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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of +the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have +to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. + +Title: Silhouettes + +Author: Arthur Symons + +Release Date: July 28, 2009 [EBook #29531] +[Last updated: October 29, 2020] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SILHOUETTES *** + + + + +Produced by Ruth Hart + + + + + + +</pre> + +<h1>SILHOUETTES</h1> + +<h2>BY<br />ARTHUR SYMONS</h2> + +<h4>SECOND EDITION<br /> +REVISED AND ENLARGED</h4> + +<h4>LONDON: LEONARD SMITHERS<br /> +EFFINGHAM HOUSE: ARUNDEL STREET<br /> +STRAND: MDCCCXCVI</h4> + +<p class="center"> +TO<br /> +KATHERINE WILLARD,<br /> +NOW<br /> +KATHERINE BALDWIN.</p> + +<p class="center"> +<i>Paris: May,</i> 1892.<br /> +<i>London: February,</i> 1896.</p> + +<hr /> + +<h2>CONTENTS.</h2> + +<table summary="" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto"> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#1">*Preface</a>:</td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#1">Being a Word on Behalf of Patchouli:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. xiii.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> </td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#2">At Dieppe:</a></td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#3">After Sunset</a>:</td> + +<td align="right">p. 3.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#4">On the Beach:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 4.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#5">Rain on the Down:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 5.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#6">Before the Squall:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 6.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#7">Under the Cliffs:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 7.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#8">Requies:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 8.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> </td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#9">Masks and Faces:</a></td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#10">Pastel:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 11.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#11">Her Eyes:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 12.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#12">Morbidezza:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 13.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#13">Maquillage:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 14.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#14">*Impression:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 15.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#15">An Angel of Perugino:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 16.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#16">At Fontainebleau:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 17.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#17">On the Heath:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 18.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#18">In the Oratory:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 19.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#19">Pattie:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 20.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#20">In an Omnibus:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 21.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#21">On Meeting After:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 22.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#22">In Bohemia:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 23.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#23">Emmy:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 24.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#24">Emmy at the Eldorado:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 26.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#25">*At the Cavour:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 27.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#26">In the Haymarket:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 28.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#27">At the Lyceum:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 29.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#28">The Blind Beggar:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 30.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#29">The Old Labourer:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 31.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#30">The Absinthe Drinker:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 32.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#31">Javanese Dancers</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 33.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> </td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#32">Love’s Disguises:</a></td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#33">Love in Spring:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 37.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#34">Gipsy Love</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 38.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#35">In Kensington Gardens:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 39.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#36">*Rewards:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 40.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#37">Perfume:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 41.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#38">Souvenir:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 42.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#39">*To Mary:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 43.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#40">To a Great Actress:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 44.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#41">Love in Dreams:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 45.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#42">Music and Memory:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 46.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#43">*Spring Twilight:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 47.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#44">In Winter:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 48.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#45">*Quest:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 49.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#46">To a Portrait:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 50.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#47">*Second Thoughts:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 51.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#48">April Midnight:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 52.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#49">During Music:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 53.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#50">On the Bridge:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 54.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#51">“I Dream of Her”:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 55.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#52">*Tears:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 56.