Or that the past will always win
A glory from its being far;
And orb into the perfect star
We saw not, when we moved therein ?

XXV

I KNOW that this was Life,-the track
Whereon with equal feet we fared;
And then, as now, the day prepared
The daily burden for the back.

But this it was that made me move
As light as carrier-birds in air;
I loved the weight I had to bear,
Because it needed help of Love:

Nor could I weary, heart or limb,

When mighty Love would cleave in twain
The lading of a single pain,

And part it, giving half to him.

XXVI

STILL onward winds the dreary way;
I with it; for I long to prove

No lapse of moons can canker Love,
Whatever fickle tongues may say.

And if that eye which watches guilt

And goodness, and hath power to see Within the green the moulder'd tree, And towers fall'n as soon as built

Oh, if indeed that eye foresee

Or see (in Him is no before)
In more of life true life no more,

And Love the indifference to be,

So might I find, ere yet the morn
Breaks hither over Indian seas,

That Shadow waiting with the keys,
To cloak me from my proper scorn.

XXVII

I ENVY not in any moods

The captive void of noble rage, The linnet born within the cage, That never knew the summer woods:

I envy not the beast that takes

His license in the field of time,
Unfetter'd by the sense of crime,
To whom a conscience never wakes;

Nor, what may count itself as blest,
The heart that never plighted troth
But stagnates in the weeds of sloth,
Nor any want-begotten rest.

I hold it true, whate'er befall;

I feel it, when I sorrow most; 'Tis better to have loved and lost Than never to have loved at all.

XXVIII

THE time draws near the birth of Christ :
The moon is hid; the night is still;
The Christmas bells from hill to hill

Answer each other in the mist.

Four voices of four hamlets round,

From far and near, on mead and moor,
Swell out and fail, as if a door

Were shut between me and the sound

Each voice four changes on the wind,

:

That now dilate, and now decrease,
Peace and goodwill, goodwill and peace,

Peace and goodwill, to all mankind.

This year I slept and woke with pain,
I almost wish'd no more to wake,

And that my hold on life would break Before I heard those bells again :

But they my troubled spirit rule,

For they controll'd me when a boy;
They bring me sorrow touch'd with joy,

The merry merry bells of Yule.

XXIX

WITH Such compelling cause to grieve
As daily vexes household peace,
And chains regret to his decease,
How dare we keep our Christmas-eve;

Which brings no more a welcome guest
To enrich the threshold of the night
With shower'd largess of delight,
In dance and song and game and jest.

Yet go, and while the holly boughs
Entwine the cold baptismal font,

Make one wreath more for Use and Wont, That guard the portals of the house;

Old sisters of a day gone by,

Gray nurses, loving nothing new;

Why should they miss their yearly due
They too will die.

Before their time?

XXX

WITH trembling fingers did we weave
The holly round the Christmas hearth;
A rainy cloud possess'd the earth,

And sadly fell our Christmas-eve.

At our old pastimes in the hall

We gambol'd, making vain pretence
Of gladness, with an awful sense

Of one mute Shadow watching all.

We paused: the winds were in the beech:
We heard them sweep the winter land;
And in a circle hand-in-hand

Sat silent, looking each at each.

Then echo-like our voices rang;
We sung, tho' every eye was dim,
A merry song we sang with him
Last year: impetuously we sang:

We ceased: a gentler feeling crept
Upon us surely rest is meet:

"They rest," we said, "their sleep is sweet,"

And silence follow'd, and we wept.

Our voices took a higher range;

Once more we sang: "They do not die

Nor lose their mortal sympathy,

Nor change to us, although they change;

Rapt from the fickle and the frail
With gather'd power, yet the same,
Pierces the keen seraphic flame
From orb to orb, from veil to veil."

Rise, happy morn, rise, holy morn,

Draw forth the cheerful day from night: O Father, touch the east, and light The light that shone when Hope was born.

XXXI

WHEN Lazarus left his charnel-cave,
And home to Mary's house return'd,
Was this demanded—if he yearn'd
To hear her weeping by his grave?

"Where wert thou, brother, those four days?"
There lives no record of reply,
Which telling what it is to die

Had surely added praise to praise.

From every house the neighbours met,

The streets were fill'd with joyful sound,
A solemn gladness even crown'd

The purple brows of Olivet.

Behold a man raised up by Christ!
The rest remaineth unreveal'd;
He told it not; or something seal'd
The lips of that Evangelist.

XXXII

HER eyes are homes of silent prayer,
Nor other thought her mind admits
But, he was dead, and there he sits,
And he that brought him back is there.

Then one deep love doth supersede
All other, when her ardent gaze
Roves from the living brother's face,

And rests upon the Life indeed.

All subtle thought, all curious fears,

Borne down by gladness so complete, She bows, she bathes the Saviour's feet With costly spikenard and with tears.

Thrice blest whose lives are faithful prayers, Whose loves in higher love endure; What souls possess themselves so pure, Or is there blessedness like theirs?

XXXIII

O THOU that after toil and storm
Mayst seem to have reach'd a purer air,
Whose faith has centre everywhere,

Nor cares to fix itself to form,

Leave thou thy sister when she prays,
Her early Heaven, her happy views;
Nor thou with shadow'd hint confuse

A life that leads melodious days.
Her faith thro' form is pure as thine,

Her hands are quicker unto good:
Oh, sacred be the flesh and blood
To which she links a truth divine!

See thou, that countest reason ripe
In holding by the law within,
Thou fail not in a world of sin,
And ev'n for want of such a type.

XXXIV

My own dim life should teach me this,
That life shall live for evermore,

Else earth is darkness at the core,

And dust and ashes all that is;

This round of green, this orb of flame,
Fantastic beauty; such as lurks
In some wild Poet, when he works
Without a conscience or an aim.

What then were God to such as I?

'Twere hardly worth my while to choose Of things all mortal, or to use

A little patience ere I die;

"Twere best at once to sink to peace,

Like birds the charming serpent draws,
To drop head-foremost in the jaws

Of vacant darkness and to cease.