The comet hanging o'er the waste dark seas, The massy rainbow curved in front of it, Beyond the village with the masts and trees; 860 The snaky imp, dog-headed, from the Pit, Bearing upon its batlike leathern pinions Her name unfolded in the sun's dominions, The MELENCOLIA' that transcends all wit. Thus has the artist copied her, and thus 865 Surrounded to expound her form sublime, Her fate heroic and calamitous; Fronting the dreadful mysteries of Time, Unvanquished in defeat and desolation, Undaunted in the hopeless conflagration 870 Of the day setting on her baffled prime. Baffled and beaten back she works on still, Weary and sick of soul she works the more, Sustained by her indomitable will: The hands shall fashion and the brain 875 shall pore And all her sorrow shall be turned to labour, Till death the friend-foe piercing with his sabre That mighty heart of hearts ends bitter He cried out through the night: With its ghost of a moon 905 1874 5 10 885 Beneath and around Then all again still. The sense that every struggle brings defeat Because Fate holds no prize to crown suc cess; A long shuddering thrill 1881 20 AN empty laugh, I heard it on the road This much I know, that it goes up to God; 10 Whose life is music of the eternal sea! And be not careful to unearth a cause: 1893 That move thy life, nor will they suffer let, Nor change their scope; else, living, thou wert dead. 20 "This is thy life: indulge its natural flow, And carve these forms. They yet may find a place On shelves for them reserved. In any case, I bid thee carve them, knowing what I know.' A WISH 1893 OF two things one: with Chaucer let me ride, THE VOICES OF NATURE *Collected Poems, The Macmillan Company, 1900. By permission of the Publishers. 1893 Were silver castanets ODE WE are the music-makers, And we are the dreamers of dreams, Wandering by lone sea-breakers, And sitting by desolate streams; World-losers and world-forsakers, On whom the pale moon gleams: That tinkled 'mong the vanities, and quick- Yet we are the movers and shakers ened 5 25 30 Of the world for ever, it seems. With wonderful deathless ditties We build up the world's great cities, And out of a fabulous story We fashion an empire's glory: One man with a dream, at pleasure, Shall go forth and conquer a crown; And three with a new song's measure Can trample a kingdom down. 10 15 35 We, in the ages lying In the buried past of the earth, Built Nineveh with our sighing, And Babel itself in our mirth; And o'erthrew them with prophesying To the Old of the New World's worth; For each age is a dream that is dying, Or one that is coming to birth. A breath of our inspiration Is the life of each generation; A wondrous thing of our dreaming Unearthly, impossible seemingThe soldier, the king, and the peasant Are working together in one, Till our dream shall become their present, And their work in the world be done. 20 25 25 30 And therefore to-day is thrilling And the multitudes are enlisted But we, with our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see, Our souls with high music ringing: O men! it must ever be 45 50 That we dwell, in our dreaming and sing ing, A little apart from ye. 55 The lily of your bended head, 5 The bindweed of your hair: From the dazzling unknown shore; Bring us hither your sun and your summers, And renew our world as of yore; You shall teach us your song's new numbers, And things that we dreamed not before: 70 Yea, in spite of a dreamer who slumbers, And a singer who sings no more. 1874 Thrush, blackbird, linnet, without pause, The burden did repeat, And still began again because You were more sweet. And then I went down to the sea, 15 HEATHER ALE FROM the bonny bells of heather In their dwellings underground. There rose a king in Scotland, He smote the Picts in battle, Summer came in the country, 10 5 Rudely plucked from their hiding, And the king sat high on his charger, And the dwarfish and swarthy couple There stood the son and father A word for the royal ear. 'Life is dear to the agèd, And honour a little thing; His voice was small as a sparrow's, And shrill and wonderful clear: 'I would gladly sell my secret, Only my son I fear. 10 But the manner of the brewing Was none alive to tell. And it's I will tell the secret That I have sworn to keep.' 20 In graves that were like children's On many a mountain head, They took the son and bound him, Neck and heels in a thong, The Brewsters of the Heather And a lad took him and swung him, 75 Lay numbered with the dead. And flung him far and strong, And the sea swallowed his body, |