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#53">*The Last Exit:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 57.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#54">After Love:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 58.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#55">Alla Passeretta Bruna:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 59.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> </td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#56">Nocturnes:</a></td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#57">Nocturne:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 63.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#58">Her Street:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 64.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#59">On Judges’ Walk:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 65.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#60">In the Night:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 66.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> </td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#61">Fêtes Galantes:</a></td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#62">*Mandoline:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 69.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#63">*Dans l’Allée</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 70.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#64">*Cythère:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 71.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#65">*Les Indolents:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 72.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#66">*Fantoches:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 73.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#67">*Pantomine:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 74.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#68">*L’Amour par Terre:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 75.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#69">*A Clymène:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 76.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#70">From Romances sans Parole</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 71.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> </td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"> </td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#71">Moods and Memories:</a></td> + +<td align="right"> </td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#72">City Nights:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 81.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#73">A White Night:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 82.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#74">In the Valley:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 83.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#75">Peace at Noon:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 84.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#76">In Fountain Court:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 85.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#77">At Burgos:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 86.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#78">At Dawn:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 87.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#79">In Autumn:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 88.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#80">On the Roads:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 89.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#81">*Pierrot in Half-Mourning:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 90.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td><a href="#82">For a Picture of Watteau:</a></td> + +<td align="right">p. 91.</td> + +<td align="right"></td> +</tr> + +</table> + +<p> +* The Preface, and the nineteen Poems marked with an asterisk, were not +contained in the first edition. One Poem has been omitted, and many completely +rewritten. +</p> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="1"></a>PREFACE:</h2> + +<h3>BEING A WORD ON BEHALF OF PATCHOULI.</h3> + +<p> +AN ingenuous reviewer once described some verses of mine as “unwholesome,” +because, he said, they had “a faint smell of Patchouli about them.” I am a +little sorry he chose Patchouli, for that is not a particularly favourite scent +with me. If he had only chosen Peau d’Espagne, which has a subtle meaning, or +Lily of the Valley, with which I have associations! But Patchouli will serve. +Let me ask, then, in republishing, with additions, a collection of little +pieces, many of which have been objected to, at one time or another, as being +somewhat deliberately frivolous, why art should not, if it please, concern +itself with the artificially charming, which, I suppose, is what my critic means +by Patchouli? All art, surely, is a form of artifice, and thus, to the truly +devout mind, condemned already, if not as actively noxious, at all events as +needless. That is a point of view which I quite understand, and its conclusion I +hold to be absolutely logical. I have the utmost respect for the people who +refuse to read a novel, to go to the theatre, or to learn dancing. That is to +have convictions and to live up to them. I understand also the point of view +from which a work of art is tolerated in so far as it is actually militant on +behalf of a religious or a moral idea. But what I fail to understand are those +delicate, invisible degrees by which a distinction is drawn between this form of +art and that; the hesitations, and compromises, and timorous advances, and +shocked retreats, of the Puritan conscience once emancipated, and yet afraid of +liberty. However you may try to convince yourself to the contrary, a work of art +can be judged only from two standpoints: the standpoint from which its art is +measured entirely by its morality, and the standpoint from which its morality is +measured entirely by its art.</p> + +<p>Here, for once, in connection with these “Silhouettes,” I have not, if my +recollection serves me, been accused of actual immorality. I am but a fair way +along the “primrose path,” not yet within singeing distance of the “everlasting +bonfire.” In other words, I have not yet written “London Nights,” which, it +appears (I can scarcely realize it, in my innocent abstraction in aesthetical +matters), has no very salutary reputation among the blameless moralists of the +press. I need not, therefore, on this occasion, concern myself with more than +the curious fallacy by which there is supposed to be something inherently wrong +in artistic work which deals frankly and lightly with the very real charm of the +lighter emotions and the more fleeting sensations.</p> + +<p>I do not wish to assert that the kind of verse which happened to reflect +certain moods of mine at a certain period of my life, is the best kind of verse +in itself, or is likely to seem to me, in other years, when other moods may have +made me their own, the best kind of verse for my own expression of myself. Nor +do I affect to doubt that the creation of the supreme emotion is a higher form +of art than the reflection of the most exquisite sensation, the evocation of the +most magical impression. I claim only an equal liberty for the rendering of +every mood of that variable and inexplicable and contradictory creature which we +call ourselves, of every aspect under which we are gifted or condemned to +apprehend the beauty and strangeness and curiosity of the visible world.