Crept o'er those waters, till írom coast

to coast The moving billows of my being fell Into a death of ice, immovable :-And then-what earthquakes made it

gape and split. The white Moon smiling all the while

on it, These words conceal :-If not, each word

would be The key of stanchless tears. Weep not

for me !

came

As is the Moon, whose changes ever run Into themselves, to the eternal Sun ; The cold chaste Moon, the Queen 0

Heaven's bright isles, Who makes all beautiful on which she

smiles, That wandering shrine of soft yet icy

flame Which ever is transformed, yet still the

same, And warms not but illumines. Young

and fair As the descended Spirit of that sphere, She hid me, as the Moon may hide the

night From its own darkness, until all was

bright Between the Heaven and Earth of my

calm mind, And, as a cloud charioted by the wind, She led me to a cave in that wild place, And sate beside me, with her downward

face Illumining my slumbers, like the Moon Waxing and waning o'er Endymion. And I was laid asleep, spirit and limb, And all my being became bright or dim As the Moon's image in a summer sea, According as she smiled or frowned on

me ; And there I lay, within a chaste cold

bed :

Afas, I then was nor alive nor dead :For at her silver voice came Death and

Life, Unmindful each of their accustomed

strife, Masked like twin babes, a sister and a

brother, The wandering hopes of one abandoned

mother, And through the cavern without wings

they flew, And cried " Away, he is not of our

crew." I wept, and though it be a dream, I

weep.

At length, into the obscure Forest The Vision I had sought through grief

and shame. Athwart that wintry wilderness of

thorns Flashed from her motion splendor like

the Morn's And from her presence life was radiated Through the gray earth and branches

bare and dead ; So that her way was pavedl, and roofed

above With flowers as soft as thoughts of bud

ding love ; And music from her respiration spread Like light,-all other sounds were pene.

trated By the small, still, sweet spirit of that

sound, So that the savage winds hung mute

around; And odor's warm and fresh fell from her

hair, Dissolving the dull cold in the frore air : Soft as an Incarnation of the Sun, When light is changed to love, this

glorious One Floated into the cavern where I lay, And called my Spirit, and the dreaming

clay Was listed by the thing that dreamed

below As smoke by fire, and in her beauty's

glow I stood, and felt the dawn of my long

night Was penetrating me with living light: I kuew it was the Vision veiled from me So many years--that it was Emily. Twin Spheres of light who rule this

passive Earth, This world of love, this me: and inte birth

Wart Awaken all its fruits and flowers, and

What storms then shook the ocean of

my sleep, Blotting that Moon, whose pale and

waning lips Then shrank as in the sickness of

eclipse ;And how iny soul was as a lampless sea, And who was then its Tempest ; and

when She, The Planet of that hour, was quenched,

What frost

Which from its heart of hearts that plant

puts forth Whose fruit, made perfect by thy sunny

eyes, Will be as of the trees of Paradise.

Magnetic might into its central heart; And lift its billows and its mists, and

guide By everlasting laws, each wind and tide To its fit cloud, and its appointed cave; And lull its storms, each in the craggy

grave Which was its cradle, luring to faint

bowers The armies of the rainbow-wingéd

showers; And, as those married lights, which

from the towers Of Heaven look forth and fold the wan

dering globe In liquid sleep and splendor, as a robe ; And all their many-mingled influence

blend, If equal, yet unlike, to one sweet end ;So ye, bright regents, with alternate

sway Govern my sphere of being, night and

day 1 Thou, not disdaining even a borrowed

might: Thou, not eclipsing a remoter light; And, through the shadow of the

seasons three, From Spring to Autumn's sere maturity, Light it into the Winter of the tomb, Where it may ripen to a brighter bloom. Thou too, O Comet beautiful and fierce, Who drew the heart of this frail Uni.

his way

The day is come, and thou wilt fly

with me. To whatsoe'er of dull mortality Is mine, remain a vestal sister still ; To the intense, the deep, the imperish

able, Not mine but me, henceforth be thou

united Even as a bride, delighting and de

lighted. The hour is come the destined Star

has risen Which shall descend upon a vacant

prison. The walls are high, the gates are strong,

thick set The sentinels—but true love never yet Was thus constrained : it overleaps all

fence: Like lightning, with invisible violence Piercing its continents; like Heaven's

free breath, Which he who grasps can hold not ;

liker Death, Who rides upon a thought, and makes Through temple, tower, and palace, and

the array Of arms; more strength has Love than

he or they ; For it can burst his charnel, and make

free The limbs in chains, the heart in agony, The soul in dust and chaos.

