Lie as they fell? Would they be ears of wheat

Sown once for focd but trodden into clay?

Or golden coins squandered and still to pay?

Or drops of blood dabbling the guilty feet?

Or such spilt water as in dreams must cheat

The undying throats of Hell, athirst alway?

I do not see them here; but after death God knows I know the faces I shall see, Each one a murdered self, with low last breath.

"I am thyself,-what hast thou done to me?"

"And I-and I--thyself," (lo! each one saith,)

"And thou thyself to all eternity!"

LXXXIX. THE TREES OF THE GARDEN

YE who have passed Death's haggard hills; and ye

Whom trees that knew your sires shall cease to know

And still stand silent:-is it all a show, A wisp that laughs upon the wall?— decree

Of some inexorable supremacy

Which ever, as man strains his blind surmise

From depth to ominous depth, looks past his eyes,

Sphinx-faced with unabashed augury? Nay, rather question the Earth's self. Invoke

The storm-felled forest-trees moss-grown to-day

Whose roots are hillocks where the children play;

Or ask the silver sapling 'neath what yoke

Those stars, his spray-crown's clustering gems, shall wage

Their journey still when his boughs shrink with age.

XC. "RETRO ME, SATHANA!"

GET thee behind me. Even as, heavycurled,

Stooping against the wind, a charioteer Is snatched from out his chariot by the hair,

So shall Time be; and as the void car, hurled

Abroad by reinless steeds, even so the world:

Yea, even as chariot-dust upon the air, It shall be sought and not found anywhere.

Get thee behind me, Satan. Oft unfurled,

Thy perilous wings can beat and break like lath

Much mightiness of men to win thee praise.

Leave these weak feet to tread in narrow

Since not for either this stark marriage

sheet

And the long pauses of this weddingbell;

Yet o'er her grave the night and day dispel

At last their feud forlorn, with cold and heat

Nor other than dear friends to death may fleet

The two lives left that most of her can tell :

So separate hopes, which in a soul had wooed

The one same Peace, strove with each other long,

And Peace before their faces perished since :

So through that soul, in restless brotherhood,

They roam together now, and wind among

Its bye-streets, knocking at the dusty inns.

And uttermost labors, having once o'ersaid

All grievous memories on his long life shed,

This worst regret to one true heart could speak

That when, with sorrowing love and reverence meek,

He stooped o'er sweet Colonna's dying bed,

His Muse and dominant Lady, spiritwed,

Her hand he kissed, but not her brow or cheek.

O Buonarrotti, good at Art's firewheels

To urge her chariot!-even thus the Soul,

Touching at length some sorely-chastened goal,

Earns oftenest but a little: her appeals Were deep and mute,-lowly her claim. Let be:

What holds for her Death's garner? And for thee?

XCVI. LIFE THE BELOVED

As thy friend's face, with shadow of soul o'erspread, [hath been Somewhile unto thy sight perchance

Ah! when the wan soul in that golden air

Between the scriptured petals softly blown

Peers breathless for the gift of grace unknown,

Ah! let none other alien spell soe`er But only the one Hope's one name be there,

Not less nor more, but even that word alone. 1869, 1870, 1881.1

THE CLOUD CONFINES

THE day is dark and the night
To him that would search their heart;
No lips of cloud that will part
Nor morning song in the light:
Only, gazing alone,

To him wild shadows are shown,
Deep under deep unknown

And height above unknown height.
Still we say as we go,-

"Strange to think by the way,
Whatever there is to know,

That shall we know one day."

The Past is over and fled;

Named new, we name it the old;
Thereof some tale hath been told,
But no word comes from the dead;
Whether at all they be,

Or whether as bond or free,
Or whether they too were we,
Or by what spell they have sped.

Still we say as we go,

"Strange to think by the way, Whatever there is to know,

That shall we know one day."

What of the heart of hate

That beats in thy breast, O Time?— Red strife from the furthest prime, And anguish of fierce debate; War that shatters her slain,

And peace that grinds them as grain, And eyes fixed ever in vain On the pitiless eyes of Fate.

Still we say as we go,

Strange to think by the way,

1 Sixteen Sonnets, Numbers 25, 39, 47, 43-52, 63, 65, 67, 86, 91, 97, 99, and 100, were published in the Fortnightly Review, 1869. Fifty Sonnets (for the exact list see W. M. Rossetti's edition of the Collected Works, I, 517) were published, with eleven lyrics, as "Sonnets and Songs towards a work to be entitled The House of Life," in the Poems, 1870. The House of Life, as it now stands, consisting of sonnets only, was published in Ballads and Sonnets, 1881.

Whatever there is to know,

That shall we know one day."