</p> + +<p> +Patchouli! Well, why not Patchouli? Is there any “reason in nature” +why we should write exclusively about the natural blush, if the delicately +acquired blush of rouge has any attraction for us? Both exist; both, I think, +are charming in their way; and the latter, as a subject, has, at all events, +more novelty. If you prefer your “new-mown hay” in the hayfield, and +I, it may be, in a scent-bottle, why may not my individual caprice be allowed +to find expression as well as yours? Probably I enjoy the hayfield as much as +you do; but I enjoy quite other scents and sensations as well, and I take the +former for granted, and write my poem, for a change, about the latter. There is +no necessary difference in artistic value between a good poem about a flower in +the hedge and a good poem about the scent in a sachet. I am always charmed to +read beautiful poems about nature in the country. Only, personally, I prefer +town to country; and in the town we have to find for ourselves, as best we may, +the <i>décor</i> which is the town equivalent of the great natural <i>décor</i> +of fields and hills. Here it is that artificiality comes in; and if any one +sees no beauty in the effects of artificial light, in all the variable, most +human, and yet most factitious town landscape, I can only pity him, and go on +my own way. +</p> + +<p>That is, if he will let me. But he tells me that one thing is right and the +other is wrong; that one is good art and the other is bad; and I listen in +amazement, sometimes not without impatience, wondering why an estimable personal +prejudice should be thus exalted into a dogma, and uttered in the name of art. +For in art there can be no prejudices, only results. If we arc to save people’s +souls by the writing of verses, well and good. But if not, there is no choice +but to admit an absolute freedom of choice. And if Patchouli pleases one, why +not Patchouli?</p> + +<p class="right"> +Arthur Symons. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +London, <i>February,</i>1896. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="2"></a>AT DIEPPE.</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="3"></a>AFTER SUNSET.</h2> + +<p>THE sea lies quieted beneath<br /> + The after-sunset flush<br /> +That leaves upon the heaped grey clouds<br /> + The grape’s faint purple blush.</p> + +<p>Pale, from a little space in heaven<br /> + Of delicate ivory,<br /> +The sickle-moon and one gold star<br /> + Look down upon the sea.<br /><br /></p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="4"></a>ON THE BEACH.</h2> + +<p>NIGHT, a grey sky, a ghostly sea,<br /> + The soft beginning of the rain:<br /> + Black on the horizon, sails that wane<br /> +Into the distance mistily.</p> + +<p>The tide is rising, I can hear<br /> + The soft roar broadening far along;<br /> +It cries and murmurs in my car<br /> + A sleepy old forgotten song.</p> + +<p>Softly the stealthy night descends,<br /> + The black sails fade into the sky:<br /> +Is this not, where the sea-line ends,<br /> + The shore-line of infinity?</p> + +<p>I cannot think or dream: the grey<br /> + Unending waste of sea and night,<br /> + Dull, impotently infinite,<br /> +Blots out the very hope of day. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="5"></a>RAIN ON THE DOWN.</h2> + +<p>NIGHT, and the down by the sea,<br /> + And the veil of rain on the down;<br /> +And she came through the mist and the rain to me<br /> + From the safe warm lights of the town.</p> + +<p>The rain shone in her hair,<br /> + And her face gleamed in the rain;<br /> +And only the night and the rain were there<br /> + As she came to me out of the rain.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="6"></a>BEFORE THE SQUALL.</h2> + +<p>THE wind is rising on the sea,<br /> + White flashes dance along the deep,<br /> +That moans as if uneasily<br /> + It turned in an unquiet sleep.</p> + +<p>Ridge after rocky ridge upheaves<br /> + A toppling crest that falls in spray<br /> +Where the tormented beach receives<br /> + The buffets of the sea’s wild play.</p> + +<p>On the horizon’s nearing line,<br /> + Where the sky rests, a visible wall.<br /> +Grey in the offing, I divine<br /> + The sails that fly before the squall.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="7"></a>UNDER THE CLIFFS.</h2> + +<p>BRIGHT light to windward on the horizon’s verge;<br /> +To leeward, stormy shadows, violet-black,<br /> +And the wide sea between<br /> +A vast unfurrowed field of windless green;<br /> +The stormy shadows flicker on the track<br /> +Of phantom sails that vanish and emerge.</p> + +<p>I gaze across the sea, remembering her.<br /> +I watch the white sun walk across the sea,<br /> +This pallid afternoon,<br /> +With feet that tread as whitely as the moon,<br /> +And in his fleet and shining feet I see<br /> +The footsteps of another voyager.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="8"></a>REQUIES.</h2> + +<p>O IS it death or life<br /> + That sounds like something strangely known<br /> +In this subsiding out of strife,<br /> + This slow sea-monotone?</p> + +<p>A sound, scarce heard through sleep,<br /> + Murmurous as the August bees<br /> +That fill the forest hollows deep<br /> + About the roots of trees.</p> + +<p>O is it life or death,<br /> + O is it hope or memory,<br /> +That quiets all things with this breath<br /> + Of the eternal sea?</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="9"></a>MASKS AND FACES.</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="10"></a>PASTEL.</h2> + +<p>THE light of our cigarettes<br /> + Went and came in the gloom:<br /> + It was dark in the little room.</p> + +<p>Dark, and then, in the dark,<br /> + Sudden, a flash, a glow,<br /> + And a hand and a ring I know.</p> + +<p>And then, through the dark, a flush<br /> + Ruddy and vague, the grace—<br /> + A rose—of her lyric face.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="11"></a>HER EYES.</h2> + +<p>BENEATH the heaven of her brows’<br /> + Unclouded noon of peace, there lies<br /> +A leafy heaven of hazel boughs<br /> + In the seclusion of her eyes;</p> + +<p>Her troubling eyes that cannot rest;<br /> + And there’s a little flame that dances<br /> +(A firefly in a grassy nest)<br /> + In the green circle of her glances;</p> + +<p>A frolic Faun that must be hid,<br /> + Shyly, in some fantastic shade,<br /> +Where pity droops a tender lid<br /> + On laughter of itself afraid.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="12"></a>MORBIDEZZA.</h2> + +<p>WHITE girl, your flesh is lilies<br /> +Grown ’neath a frozen moon,<br /> +So still is<br /> +The rapture of your swoon<br /> +Of whiteness, snow or lilies.</p> + +<p>The virginal revealment,<br /> +Your bosom’s wavering slope,<br /> +Concealment,<br /> +’Neath fainting heliotrope,<br /> +Of whitest white’s revealment,</p> + +<p>Is like a bed of lilies,<br /> +A jealous-guarded row,<br /> +Whose will is<br /> +Simply chaste dreams:—but oh,<br /> +The alluring scent of lilies!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="13"></a>MAQUILLAGE.</h2> + +<p>THE charm of rouge on fragile cheeks,<br /> + Pearl-powder, and, about the eyes,<br /> +The dark and lustrous Eastern dyes;<br /> + The floating odour that bespeaks<br /> +A scented boudoir and the doubtful night<br /> +Of alcoves curtained close against the light</p> + +<p>Gracile and creamy white and rose,<br /> + Complexioned like the flower of dawn,<br /> +Her fleeting colours are as those<br /> + That, from an April sky withdrawn,<br /> +Fade in a fragrant mist of tears away<br /> +When weeping noon leads on the altered day.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="14"></a>IMPRESSION.</h2> + +<p>TO M. C.</p> + +<p>THE pink and black of silk and lace,<br /> + Flushed in the rosy-golden glow<br /> +Of lamplight on her lifted face;<br /> +Powder and wig, and pink and lace,</p> + +<p>And those pathetic eyes of hers;<br /> + But all the London footlights know<br /> +The little plaintive smile that stirs<br /> +The shadow in those eyes of hers.</p> + +<p>Outside, the dreary church-bell tolled,<br /> + The London Sunday faded slow;<br /> +Ah, what is this? what wings unfold<br /> +In this miraculous rose of gold?</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="15"></a>AN ANGEL OF PERUGINO.</h2> + +<p>HAVE I not seen your face before<br /> + Where Perugino’s angels stand<br /> +In those calm circles, and adore<br /> + With singing throat and lifted hand?</p> + +<p>So the pale hair lay crescent-wise,<br /> + About the placid forehead curled,<br /> +And the pale piety of eyes<br /> + Was as God’s peace upon the world.</p> + +<p>And you, a simple child serene,<br /> + Wander upon your quiet way,<br /> +Nor know that any eyes have seen<br /> + The Umbrian halo crown the day.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="16"></a>AT FONTAINEBLEAU.</h2> + +<p>IT was a day of sun and rain,<br /> + Uncertain as a child’s quick moods;<br /> +And I shall never pass again<br /> + So blithe a day among the woods.</p> + +<p>The forest knew you and was glad,<br /> + And laughed for very joy to know<br /> +Her child was with her; then, grown sad,<br /> + She wept, because her child must go.</p> + +<p>And you would spy and you would capture<br /> + The shyest flower that lit the grass:<br /> +The joy I had to watch your rapture<br /> + Was keen as even your rapture was.</p> + +<p>The forest knew you and was glad,<br /> + And laughed and wept for joy and woe.<br /> +This was the welcome that you had<br /> + Among the woods of Fontainebleau.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="17"></a>ON THE HEATH.</h2> + +<p>HER face’s wilful flash and glow<br /> + Turned all its light upon my face<br /> + One bright delirious moment’s space,<br /> +And then she passed: I followed slow</p> + +<p>Across the heath, and up and round,<br /> + And watched the splendid death of day<br /> + Upon the summits far away,<br /> +And in her fateful beauty found</p> + +<p>The fierce wild beauty of the light<br /> + That startles twilight on the hills,<br /> + And lightens all the mountain rills,<br /> +And flames before the feet of night.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="18"></a>IN THE ORATORY.</h2> + +<p>THE incense mounted like a cloud,<br /> + A golden cloud of languid scent;<br /> +Robed priests before the altar bowed,<br /> + Expecting the divine event.</p> + +<p>Then silence, like a prisoner bound,<br /> + Rose, by a mighty hand set free,<br /> +And dazzlingly, in shafts of sound,<br /> + Thundered Beethoven’s Mass in C.</p> + +<p>She knelt in prayer; large lids serene<br /> + Lay heavy on the sombre eyes,<br /> +As though to veil some vision seen<br /> + Upon the mounts of Paradise.</p> + +<p>Her dark face, calm as carven stone.<br /> + The face that twilight shows the day,<br /> +Brooded, mysteriously alone,<br /> + And infinitely far away.</p> + +<p>Inexplicable eyes that drew<br /> + Mine eyes adoring, why from me<br /> +Demand, new Sphinx, the fatal clue<br /> + That seals my doom or conquers thee?</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="19"></a>PATTIE.</h2> + +<p>COOL comely country Pattie, grown<br /> + A daisy where the daisies grow,<br /> +No wind of heaven has ever blown<br /> + Across a field-flower’s daintier snow.</p> + +<p>Gold-white among the meadow-grass<br /> + The humble little daisies thrive;<br /> +I cannot see them as I pass,<br /> + But I am glad to be alive.</p> + +<p>And so I turn where Pattie stands,<br /> + A flower among the flowers at play;<br /> +I’ll lay my heart into her hands,<br /> + And she will smile the clouds away.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="20"></a>IN AN OMNIBUS.</h2> + +<p>YOUR smile is like a treachery,<br /> + A treachery adorable;<br /> +So smiles the siren where the sea<br /> + Sings to the unforgetting shell.</p> + +<p>Your fleeting Leonardo face,<br /> + Parisian Monna Lisa, dreams<br /> + Elusively, but not of streams<br /> +Born in a shadow-haunted place.</p> + +<p>Of Paris, Paris, is your thought,<br /> + Of Paris robes, and when to wear<br /> +The latest bonnet you have bought<br /> + To match the marvel of your hair.</p> + +<p>Yet that fine malice of your smile,<br /> + That faint and fluctuating glint<br /> + Between your eyelids, does it hint<br /> +Alone of matters mercantile?</p> + +<p>Close lips that keep the secret in,<br /> + Half spoken by the stealthy eyes,<br /> +Is there indeed no word to win,<br /> + No secret, from the vague replies</p> + +<p>Of lips and lids that feign to hide<br /> + That which they feign to render up?<br /> + Is there, in Tantalus’ dim cup,<br /> +The shadow of water, nought beside?</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="21"></a>ON MEETING AFTER.</h2> + +<p>HER eyes are haunted, eyes that were<br /> + Scarce sad when last we met.<br /> +What thing is this has come to her<br /> + That she may not forget?</p> + +<p>They loved, they married: it is well!<br /> + But ah, what memories<br /> +Are these whereof her eyes half tell,<br /> + Her haunted eyes?</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="22"></a>IN BOHEMIA.</h2> + +<p>DRAWN blinds and flaring gas within,<br /> + And wine, and women, and cigars;<br /> +Without, the city’s heedless din;<br /> + Above, the white unheeding stars.</p> + +<p>And we, alike from each remote,<br /> + The world that works, the heaven that waits,<br /> +Con our brief pleasures o’er by rote,<br /> + The favourite pastime of the Fates.</p> + +<p>We smoke, to fancy that we dream,<br /> + And drink, a moment’s joy to prove,<br /> +And fain would love, and only seem<br /> + To love because we cannot love.</p> + +<p>Draw back the blinds, put out the light:<br /> + ’Tis morning, let the daylight come.<br /> +God! how the women’s cheeks are white,<br /> + And how the sunlight strikes us dumb!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="23"></a>EMMY.</h2> + +<p>EMMY’S exquisite youth and her virginal air,<br /> + Eyes and teeth in the flash of a musical smile,<br /> +Come to me out of the past, and I see her there<br /> + As I saw her once for a while.</p> + +<p>Emmy’s laughter rings in my ears, as bright,<br /> + Fresh and sweet as the voice of a mountain brook,<br /> +And still I hear her telling us tales that night,<br /> + Out of Boccaccio’s book.</p> + +<p>There, in the midst of the villainous dancing-hall,<br /> + Leaning across the table, over the beer,<br /> +While the music maddened the whirling skirts of the ball,<br /> + As the midnight hour drew near,</p> + +<p>There with the women, haggard, painted and old,<br /> + One fresh bud in a garland withered and stale,<br /> +She, with her innocent voice and her clear eyes, told<br /> + Tale after shameless tale.</p> + +<p>And ever the witching smile, to her face beguiled,<br /> + Paused and broadened, and broke in a ripple of fun,<br /> +And the soul of a child looked out of the eyes of a child,<br /> + Or ever the tale was done.</p> + +<p>O my child, who wronged you first, and began<br /> + First the dance of death that you dance so well?<br /> +Soul for soul: and I think the soul of a man<br /> + Shall answer for yours in hell.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="24"></a>EMMY AT THE ELDORADO.</h2> + +<p>TO meet, of all unlikely things,<br /> +Here, after all one’s wanderings!<br /> +But, Emmy, though we meet,<br /> +What of this lover at your feet?</p> + +<p>For, is this Emmy that I see?<br /> +A fragile domesticity<br /> +I seem to half surprise<br /> +In the evasions of those eyes.</p> + +<p>Once a child’s cloudless eyes, they seem<br /> +Lost in the blue depths of a dream,<br /> +As though, for innocent hours,<br /> +To stray with love among the flowers.</p> + +<p>Without regret, without desire,<br /> +In those old days of love on hire,<br /> +Child, child, what will you do,<br /> +Emmy, now love is come to you?</p> + +<p>Already, in so brief a while,<br /> +The gleam has faded from your smile;<br /> +This grave and tender air<br /> +Leaves you, for all but one, less fair.</p> + +<p>Then, you were heedless, happy, gay,<br /> +Immortally a child; to-day<br /> +A woman, at the years’ control:<br /> +Undine has found a soul.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="25"></a>AT THE CAVOUR.</h2> + +<p>WINE, the red coals, the flaring gas,<br /> + Bring out a brighter tone in cheeks<br /> +That learn at home before the glass<br /> + The flush that eloquently speaks.</p> + +<p>The blue-grey smoke of cigarettes<br /> + Curls from the lessening ends that glow;<br /> +The men are thinking of the bets,<br /> + The women of the debts, they owe.</p> + +<p>Then their eyes meet, and in their eyes<br /> + The accustomed smile comes up to call,<br /> +A look half miserably wise.<br /> + Half heedlessly ironical.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="26"></a>IN THE HAYMARKET.</h2> + +<p>I DANCED at your ball a year ago,<br /> + To-night I pay for your bread and cheese,<br /> +“And a glass of bitters, if you please,<br /> + For you drank my best champagne, you know!”</p> + +<p>Madcap ever, you laugh the while,<br /> + As you drink your bitters and munch your bread;<br /> +The face is the same, and the same old smile<br /> + Came up at a word I said.</p> + +<p>A year ago I danced at your ball,<br /> + I sit by your side in the bar to-night;<br /> +And the luck has changed, you say: that’s all!<br /> + And the luck will change, you say: all right!</p> + +<p>For the men go by, and the rent’s to pay,<br /> + And you haven’t a friend in the world to-day;<br /> +And the money comes and the money goes:<br /> + And to-night, who cares? and to-morrow, who knows?</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="27"></a>AT THE LYCEUM.</h2> + +<p>HER eyes are brands that keep the angry heat<br /> + Of fire that crawls and leaves an ashen path.<br /> + The dust of this devouring flame she hath<br /> +Upon her cheeks and eyelids. Fresh and sweet<br /> +In days that were, her sultry beauty now<br /> + Is pain transfigured, love’s impenitence,<br /> + The memory of a maiden innocence,<br /> +As a crown set upon a weary brow.</p> + +<p>She sits, and fain would listen, fain forget;<br /> + She smiles, but with those tragic, waiting eyes,<br /> +Those proud and piteous lips that hunger yet<br /> + For love’s fulfilment. Ah, when Landry cries<br /> +“My heart is dead!” with what a wild regret<br /> + Her own heart feels the throb that never dies!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="28"></a>THE BLIND BEGGAR.</h2> + +<p>HE stands, a patient figure, where the crowd<br /> + Heaves to and fro beside him. In his ears<br /> + All day the Fair goes thundering, and he hears<br /> +In darkness, as a dead man in his shroud.<br /> +Patient he stands, with age and sorrow bowed,<br /> + And holds a piteous hat of ancient yean;<br /> + And in his face and gesture there appears<br /> +The desperate humbleness of poor men proud.</p> + +<p>What thoughts are his, as, with the inward sight,<br /> + He sees those mirthful faces pass him by?<br /> +Is the long darkness darker for that light.<br /> + The misery deeper when that joy is nigh?<br /> +Patient, alone, he stands from morn to night,<br /> + Pleading in his reproachful misery.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="29"></a>THE OLD LABOURER.</h2> + +<p>HIS fourscore years have bent a back of oak,<br /> + His earth-brown cheeks are full of hollow pits;<br /> + His gnarled hands wander idly as he sits<br /> +Bending above the hearthstone’s feeble smoke.<br /> +Threescore and ten slow years he tilled the land;<br /> + He wrung his bread from out the stubborn soil;<br /> + He saw his masters flourish through his toil;<br /> +He held their substance in his horny hand.</p> + +<p>Now he is old: he asks for daily bread:<br /> + He who has sowed the bread he may not taste<br /> + Begs for the crumbs: he +would do no man wrong.<br /> +The Parish Guardians, when his case is read,<br /> + Will grant him (yet with no unseemly haste)<br /> + Just seventeen pence to starve on, seven days long.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="30"></a>THE ABSINTHE DRINKER.</h2> + +<p>GENTLY I wave the visible world away.<br /> + Far off, I hear a roar, afar yet near,<br /> + Far off and strange, a voice is in my ear,<br /> +And is the voice my own? the words I say<br /> +Fall strangely, like a dream, across the day;<br /> + And the dim sunshine is a dream. How clear,<br /> + New as the world to lovers’ eyes, appear<br /> +The men and women passing on their way!</p> + +<p>The world is very fair. The hours are all<br /> + Linked in a dance of mere forgetfulness.<br /> + I am at peace with God +and man. O glide,<br /> +Sands of the hour-glass that I count not, fall<br /> + Serenely: scarce I feel your soft caress.<br /> + Rocked on this dreamy and +indifferent tide.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="31"></a>JAVANESE DANCERS,</h2> + +<p>TWITCHED strings, the clang of metal, beaten drums.<br /> + Dull, shrill, continuous, disquieting;<br /> +And now the stealthy dancer comes<br /> + Undulantly with cat-like steps that cling;</p> + +<p>Smiling between her painted lids a smile,<br /> + Motionless, unintelligible, she twines<br /> + Her fingers into mazy lines,<br /> +Twining her scarves across them all the while.</p> + +<p>One, two, three, four step forth, and, to and fro,<br /> + Delicately and imperceptibly,<br /> +Now swaying gently in a row,<br /> + Now interthreading slow and rhythmically,</p> + +<p>Still with fixed eyes, monotonously still,<br /> + Mysteriously, with smiles inanimate,<br /> + With lingering feet that undulate,<br /> +With sinuous fingers, spectral hands that thrill,</p> + +<p>The little amber-coloured dancers move,<br /> + Like little painted figures on a screen,<br /> + Or phantom-dancers haply seen<br /> +Among the shadows of a magic grove.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="32"></a>LOVE’S DISGUISES.</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="33"></a>LOVE IN SPRING.</h2> + +<p>GOOD to be loved and to love for a little, and then<br /> + Well to forget, be forgotten, ere loving grow life!<br /> +Dear, you have loved me, but was I the man among men?<br /> +Sweet, I have loved you, but scarcely as mistress or wife.</p> + +<p>Message of Spring in the hearts of a man and a maid,<br /> + Hearts on a holiday: ho! let us love: it is Spring.<br /> +Joy in the birds of the air, in the buds of the glade,<br /> + Joy in our hearts in the joy of the hours on the wing.</p> + +<p>Well, but to-morrow? To-morrow, good-bye: it is over.<br /> + Scarcely with tears shall we part, with a smile who had +met.<br /> +Tears? What is this? But I thought we were playing at lover.<br /> + Play-time is past. I am going. And you love me yet!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="34"></a>GIPSY LOVE.