Emily, A ship is floating in the harbor now, A wind is lovering o'er the mountain's

brow; There is a path on the sea's azure floor, No keel has ever ploughed that path

before; The halcyons brood around the foamless isles ;

(wiles ; The treacherous Ocean has forsworn its The merry mariners are bold and free: Say, my heart's sister, wilt thou sail

with me? Our bark is as an albatross, whose nest Is a far Eden of the purple East; And we between er wings will sit,

while Night And Day, and storm, and Calm, pursue

their flight,

verse

urn

Towards thine own; till, wrecked in

that convulsion, Alternating attraction and repulsion, Thine went astray and that was rent in

twain; Oh, float into our azure heaven again! Be there love's folding-star at thy return; The living Sun will feed thee from its

(horn Of goluen fire ; the Moon will veil hier In thy last smiles; adoring Even and

Morn Will worship thee with incense of calm

breath And lights and shadows; as the star of

Death And Birth is worshipped by those

sisters wild Called Hope and Fear-upon the heart

are piled Their offerings,--of this sacrifice divine A world shall be the altar.

Lady mine, Scorn not these flowers of thought, the

fading birth

Cradled, and hung in clear tranquility : Bright as that wandering Eden Lucifer, Washed by the soft blue Oceans of

young air, It is a favored place. Famine or Blight, Pestilence, War, and Earthquake, never

liglit Upon its mountain-peaks; blind vul

tures, they Sail onward far upon their fatal way : The wingéd storms, chanting their

thunder-psalın To other lands, leave azure chasms of

calm Over this isle, or weep themselves in dew, From which its fields and woods ever

renew

:

a

Our ministers, along the boundless Sea,
Treading each other's heels, unheededly.
It is an Isle under Ionian skies,
Beautiful as a wreck of Paradise,
And, for the harbors are not safe and

good, This land would have remained a soli

tude But for some pastoral people native

there, Who from the Elysian, clear, and golden

air Draw the last spirit of the age of gold, Simple and spirited ; innocent avd bold. The blue Ægean girds this chosen home, With ever-changing sound and light and

foam, Kissing the sifted sands, and caverns

hoar; And all the winds wandering along the

shore Undulate with the undulating tide : There are thick woods where sylvan

forms abide : And many a fountain, rivulet, and pond, As clear as elemental diamond, Or serene morning air; and far beyond, The mossy tracks made by the goats

and deer (Which the rough shepherd treads but

once a year), Pierce into glades, caverns, and bowers,

and balls Built round with ivy, which the water

falls Illumining, with sound that never fails Accompany the noonday nightingales; And all the place is peopled with sweet

airs ; The light clear element which the isle Is heavy with the scent of lemon-flowers, Which floats like mist laden with unseen

showers And falls upon the eyelids like faint

sleep; And from the moss violets and jonquils

peep, And dart their arrowy odor through the

brain Till you might faint with that delicious

pain, And every motion, odor, beam, and tone With that deep music is in unison : Which is a soul within the soul-they Like echoes of an antenatal dream.It is an isle 'twixt Heaven, Air, Earth,

Their green and golden immortality. And from the sea there rise, and from

the sky There fall, clear exhalations, soft and

bright, Veil after veil, each hiding some delight, Which Sun or Moon or zephyr draw

aside, Till the isle's beauty, like a naked bride Glowing at once with love and loveli

ness, Blushies and trembles at its own excess : Yet, like a buried lamp, a Soul no less Burns in the heart of this delicious isle, An atom of th' Eternal, whose own

smile Unfolds itself, and may be felt, not seen O'er the gray rocks, blue waves, and

forests green, Filling their bare and void interstices.But the chief marvel of the wilderness Is a lone dwelling, built by whom or

how None of the rustic island-people know; 'Tis not a tower of strength, though

with its height It overtops the woods ; but, for delight, Some wise and tender Ocean-King, ere

crime Had been invented, in the world's young

prime, Reared it, a wonder of that simple time. An envy of the isles, a pleasure-house Made sacred to his sister and his spouse. It scarce seems now a wreck of humar

art, But, as it were Titanic; in the heart Of Earth having assumed its form, then

grown Out of the mountains, from the living

stone, Lifting itself in caverns light and high;

wears

For all the antique and learned imagery
Has been erased, and in the place of it
The ivy and the wild-vine interknit
The volumes of their many twining

stems ; Parasite flowers illume with dewy gems The lampless halls, and when they fade,

the sky Peeps through their winter-woof of

tracery With Moonlight patches, or star atoms

keen, Or fragments of the day's intense Working mosaic on their Parian floors. And, day and night, aloof, from the

high towers And terraces, the Earth and Ocean seem To sleep in one another's arms, and dream Of waves, flowers, clouds, woods, rocks,

and all that we Read in their smiles, and call reality.

serene:

