I THE SOUDANESE They wrong’d not us, nor sought ‘gainst us to wage The bitter battle. On their God they cried For succour, deeming justice to abide In heaven, if banish’d from earth’s vicinage. And when they rose with a gall’d lion’s rage, We, on the captor’s, keeper’s, tamer’s side, We, with the alien tyranny […]

‘Tis human fortune’s happiest height to be A spirit melodious, lucid, poised, and whole; Second in order of felicity I hold it, to have walk’d with such a soul. * * * * * The statue–Buonarroti said–doth wait, Thrall’d in the block, for me to emancipate. The poem–saith the poet–wanders free Till I betray it […]

TO JAMES BROMLEY WITH “WORDSWORTH’S GRAVE” Ere vandal lords with lust of gold accurst Deface each hallowed hillside we revere– Ere cities in their million-throated thirst Menace each sacred mere– Let us give thanks because one nook hath been Unflooded yet by desecration’s wave, The little churchyard in the valley green That holds our Wordsworth’s […]

TO LONDON, MY HOSTESS City that waitest to be sung,– For whom no hand To mighty strains the lyre hath strung In all this land, Though mightier theme the mightiest ones Sang not of old, The thrice three sisters’ godlike sons With lips of gold,– Till greater voice thy greatness sing In loftier times, Suffer […]

TO RICHARD HOLT HUTTON AND MEREDITH TOWNSEND WITH GRATITUDE LACHRYMAE MUSARUM (6TH OCTOBER 1892) Low, like another’s, lies the laurelled head: The life that seemed a perfect song is o’er: Carry the last great bard to his last bed. Land that he loved, thy noblest voice is mute. Land that he loved, that loved him! […]

To the eye and the ear of the Dreamer This Dream out of darkness flew, Through the horn or the ivory portal, But he wist not which of the two. It was the Human Spirit, Of all men’s souls the Soul, Man the unwearied climber, That climbed to the unknown goal. And up the steps […]

A beckoning spirit of gladness seemed afloat, That lightly danced in laughing air before us: The earth was all in tune, and you a note Of Nature’s happy chorus. ‘Twas like a vernal morn, yet overhead The leafless boughs across the lane were knitting: The ghost of some forgotten Spring, we said, O’er Winter’s world […]

(4TH AUGUST 1892) Within a narrow span of time, Three princes of the realm of rhyme, At height of youth or manhood’s prime, From earth took wing, To join the fellowship sublime Who, dead, yet sing. He, first, his earliest wreath who wove Of laurel grown in Latmian grove, Conquered by pain and hapless love […]

Not here, O teeming City, was it meet Thy lover, thy most faithful, should repose, But where the multitudinous life-tide flows Whose ocean-murmur was to him more sweet Than melody of birds at morn, or bleat Of flocks in Spring-time, there should Earth enclose His earth, amid thy thronging joys and woes, There, ‘neath the […]

Inhospitably hast thou entertained, O Poet, us the bidden to thy board, Whom in mid-feast, and while our thousand mouths Are one laudation of the festal cheer, Thou from thy table dost dismiss, unfilled. Yet loudlier thee than many a lavish host We praise, and oftener thy repast half-served Than many a stintless banquet, prodigally […]

[Mr. Oscar Wilde, having discovered that England is unworthy of him, has announced his resolve to become a naturalised Frenchman.] And wilt thou, Oscar, from us flee, And must we, henceforth, wholly sever? Shall thy laborious jeux-d’esprit Sadden our lives no more for ever? And all thy future wilt thou link With that brave land […]

Reluctant Summer! once, a maid Full easy of access, In many a bee-frequented shade Thou didst thy lover bless. Divinely unreproved I played, Then, with each liberal tress– And art thou grown at last afraid Of some too close caress? Or deem’st that if thou shouldst abide My passion might decay? Thou leav’st me pining […]

“Not ours,” say some, “the thought of death to dread; Asking no heaven, we fear no fabled hell: Life is a feast, and we have banqueted– Shall not the worms as well? “The after-silence, when the feast is o’er, And void the places where the minstrels stood, Differs in nought from what hath been before, […]

As we wax older on this earth, Till many a toy that charmed us seems Emptied of beauty, stripped of worth, And mean as dust and dead as dreams,– For gauds that perished, shows that passed, Some recompense the Fates have sent: Thrice lovelier shine the things that last, The things that are more excellent. […]

I England my mother, Wardress of waters. Builder of peoples, Maker of men,– Hast thou yet leisure Left for the muses? Heed’st thou the songsmith Forging the rhyme? Deafened with tumults, How canst thou hearken? Strident is faction, Demos is loud. Lazarus, hungry, Menaces Dives; Labour the giant Chafes in his hold. Yet do the […]

In the night, in the night, When thou liest alone, Ah, the sounds that are blown In the freaks of the breeze, By the spirit that sends The voice of far friends With the sigh of the seas In the night! In the night, in the night, When thou liest alone, Ah, the ghosts that […]

As some most pure and noble face, Seen in the thronged and hurrying street, Sheds o’er the world a sudden grace, A flying odour sweet, Then, passing, leaves the cheated sense Baulked with a phantom excellence; So, on our soul the visions rise Of that fair life we never led: They flash a splendour past […]

(Lines written on the appearance of Lord Tennyson’s drama.) Clear as of old the great voice rings to-day, While Sherwood’s oak-leaves twine with Aldworth’s bay: The voice of him the master and the sire Of one whole age and legion of the lyre, Who sang his morning-song when Coleridge still Uttered dark oracles from Highgate […]

(12TH OCTOBER 1492) From his adventurous prime He dreamed the dream sublime: Over his wandering youth It hung, a beckoning star. At last the vision fled, And left him in its stead The scarce sublimer truth, The world he found afar. The scattered isles that stand Warding the mightier land Yielded their maidenhood To his […]

PART THE FIRST There was a time, it passeth me to say How long ago, but sure ’twas many a day Before the world had gotten her such store Of foolish wisdom as she hath,–before She fell to waxing gray with weight of years And knowledge, bitter knowledge, bought with tears,– When it did seem […]