</h2> + +<p>THE gipsy tents are on the down,<br /> + The gipsy girls are here;<br /> +And it’s O to be off and away from the town<br /> + With a gipsy for my dear!</p> + +<p>We’d make our bed in the bracken<br /> + With the lark for a chambermaid;<br /> +The lark would sing us awake in the mornings<br /> + Singing above our head.</p> + +<p>We’d drink the sunlight all day long<br /> + With never a house to bind us;<br /> +And we’d only flout in a merry song<br /> + The world we left behind us.</p> + +<p>We would be free as birds are free<br /> + The livelong day, the livelong day;<br /> +And we would lie in the sunny bracken<br /> + With none to say us nay.</p> + +<p>The gipsy tents are on the down,<br /> + The gipsy girls are here;<br /> +And it’s O to be off and away from the town<br /> + With a gipsy for my dear!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="35"></a>IN KENSINGTON GARDENS.</h2> + +<p>UNDER the almond tree,<br /> +Room for my love and me!<br /> + Over our heads the April blossom;<br /> +April-hearted are we.</p> + +<p>Under the pink and white,<br /> +Love in her eyes alight;<br /> + Love and the Spring and Kensington Gardens:<br /> +Hey for the heart’s delight!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="36"></a>REWARDS.</h2> + +<p>BECAUSE you cried, I kissed you, and,<br /> +Ah me! how should I understand<br /> +That piteous little you were fain<br /> +To cry and to be kissed again?</p> + +<p>Because you smiled at last, I thought<br /> +That I had found what I had sought.<br /> +But soon I found, without a doubt,<br /> +No man can find a woman out.</p> + +<p>I kissed your tears, and did not stay<br /> +Till I had kissed them all away.<br /> +Ah, hapless me! ah, heartless child!<br /> +She would not kiss me when she smiled.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="37"></a>PERFUME.</h2> + +<p>SHAKE out your hair about me, so,<br /> + That I may feel the stir and scent<br /> +Of those vague odours come and go<br /> + The way our kisses went.</p> + +<p>Night gave this priceless hour of love,<br /> + But now the dawn steals in apace,<br /> +And amorously bends above<br /> + The wonder of your face.</p> + +<p>“Farewell” between our kisses creeps,<br /> + You fade, a ghost, upon the air;<br /> +Yet, ah! the vacant place still keeps<br /> + The odour of your hair.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="38"></a>SOUVENIR.</h2> + +<p>HOW you haunt me with your eyes!<br /> +Still that questioning persistence,<br /> +Sad and sweet, across the distance<br /> +Of the days of love and laughter,<br /> +Those old days of love and lies.</p> + +<p>Not reproaching, not reproving,<br /> +Only, always, questioning,<br /> +Those divinest eyes can bring<br /> +Memories of certain summers,<br /> +Nights of dreaming, days of loving,</p> + +<p>When I loved you, when your kiss,<br /> +Shyer than a bird to capture,<br /> +Lit a sudden heaven of rapture;<br /> +When we neither dreamt that either<br /> +Could grow old in heart like this.</p> + +<p>Do you still, in love’s December,<br /> +Still remember, still regret<br /> +That sweet unavailing debt?<br /> +Ah, you haunt me, to remind me<br /> +You remember, I forget!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="39"></a>TO MARY.</h2> + +<p>IF, Mary, that imperious face,<br /> + And not in dreams alone,<br /> +Come to this shadow-haunted place<br /> + And claim dominion;</p> + +<p>If, for your sake, I do unqueen<br /> + Some well-remembered ghost,<br /> +Forgetting much of what hath been<br /> + Best loved, remembered most;</p> + +<p>It is your witchery, not my will,<br /> + Your beauty, not my choice:<br /> +My shadows knew me faithful, till<br /> + They heard your living voice.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="40"></a>TO A GREAT ACTRESS.</h2> + +<p>SHE has taken my heart, though she knows not, would care not.<br /> + It thrills at her voice like a reed in the wind;<br /> +I would taste all her agonies, have her to spare not,<br /> + Sin deep as she sinned,</p> + +<p>To be tossed by the storm of her love, as the ocean<br /> + Rocks vessels to wreck; to be hers, though the cost<br /> +Were the loss of all else: for that moment’s emotion<br /> + Content to be lost!</p> + +<p>To be, for a moment, the man of all men to her,<br /> + All the world, for one measureless moment complete;<br /> +To possess, be possessed! To be mockery then to her,<br /> + Then to die at her feet!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="41"></a>LOVE IN DREAMS.</h2> + +<p>I LIE on my pallet bed,<br /> + And I hear the drip of the rain;<br /> +The rain on my garret roof is falling,<br /> + And I am cold and in pain.</p> + +<p>I lie on my pallet bed,<br /> + And my heart is wild with delight;<br /> +I hear her voice through the midnight calling,<br /> + As I lie awake in the night.</p> + +<p>I lie on my pallet bed,<br /> + And I see her bright eyes gleam;<br /> +She smiles, she speaks, and the world is ended,<br /> + And made again in a dream.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="42"></a>MUSIC AND MEMORY.</h2> + +<p>To K.W.</p> + +<p>ACROSS the tides of music, in the night,<br /> +Her magical face,<br /> +A light upon it as the happy light<br /> +Of dreams in some delicious place<br /> +Under the moonlight in the night.</p> + +<p>Music, soft throbbing music in the night,<br /> +Her memory swims<br /> +Into the brain, a carol of delight;<br /> +The cup of music overbrims<br /> +With wine of memory, in the night.</p> + +<p>Her face across the music, in the night,<br /> +Her face a refrain,<br /> +A light that sings along the waves of light,<br /> +A memory that returns again,<br /> +Music in music, in the night.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="43"></a>SPRING TWILIGHT.</h2> + +<p>To K. W.</p> + +<p>THE twilight droops across the day,<br /> + I watch her portrait on the wall<br /> +Palely recede into the grey<br /> + That palely comes and covers all.</p> + +<p>The sad Spring twilight, dull, forlorn,<br /> + The menace of the dreary night:<br /> +But in her face, more fair than morn,<br /> + A sweet suspension of delight.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="44"></a>IN WINTER.</h2> + +<p>PALE from the watery west, with the pallor of winter a-cold,<br /> +Rays of the afternoon sun in a glimmer across the trees;<br /> +Glittering moist underfoot, the long alley. The firs, one by one,<br /> +Catch and conceal, as I saunter, and flash in a dazzle of gold<br /> +Lower and lower the vanishing disc: and the sun alone sees<br /> +At I wait for my love in the fir-tree alley alone with the sun.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="45"></a>QUEST.</h2> + +<p>I CHASE a shadow through the night,<br /> + A shadow unavailing;<br /> +Out of the dark, into the light,<br /> + I follow, follow: is it she?</p> + +<p>Against the wall of sea outlined,<br /> + Outlined against the windows lit,<br /> +The shadow flickers, and behind<br /> + I follow, follow after it.</p> + +<p>The shadow leads me through the night<br /> + To the grey margin of the sea;<br /> +Out of the dark, into the light,<br /> + I follow unavailingly.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="46"></a>TO A PORTRAIT.</h2> + +<p>A PENSIVE photograph<br /> + Watches me from the shelf:<br /> +Ghost of old love, and half<br /> + Ghost of myself!</p> + +<p>How the dear waiting eyes<br /> + Watch me and love me yet:<br /> +Sad home of memories,<br /> + Her waiting eyes!</p> + +<p>Ghost of old love, wronged ghost,<br /> + Return, though all the pain<br /> +Of all once loved, long lost,<br /> + Come back again.</p> + +<p>Forget not, but forgive!<br /> + Alas, too late I cry.<br /> +We are two ghosts that had their chance to live,<br /> + And lost it, she and I.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="47"></a>SECOND THOUGHTS.</h2> + +<p>WHEN you were here, ah foolish then!<br /> + I scarcely knew I loved you, dear.<br /> +I know it now, I know it when<br /> + You are no longer here.</p> + +<p>When you were here, I sometimes tired,<br /> + Ah me! that you so loved me, dear.<br /> +Now, in these weary days desired,<br /> + You are no longer here.</p> + +<p>When you were here, did either know<br /> + That each so loved the other, dear?<br /> +But that was long and long ago:<br /> + You are no longer here.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="48"></a>APRIL MIDNIGHT.</h2> + +<p>SIDE by side through the streets at midnight,<br /> + Roaming together,<br /> +Through the tumultuous night of London,<br /> + In the miraculous April weather.</p> + +<p>Roaming together under the gaslight,<br /> + Day’s work over,<br /> +How the Spring calls to us, here in the city,<br /> + Calls to the heart from the heart of a lover!</p> + +<p>Cool the wind blows, fresh in our faces,<br /> + Cleansing, entrancing,<br /> +After the heat and the fumes and the footlights,<br /> + Where you dance and I watch your dancing.</p> + +<p>Good it is to be here together,<br /> + Good to be roaming;<br /> +Even in London, even at midnight,<br /> + Lover-like in a lover’s gloaming.</p> + +<p>You the dancer and I the dreamer,<br /> + Children together,<br /> +Wandering lost in the night of London,<br /> + In the miraculous April weather.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="49"></a>DURING MUSIC.</h2> + +<p>THE music had the heat of blood,<br /> + A passion that no words can reach;<br /> +We sat together, and understood<br /> + Our own heart’s speech.</p> + +<p>We had no need of word or sign,<br /> + The music spoke for us, and said<br /> +All that her eyes could read in mine<br /> + Or mine in hers had read.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="50"></a>ON THE BRIDGE.</h2> + +<p>MIDNIGHT falls across hollow gulfs of<br /> +night<br /> + As a stone that falls in a sounding well;<br /> +Under us the Seine flows through dark and light,<br /> + While the beat of time—hark!—is audible.</p> + +<p>Lights on bank and bridge glitter gold and red,<br /> + Lights upon the stream glitter red and white;<br /> +Under us the night, and the night overhead.<br /> + We together, we alone together in the night.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="51"></a>“I DREAM OF HER.”</h2> + +<p>I DREAM of her the whole night long,<br /> + The pillows with my tears are wet.<br /> +I wake, I seek amid the throng<br /> + The courage to forget.</p> + +<p>Yet still, as night comes round, I dread,<br /> + With unavailing fears,<br /> +The dawn that finds, beneath my head,<br /> + The pillows wet with tears.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="52"></a>TEARS.</h2> + +<p>O HANDS that I have held in mine,<br /> + That knew my kisses and my tears,<br /> + Hands that in other years<br /> +Have poured my balm, have poured my wine;</p> + +<p>Women, once loved, and always mine,<br /> + I call to you across the years,<br /> + I bring a gift of tears,<br /> +I bring my tears to you as wine.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="53"></a>THE LAST EXIT.</h2> + +<p>OUR love was all arrayed in pleasantness,<br /> + A tender little love that sighed and smiled<br /> + At little happy nothings, like a child,<br /> +A dainty little love in fancy dress.</p> + +<p>But now the love that once was half in play<br /> + Has come to be this grave and piteous thing.<br /> + Why did you leave me all this suffering<br /> +For all your memory when you went away?</p> + +<p>You might have played the play out, O my friend,<br /> + Closing upon a kiss our comedy.<br /> + Or is it, then, a fault of taste in me,<br /> +Who like no tragic exit at the end?</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="54"></a>AFTER LOVE.</h2> + +<p>O TO part now, and, parting now,<br /> + Never to meet again;<br /> +To have done for ever, I and thou,<br /> + With joy, and so with pain.</p> + +<p>It is too hard, too hard to meet<br /> + As friends, and love no more;<br /> +Those other meetings were too sweet<br /> + That went before.</p> + +<p>And I would have, now love is over,<br /> + An end to all, an end:<br /> +I cannot, having been your lover,<br /> + Stoop to become your friend!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="55"></a>ALLA PASSERETTA BRUNA.</h2> + +<p>IF I bid you, you will come,<br /> + If I bid you, you will go,<br /> + You are mine, and so I +take you<br /> +To my heart, your home;<br /> + Well, ah, well I know<br /> + I shall not forsake you.</p> + +<p>I shall always hold you fast,<br /> + I shall never set you free,<br /> + You are mine, and I +possess you<br /> +Long as life shall last;<br /> + You will comfort me,<br /> + I shall bless you.</p> + +<p>I shall keep you as we keep<br /> + Flowers for memory, hid away,<br /> + Under many a newer token<br /> +Buried deep,<br /> + Roses of a gaudier day,<br /> + Rings and trinkets, +bright and broken.</p> + +<p>Other women I shall love,<br /> + Fame and fortune I may win,<br /> + But when fame and love +forsake me<br /> +And the light is night above,<br /> + You will let me in,<br /> + You will take me.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="56"></a>NOCTURNES.</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="57"></a>NOCTURNE.</h2> + +<p>ONE little cab to hold us two,<br /> +Night, an invisible dome of cloud,<br /> +The rattling wheels that made our whispers loud,<br /> +As heart-beats into whispers grew;<br /> +And, long, the Embankment with its lights,<br /> +The pavement glittering with fallen rain,<br /> +The magic and the mystery that are night’s,<br /> +And human love without the pain.</p> + +<p>The river shook with wavering gleams,<br /> +Deep buried as the glooms that lay<br /> +Impenetrable as the grave of day,<br /> +Near and as distant as our dreams.<br /> +A bright train flashed with all its squares<br /> +Of warm light where the bridge lay mistily.<br /> +The night was all about us: we were free,<br /> +Free of the day and all its cares!</p> + +<p>That was an hour of bliss too long,<br /> +Too long to last where joy is brief.<br /> +Yet one escape of souls may yield relief<br /> +To many weary seasons’ wrong.<br /> +“O last for ever!” my heart cried;<br /> +It ended: heaven was done.<br /> +I had been dreaming by her side<br /> +That heaven was but begun.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="58"></a>HER STREET.</h2> + +<p>(IN ABSENCE.)</p> + +<p>I PASSED your street of many memories.<br /> + A sunset, sombre pink, the flush<br /> + Of inner rose-leaves idle fingers crush,<br /> +Died softly, as the rose that dies.<br /> +All the high heaven behind the roof lay thus,<br /> + Tenderly dying, touched with pain<br /> + A little; standing there I saw again<br /> +The sunsets that were dear to us.</p> + +<p>I knew not if ’twere bitter or more sweet<br /> + To stand and watch the roofs, the sky.<br /> + O bitter to be there and you not nigh,<br /> +Yet this had been that blessed street.<br /> +How the name thrilled me, there upon the wall!<br /> + There was the house, the windows there<br /> + Against the rosy twilight high and bare,<br /> +The pavement-stones: I knew them all!</p> + +<p>Days that have been, days that have fallen cold!<br /> + I stood and gazed, and thought of you,<br /> + Until remembrance sweet and mournful drew<br /> +Tears to eyes smiling as of old.<br /> +So, sad and glad, your memory visibly<br /> + Alive within my eyes, I turned;<br /> + And, through a window, met two eyes that burned,<br /> +Tenderly questioning, on me.