Thro' which the lights, rose, amber, emerald, blue, Flush'd in her temples and her eyes, And from her lips, as morn from Memnon, drew Rivers of melodies. No nightingale delighteth to prolong. More than my soul to hear her echo'd song Singing and murmuring in her feastful mirth Lord over Nature, Lord of the visible earth, Communing with herself: "All these are mine, Making sweet close of his delicious toils To mimic heaven; and clapt her hands and cried, "I marvel if my still delight In this great house so royal-rich, and wide, "O all things fair to sate my various eyes! "O God-like isolation which art mine, I can but count thee perfect gain, What time I watch the darkening droves of swine That range on yonder plain. "In filthy sloughs they roll a prurient skin, They graze and wallow, breed and sleep; And oft some brainless devil enters in, And drives them to the deep." Then of the moral instinct would she prate, "I take possession of man's mind and deed. Full oft the riddle of the painful earth And so she throve and prosper'd: so three years Lest she should fail and perish utterly, Plagued her with sore despair. When she would think, where'er she turn'd her sight Deep dread and loathing of her solitude "What! is not this my place of strength, she said, But in dark corners of her palace stood On white-eyed phantasms weeping tears of blood, And hollow shades enclosing hearts of flame, A spot of dull stagnation, without light A still salt pool, lock'd in with bars of sand; A star that with the choral starry dance Back on herself her serpent pride had curl'd. She, mouldering with the dull earth's mouldering sod Lay there exiled from eternal God, And death and life she hated equally Remaining utterly confused with fears, Shut up as in a crumbling tomb, girt round Far off she seem'd to hear the dully sound As in strange lands a traveller walking slow, A little before moon-rise hears the low And knows not if it be thunder or a sound Of great wild beasts; then thinketh, "I have found She howl'd aloud, "I am on fire within. So when four years were wholly finished, "Yet pull not down my palace-towers, that are So lightly, beautifully built: Perchance I may return with others there When I have purged my guilt." LADY CLARA VERE DE VERE. LADY Clara Vere de Vere, Of me you shall not win renown: Lady Clara Vere de Vere, I know you proud to bear your name, Your pride is yet no mate for mine, Too proud to care from whence I came. Nor would I break for your sweet sake A heart that doats on truer charms. A simple maiden in her flower Is worth a hundred coats-of-arms. Lady Clara Vere de Vere, Some meeker pupil you must find, For were you queen of all that is, I could not stoop to such a mind. The lion on your old stone gates Lady Clara Vere de Vere, You put strange memories in my head. Not thrice your branching limes have blown Since I beheld young Laurence dead. Oh your sweet eyes, your low replies: A great enchantress you may be; But there was that across his throat Which you had hardly cared to see. Lady Clara Vere de Vere, When thus he met his mother's view, She had the passions of her kind, She spake some certain truths of you. |