What of the heart of love

That bleeds in thy breast, O Man?
Thy kisses snatched 'neath the ban
Of fangs that mock them above:
Thy bells prolonged unto knells,
Thy hope that a breath dispels,
Thy bitter forlorn farewells
And the empty echoes thereof ?

Still we say as we go.-
"Strange to think by the way,
Whatever there is to know,

That shall we know one day."

The sky leans dumb on the sea,
Aweary with all its wings;
And oh! the song the sea sings

Is dark everlastingly.

Our past is clean forgot.
Our present is and is not,
Our future's a sealed seedplot,
And what betwixt them are we?-

We who say as we go,-
"Strange to think by the way,
Whatever there is to know,
That shall we know one day.'
1872.

THREE SHADOWS

I LOOKED and saw your eyes In the shadow of your hair, As a traveller sees the stream

In the shadow of the wood;
And I said, "My faint heart sighs,
Ah me! to linger there,
To drink deep and to dream
In that sweet solitude."

I looked and saw your heart
In the shadow of your eyes,
As a seeker sees the gold

In the shadow of the stream;
And I said, Ah me? what art

Should win the immortal prize, Whose want must make life cold And Heaven a hollow dream?"

I looked and saw your love
In the shadow of your heart,
As a diver sees the pearl

In the shadow of the sea;
And I murmured, not above
My breath, but all apart,—
"Ah! you can love, true girl,
And is your love for me?"

1881.

INSOMNIA

THIN are the night-skirts left behind
By daybreak hours that onward creep,
And thin, alas! the shred of sleep
That wavers with the spirit's wind:
But in half-dreams that shift and roll
And still remember and forget,
My soul this hour has drawn your soul
A little nearer yet.

Our lives, most dear, are never near,
Our thoughts are never far apart,
Though all that draws us heart to heart
Seems fainter now and now more clear.
To-night Love claims his full control,
And with desire and with regret
My soul this hour has drawn your soul
A little nearer yet.

Is there a home where heavy earth Melts to bright air that breathes no pain,

Where water leaves no thirst again And springing fire is Love's new birth? If faith long bound to one true goal May there at length its hope beget, My soul that hour shall draw your soul For ever nearer yet. 1881.

CHIMES

I

Honey-flowers to the honey-comb And the honey-bees from home.

A honey-comb and a honey-flower, And the bee shall have his hour.

A honeyed heart for the honey-comb,
And the humming bee flies home.

A heavy heart in the honey-flower,
And the bee has had his hour.

II

A honey-cell's in the honeysuckle, And the honey-bee knows it well.

The honey-comb has a heart of honey,
And the humming bee 's so bonny.

A honey-flower 's the honeysuckle,
And the bee's in the honey-bell.

The honeysuckle is sucked of honey. And the bee is heavy and bonny

Brown shell first for the butterfly
And a bright wing by and by.
Butterfly, good-by to your shell,
And, bright wings, speed you well.
Bright lamplight for the butterfly
And a burnt wing by and by.
Butterfly, alas for your shell,
And, bright wings, fare you well.

LET no man ask thee of anything
Not yearborn between Spring and
Spring.

More of all worlds than he can know,
Each day the single sun doth show.
A trustier gloss than thou canst give
From all wise scrolls demonstrative,
The sea doth sigh and the wind sing.
Let no man awe thee on any height
Of earthly kingship's mouldering might.
The dust his heel holds meet for thy
brow

Hath all of it been what both are now;
And thou and he may plague together
A beggar's eyes in some dusty weather
When none that is now knows sound or
sight.

Crave thou no dower of earthly things
Unworthy Hope's imaginings.

To have brought true birth of Song to be
And to have won hearts to Poesy,
Or anywhere in the sun or rain
To have loved and been beloved again,
Is loftiest reach of Hope's bright wings.

The wild waifs cast up by the sea
Are diverse ever seasonably.
Even so the soul-tides still may land
A different drift upon the sand.
But one the sea is evermore :
And one be still, 'twixt shore and shore,
As the sea's life, thy soul in thee.

Say, hast thou pride? How then may fit
Thy mood with flatterer's silk-spun wit?
Haply the sweet voice lifts thy crest,
A breeze of fame made manifest.
Nay, but then chaf'st at flattery? Pause:
Be sure thy wrath is not because
It makes thee feel thou lovest it.

Let thy soul strive that still the same
Be early friendship's sacred flame.
The affinities have strongest part
In youth, and draw men heart to heart:
As life wears on and finds no rest,
The individual in each breast
Is tyrannous to sunder them.

In the life-drama's stern cue-call,
A friend 's a part well-prized by all: