Lines To A Movement In Mozart’s E-Flat Symphony
by
Show me again the time
When in the Junetide’s prime
We flew by meads and mountains northerly! –
Yea, to such freshness, fairness, fulness, fineness, freeness,
Love lures life on.
Show me again the day
When from the sandy bay
We looked together upon the pestered sea! –
Yea, to such surging, swaying, sighing, swelling, shrinking,
Love lures life on.
Show me again the hour
When by the pinnacled tower
We eyed each other and feared futurity! –
Yea, to such bodings, broodings, beatings, blanchings, blessings,
Love lures life on.
Show me again just this:
The moment of that kiss
Away from the prancing folk, by the strawberry-tree! –
Yea, to such rashness, ratheness, rareness, ripeness, richness,
Love lures life on.
Begun November 1898.
“IN THE SEVENTIES”
“Qui deridetur ab amico suo sicut ego.”–JOB.
In the seventies I was bearing in my breast,
Penned tight,
Certain starry thoughts that threw a magic light
On the worktimes and the soundless hours of rest
In the seventies; aye, I bore them in my breast
Penned tight.
In the seventies when my neighbours–even my friend –
Saw me pass,
Heads were shaken, and I heard the words, “Alas,
For his onward years and name unless he mend!”
In the seventies, when my neighbours and my friend
Saw me pass.
In the seventies those who met me did not know
Of the vision
That immuned me from the chillings of mis-prision
And the damps that choked my goings to and fro
In the seventies; yea, those nodders did not know
Of the vision.
In the seventies nought could darken or destroy it,
Locked in me,
Though as delicate as lamp-worm’s lucency;
Neither mist nor murk could weaken or alloy it
In the seventies!–could not darken or destroy it,
Locked in me.