This isle and house are mine, and I

have vowed Thee to be lady of the solitude.And I have fitted up some chambers

there Looking towards the golden Eastern air, And level with the living winds, which

flow Like waves above the living waves

below.--I have sent books and music there, and

all Those instruments with which high

spirits call The future from its cradle, and the past Out of its grave, and make the present

last In thoughts and joys which sleep, but

cannot die, Folded within their own eternity. Our simple life wants little, and true

taste Hires not the pale drudge Luxury, to

waste The scene it would adorn, and therefore

still, Nature with all her children, haunts the

hill. The ring-dove, in the embowering ivy,

yet Keeps up her love-lament, and the owls

flit Round the evening tower, and the young

stars glance Between the quick bats in their twilight

dance;

The spotted deer bask in the fresh

moonlight Before our gate, and the slow, silent

night Is measured by the pants of their calm

sleep. Be this our home in life, and when years

heap Their withered hours, like leaves, on

our decay, Let us become the overhanging day, The living soul of this Elysian isle, Conscious, inseparable, one. Meanwhile We two will rise, and sit, and walk

together, Under the roof of blue Ionian weather, And wander in the meadows, or ascend The mossy mouiains, where the blue

heavens bend With lightest winds, to touch their para

mour; Or linger, where the pebble-paven shore, Under the quick, faint kisses of the sea Trembles and sparkles as with ecstasy, Possessing and possest by all that is Within that calm circumference of bliss, And by each other, till to lore and live Be one :--or, at the noontide hour, arrive Where some old cavern hoar seems yet

to keep The moonlight of the expired night

asleep, Through which the awakened day can

never peep; A veil for our seclusion, close as Night's, Where secure sleep may kill thine

innocent lights ; Sleep, the fresh dew of languid love, th:

rain Whose drops quench kisses till they

burn again. And we will talk, until thought's melody Become too sweet for utterance, and it

die In words, to live again in looks, which

dart With thriling tone into the voiceless

heart, Harmonising silence without a sound. Our breath shall intermix, our bosoms

bound, And our veins beat together; and our

lips With other eloquence than words, eclipse The soul that burns between them, and

the wells Which boil under our being's inmost

cells, The fountains of our deepest life, shall be TO NIGHT

Confused in passion's golden purity,
As mountain-springs under the morning

Sun.
We shall become the same, we shall be

one

SWIFTLY walk o'er the western wave

Spirit of Night! Out of thy misty eastern cave, Where all the long and lone daylight, Thou wovest dreams of joy and fear, Which make thee terrible and dear,

Swift be thy flight!

and grew,

Spirit within two frames, oh ! wherefore

two ? One passion in twin-hearts, which grows Till like two meteors of expanding flame, Those spheres instinct with it become

the same, Touch, mingle, are transfigured ; ever

still Burning, yet ever inconsumable : In one another's substance finding food, Like flames too pure and light and un

imbued To nourish their bright lives with baser

prey, Which point to Heaven and cannot pass

away : One hope within two wills, one will

beneath Two overshadowing minds, one life, one

death, One Heaven, one Hell, one immortality, And one annihilation. Woe is me! The wingéd words on which my soul

would pierce Into the height of love's rare Universe, Are chains of lead around its flight of

fireI pant, I sink, I tremble, I expire !

When I arose and saw the dawn,

I sighed for thee ; When light rode high, and the dew was

gone, And noon lay beavy on flower and tree, And the weary Day turned to his rest, Lingering like an unloved guest,

I sighed for thee.

Thy brother Death came, and cried,

Wouldst thou me? Thy sweet child Sleep, the filmy-eyed, Murmured like a noontide bee, Shall I nestle near thy sile ? Wouldst thou me?-- And I replied,

No, not thee!

Death will come when thou art dead

Soon, too soon --Sleep will come when thon art fled ; Of neither would I ask the boon I ask of thee, belovéd Night -Swift be thine approaching flight, Come soon, soon !

1871. 1824.

TIME

Weak Verses, go, kneel at your

Sovereign's feet, And say :-“We are the masters of thy

slave; What wouldest thou with us and ours

and thine ?" Then call your sisters from Oblivion's

cave, All singing loud : “Love's very pain is

sweet, But its reward is in the world divine Which, if not here, it builds beyond the

grave." So shall ye live when I am there. Then

haste Over the hearts of men, until Marina, Vanna, Primus, and the rest, And bid them love each other and be

blest; And leave the troop which errs, and

which reproves, And come and be my guest,-for I am Love's.

1821. 1821.

ye meet

UNFATHOMABLE Sea! whose waves are

years, Ocean of Time, whose waters of deep

Woe Are brackish with the salt of human

tears! Thou shoreless flood, which in thy

ebb and flow Claspest the limits of mortality! And sick of prey, yet howling on for

more, Vomitest thy wrecks on its inhospitable

shiore;