Was mingled from the generous whole,
Sea-valleys and the deep of skies
Furnished several supplies,
And the sands whereof I'm made
Draw me to them self-betrayed?
I turn the proud portfolios
Which hold the grand designs
Of Salvator, of Guercino,
And Piranesi's lines.
I hear the lofty Paans
Of the masters of the shell,
Who heard the starry music,
And recount the numbers well:
Olympian bards who sung
Divine Ideas below,
Which always find us young,
And always keep us so.
Oft in streets or humblest places.
I detect far-wandered Graces,
Which from Eden wide astray
In lowly homes have lost their way.
Thee gliding through the sea of form,
Like the lightning through the storm,
Somewhat not to be possessed,
Somewhat not to be caressed,
No feet so fleet could ever find,
No perfect form could ever bind.
Thou eternal fugitive
Hovering over all that live,
Quick and skilful to inspire
Sweet extravagant desire,
Starry space and lily-bell
Filling with thy roseate smell,
Wilt not give the lips to taste
Of the nectar which thou hast.
All that's good and great with thee Stands in deep conspiracy.
Thou hast bribed the dark and lonely
To report thy features only;
And the cold and purple morning,
Itself with thoughts of thee adorning,
The leafy dell, the city mart,
Equal trophies of thine art,
E'en the flowing azure air,
Thou hast touched for my despair;
And, if I languish into dreams,
Again I meet the ardent beams.
Queen of things! I dare not die
In Being's deeps past ear and eye,
Lest there I find the same deceiver,
And be the sport of Fate for ever.
Dread power, but dear! if God thou be,
Unmake me quite, or give thyself to me.
O FAIR and stately maid, whose eye
Was kindled in the upper sky
At the same torch that lighted mine—
For so I must interpret still
Thy sweet dominion o'er my will,
A sympathy divine,—
Ah! let me blameless gaze upon
Features that seem in heart my own,
Nor fear those watchful sentinels
Which charm the more their glance forbids, Chaste glowing underneath their lids
With fire that draws while it repels.
THINE eyes still shined for me, though far
I lonely roved the land or sea,
As I behold yon evening star,
Which yet beholds not me.
This morn I climbed the misty hill,
And roamed the pastures through;
How danced thy form before my path,
Amidst the deep-eyed dew!
When the red bird spread his sable wing,
And showed his side of flame,
When the rose-bud ripened to the rose,
In both I read thy name.
THE sense of the world is short,
Long and various the report,-
To love and be beloved;
Men and gods have not outlearned it ;
And, how oft soe'er they've turned it,
'Tis not to be improved.
ON a mound an Arab lay,
And sung his sweet regrets,
And told his amulets.
The summer bird
His sorrow heard;
And, when he heaved a sigh profound,
The sympathetic swallows swept the ground.
"If it be as they said, she was not fair;
Beauty's not beautiful to me,
But sceptred Genius aye inorbed,
Culminating in her sphere.
This Hermione absorbed
The lustre of the land and ocean,
Hills and islands, vine and tree,
In her form and motion.
I ask no bauble miniature,
Nor ringlets dead
Shorn from her comely head,
Now that morning not disdains,—
Mountains and the misty plains-
Her colossal portraiture:
They her heralds be,
Steeped in her quality,
And singers of her fame,
Who is their muse and dame.
"Higher, dear swallows, mind not what I say. Ah! heedless how the weak are strong,
In thee to frame, in me to trust,
Thou to the Syrian couldst belong?
"I am of a lineage
That each for each doth fast engage.
In old Bassora's schools I seemed
Hermit vowed to books and gloom,
Ill-bested for gay bridegroom:
I was by thy touch redeemed;
When thy meteor glances came,
We talked at large of worldly Fate,
And drew truly every trait.
Once I dwelt apart,
Now I live with all.
As shepherd's lamp on far hill-side
Seems, by the traveller espied,
A door into the mountain heart:
So didst thou quarry and unlock
Highways for me through the rock.
"Now deceived thou wanderest
In strange lands, unblest,
And my kindred come to soothe me.
South wind is my next of blood;
He is come through fragrant wood,
Drugged with spice from climates warm,
And in every twinkling glade
And twilight nook
Unveils thy form.
Out of the forest way
Forth paced it yesterday;
And, when I sat by the water-course,
Watching the daylight fade,
It throbbed up from the brook.
River, and rose, and crag, and bird,
Frost, and sun, and eldest night,
To me their aid preferred,
To me their comfort plight:
'Courage! we are thine allies;
And with this hint be wise,—
The chains of kind
The distant bind.
Deed thou doest she must do,—
Above her will, be true;
And, in her strict resort
To winds and waterfalls,
And autumn's sun-lit festivals,
To music, and to music's thought,
Inextricably bound,
She shall find thee, and be found.
Follow not her flying feet;
Come to us, herself to meet.''
BRING me wine, but wine which never grew
In the belly of the grape,
Or grew on vine whose taproots reaching through
Under the Andes to the Cape,
Suffered no savour of the world to scape.
Let its grapes the morn salute
From a nocturnal root
Which feels the acrid juice
Of Styx and Erebus,
And turns the woe of night,
By its own craft, to a more rich delight.
We buy ashes for bread,
We buy diluted wine;
Give me of the true,
Whose ample leaves and tendrils, curled
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