TO E.B.B. I There they are, my fifty men and women Naming me the fifty poems finished! Take them, Love, the book and me together; Where the heart lies, let the brain lie also. II Rafael made a century of sonnets, 5 Made and wrote them in a certain volume Dinted with the silver-pointed pencil […]

Karshish, the picker up of learning’s crumbs, The not incurious in God’s handiwork (This man’s flesh he hath admirably made, Blown like a bubble, kneaded like a paste, To coop up and keep down on earth a space That puff of vapour from his mouth, man’s soul) –To Abib, all sagacious in our art, Breeder […]

I Said Abner, “At last thou art come! Ere I tell, ere thou speak. Kiss my cheek, wish me well!” Then I wished it, and did kiss his cheek. And he, “Since the King, O my friend, for thy countenance sent, Neither drunken nor eaten have we; nor until from his tent Thou return with […]

“Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself.” [‘Will sprawl, now that the heat of day is best, Flat on his belly in the pit’s much mire, With elbows wide, fists clenched to prop his chin, And, while he kicks both feet in the cool slush, And feels about his spine small […]

Grow old along with me 1 The best is yet to be, The last of life, for which the first was made: Our times are in His hand Who saith “A whole I planned, Youth shows but half; trust God: see all, nor be afraid!” Not that, amassing flowers, Youth sighed, “Which rose make ours, […]

(CALLED “THE FAULTLESS PAINTER”) But do not let us quarrel any more, No, my Lucrezia! bear with me for once: Sit down and all shall happen as you wish. You turn your face, but does it bring your heart? I’ll work then for your friend’s friend, never fear. Treat his own subject after his own […]

Oh Galuppi, Baldassaro, this is very sad to find! 1 I can hardly misconceive you; it would prove me deaf and blind; But altho’ I take your meaning, ’tis with such a heavy mind! Here you come with your old music, and here’s all the good it brings. What, they lived once thus at Venice […]

(AFTER HE HAS BEEN EXTEMPORIZING UPON THE MUSICAL INSTRUMENT OF HIS INVENTION) Would that the structure brave, the manifold music I build, Bidding my organ obey, calling its keys to their work, Claiming each slave of the sound, at a touch, as when Solomon willed Armies of angels that soar, legions of demons that lurk, […]

Oh, to be in England Now that April’s there, And whoever wakes in England Sees, some morning, unaware, That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf, While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough In England–now! And after April, when May follows, And the white-throat builds, and […]

(As distinguished by an Italian person of quality.) Had I but plenty of money, money enough and to spare, The house for me, no doubt, were a house in the city square; Ah, such a life, such a life, as one leads at the window there! Something to see, by Bacchus deg., something to hear, […]

ROME, 15– Vanity, saith the preacher, vanity! Draw round my bed: is Anselm keeping back? Nephews–sons mine … ah God, I know not! Well, She, men would have to be your mother once, Old Gandolf envied me, so fair she was! 5 What’s done is done, and she is dead beside, Dead long ago, and […]

ANCIEN REGIME Now that I, tying thy glass mask tightly, May gaze through these faint smokes curling whitely, As thou pliest thy trade in this devil’s-smithy– Which is the poison to poison her, prithee? He is with her, and they know that I know Where they are, what they do: they believe my tears flow […]

Your ghost will walk, you lover of trees, (If our loves remain) In an English lane, By a cornfield-side a-flutter with poppies. Hark, those two in the hazel coppice– A boy and a girl, if the good fates please, Making love, say,– The happier they! Draw yourself up from the light of the moon. And […]

Fear death? to feel the fog in my throat, The mist in my face, When the snows begin, and the blasts denote I am nearing the place, The power of the night, the press of the storm, The post of the foe; Where he stands, the Arch Fear in a visible form, Yet the strong […]

At the midnight in the silence of the sleep-time, When you set your fancies free, Will they pass to where–by death, fools think, imprisoned– Low he lies who once so loved you whom you loved so, –Pity me? Oh to love so, be so loved, yet so mistaken! What had I on earth to do […]

Ah, did you once see Shelley plain, And did he stop and speak to you, And did you speak to him again? How strange it seems and new! But you were living before that, And also you are living after; And the memory I started at– My starting moves your laughter! I crossed a moor […]

“Why?” Because all I haply can and do, All that I am now, all I hope to be,– Whence comes it save from fortune setting free Body and soul the purpose to pursue, God traced for both? If fetters, not a few, Of prejudice, convention, fall from me, These shall I bid men–each in his […]

“We shall soon lose a celebrated building.” —Paris Newspaper. No, for I’ll save it! Seven years since I passed through Paris, stopped a day To see the baptism of your Prince, 3 Saw, made my bow, and went my way: Walking the heat and headache off, I took the Seine-side, you surmise, Thought of the […]

Here’s my case. Of old I used to love him. This same unseen friend, before I knew: Dream there was none like him, none above him,– Wake to hope and trust my dream was true. Loved I not his letters deg. full of beauty? 5 Not his actions famous far and wide? Absent, he would […]

If one could have that little head of hers Painted upon a background of pure gold, Such as the Tuscan’s early art prefers! No shade encroaching on the matchless mould Of those two lips, which should be opening soft In the pure profile; not as when she laughs, For that spoils all: but rather as […]