, my rest is here; –And in the lull of wind and rain,Fresh voices make a sweet refrain,‘His rest is there, his nest is there.’ With thee the […]

No, no, the falling blossom is no signOf loveliness destroy’d and sorrow mute;The blossom sheds its loveliness divine; –Its mission is to prophecy the fruit. Nor is the day of love for ever dead,When young enchantment and romance are gone;The veil is drawn, but all the future dreadIs lightened by the finger of the dawn. […]

The buried voice bespake Antigone. ‘O sister! couldst thou know, as thou wilt know,The bliss above, the reverence below,Enkindled by thy sacrifice for me;Thou wouldst at once with holy ecstasyGive thy warm limbs into the yearning earth.Sleep, Sister! for Elysium’s dawning birth, –And faith will fill thee with what is to be!Sleep, for the Gods […]

Thou to me art such a springAs the Arab seeks at eve,Thirsty from the shining sands;There to bathe his face and hands,While the sun is taking leave,And dewy sleep is a delicious thing. Thou to me art such a dreamAs he dreams upon the grass,While the bubbling coolness nearMakes sweet music in his ear;And the […]

The flower unfolds its dawning cup,And the young sun drinks the star-dews up,At eve it droops with the bliss of day,And dreams in the midnight far away. So am I in thy sole, sweet glancePressed with a weight of utterance;Lovingly all my leaves unfold,And gleam to the beams of thirsty gold. At eve I droop, […]

Bury thy sorrows, and they shall riseAs souls to the immortal skies,And there look down like mothers’ eyes. But let thy joys be fresh as flowers,That suck the honey of the showers,And bloom alike on huts and towers. So shall thy days be sweet and bright;Solemn and sweet thy starry night,Conscious of love each change […]

When nuts behind the hazel-leafAre brown as the squirrel that hunts them free,And the fields are rich with the sun-burnt sheaf,‘Mid the blue cornflower and the yellowing tree;And the farmer glows and beams in his glee; O then is the season to wed thee a bride!Ere the garners are filled and the ale-cups foam;For a […]

I would I were the drop of rainThat falls into the dancing rill,For I should seek the river then,And roll below the wooded hill,Until I reached the sea. And O, to be the river swiftThat wrestles with the wilful tide,And fling the briny weeds asideThat o’er the foamy billows drift,Until I came to thee! I […]

I Blue July, bright July,Month of storms and gorgeous blue;Violet lightnings o’er thy sky,Heavy falls of drenching dew;Summer crown! o’er glen and gladeShrinking hyacinths in their shade;I welcome thee with all thy pride,I love thee like an Eastern bride.Though all the singing days are doneAs in those climes that clasp the sun;Though the cuckoo in […]