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="59"></a>ON JUDGES’ WALK.</h2> + +<p>THAT night on Judges’ Walk the wind<br /> + Was as the voice of doom;<br /> +The heath, a lake of darkness, lay<br /> + As silent as the tomb.</p> + +<p>The vast night brooded, white with stars,<br /> + Above the world’s unrest;<br /> +The awfulness of silence ached<br /> + Like a strong heart repressed.</p> + +<p>That night we walked beneath the trees,<br /> + Alone, beneath the trees;<br /> +There was some word we could not say<br /> + Half uttered in the breeze.</p> + +<p>That night on Judges’ Walk we said<br /> + No word of all we had to say;<br /> +But now there shall be no word said<br /> + Before the Judge’s Day.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="60"></a>IN THE NIGHT.</h2> + +<p>THE moonlight had tangled the trees<br /> +Under our feet as we walked in the night,<br /> +And the shadows beneath us were stirred by the breeze<br /> +In the magical light;<br /> +And the moon was a silver fire,<br /> +And the stars were flickers of flame,<br /> +Golden and violet and red;<br /> +And the night-wind sighed my desire,<br /> +And the wind in the tree-tops whispered and said<br /> +In her ear her adorable name.</p> + +<p>But her heart would not hear what I heard,<br /> +The pulse of the night as it beat,<br /> +Love, Love, Love, the unspeakable word,<br /> +In its murmurous repeat;<br /> +She heard not the night-wind’s sigh,<br /> +Nor her own name breathed in her ear,<br /> +Nor the cry of my heart to her heart,<br /> +A speechless, a clamorous cry:<br /> +“Love! Love! will she hear? will she hear?”<br /> +O heart, she will hear, by and by,<br /> +When we part, when for ever we part.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="61"></a>FÊTES GALANTES.</h2> + +<p>AFTER PAUL VERLAINE. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="62"></a>MANDOLINE,</h2> + +<p>THE singers of serenades<br /> + Whisper their faded vows<br /> +Unto fair listening maids<br /> + Under the singing boughs.</p> + +<p>Tircis, Aminte, are there,<br /> + Clitandre is over-long,<br /> +And Damis for many a fair<br /> + Tyrant makes many a song.</p> + +<p>Their short vests, silken and bright,<br /> + Their long pale silken trains,<br /> +Their elegance of delight,<br /> + Twine soft blue silken chains.</p> + +<p>And the mandolines and they,<br /> + Faintlier breathing, swoon<br /> +Into the rose and grey<br /> + Ecstasy of the moon.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="63"></a>DANS L’ALLÉE.</h2> + +<p>AS in the age of shepherd king and queen,<br /> +Painted and frail amid her nodding bows,<br /> +Under the sombre branches, and between<br /> +The green and mossy garden-ways she goes,<br /> +With little mincing airs one keeps to pet<br /> +A darling and provoking perroquet.<br /> +Her long-trained robe is blue, the fan she holds<br /> +With fluent fingers girt with heavy rings,<br /> +So vaguely hints of vague erotic things<br /> +That her eye smiles, musing among its folds.<br /> +—Blonde too, a tiny nose, a rosy mouth,<br /> +Artful as that sly patch that makes more sly,<br /> +In her divine unconscious pride of youth,<br /> +The slightly simpering sparkle of the eye.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="64"></a>CYTHÈRE.</h2> + +<p>BY favourable breezes fanned,<br /> + A trellised arbour is at hand<br /> + To shield us from the summer airs;</p> + +<p>The scent of roses, fainting sweet,<br /> + Afloat upon the summer heat,<br /> + Blends with the perfume that she wears.</p> + +<p>True to the promise her eyes gave,<br /> + She ventures all, and her mouth rains<br /> + A dainty fever through my veins;</p> + +<p>And Love, fulfilling all things, save<br /> + Hunger, we ’scape, with sweets and ices,<br /> + The folly of Love’s sacrifices.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="65"></a>LES INDOLENTS.</h2> + +<p>BAH! spite of Fate, that says us nay,<br /> +Suppose we die together, eh?<br /> + —A rare conclusion you discover!</p> + +<p>—What’s rare is good. Let us die so,<br /> +Like lovers in Boccaccio.<br /> + —Hi! hi! hi! you fantastic lover!</p> + +<p>—Nay, not fantastic. If you will,<br /> +Fond, surely irreproachable.<br /> + Suppose, then, that we die together?</p> + +<p>—Good sir, your jests are fitlier told<br /> +Than when you speak of love or gold.<br /> + Why speak at all, in this glad weather?</p> + +<p>Whereat, behold them once again,<br /> +Tircis beside his Dorimène,<br /> + Not far from two blithe rustic rovers,</p> + +<p>For some caprice of idle breath<br /> +Deferring a delicious death.<br /> + Hi! hi! hi! what fantastic lovers!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="66"></a>FANTOCHES.</h2> + +<p>SCARAMOUCHE waves a threatening hand<br /> +To Pulcinella, and they stand,<br /> + Two shadows, black against the moon.</p> + +<p>The old doctor of Bologna pries<br /> +For simples with impassive eyes,<br /> + And mutters o’er a magic rune.</p> + +<p>The while his daughter, scarce half-dressed,<br /> +Glides slyly ’neath the trees, in quest<br /> + Of her bold pirate lover’s sail;</p> + +<p>Her pirate from the Spanish main,<br /> +Whose passion thrills her in the pain<br /> + Of the loud languorous nightingale.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="67"></a>PANTOMIME.</h2> + +<p>PIERROT, no sentimental swain,<br /> +Washes a pâté down again<br /> + With furtive flagons, white and red.</p> + +<p>Cassandre, to chasten his content,<br /> +Greets with a tear of sentiment<br /> + His nephew disinherited.</p> + +<p>That blackguard of a Harlequin<br /> +Pirouettes, and plots to win<br /> + His Colombine that flits and flies.</p> + +<p>Colombine dreams, and starts to find<br /> +A sad heart sighing in the wind,<br /> + And in her heart a voice that sighs.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="68"></a>L’AMOUR PAR TERRE.</h2> + +<p>THE wind the other evening overthrew<br /> + The little Love who smiled so mockingly<br /> + Down that mysterious alley, so that we,<br /> +Remembering, mused thereon a whole day through.</p> + +<p>The wind has overthrown him! The poor stone<br /> + Lies scattered to the breezes. It is sad<br /> + To see the lonely pedestal, that had<br /> +The artist’s name, scarce visible, alone,</p> + +<p>Oh! it is sad to see the pedestal<br /> + Left lonely! and in dream I seem to hear<br /> + Prophetic voices whisper in my ear<br /> +The lonely and despairing end of all.</p> + +<p>Oh! it is sad! And thou, hast thou not found<br /> + One heart-throb for the pity, though thine eye<br /> + Lights at the gold and purple butterfly<br /> +Brightening the littered leaves upon the ground.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="69"></a>À CLYMÈNE.</h2> + +<p>MYSTICAL strains unheard,<br /> +A song without a word,<br /> +Dearest, because thine eyes.<br /> + Pale as the skies,</p> + +<p>Because thy voice, remote<br /> +As the far clouds that float<br /> +Veiling for me the whole<br /> + Heaven of the soul,</p> + +<p>Because the stately scent<br /> +Of thy swan’s whiteness, blent<br /> +With the white lily’s bloom<br /> + Of thy perfume,</p> + +<p>Ah! because thy dear love,<br /> +The music breathed above<br /> +By angels halo-crowned,<br /> + Odour and sound,</p> + +<p>Hath, in my subtle heart,<br /> +With some mysterious art<br /> +Transposed thy harmony,<br /> + So let it be!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="70"></a>FROM ROMANCES SANS PAROLES.</h2> + +<p>TEARS in my heart that weeps,<br /> +Like the rain upon the town,<br /> +What drowsy languor steeps<br /> +In tears my heart that weeps?</p> + +<p>O sweet sound of the rain<br /> +On earth and on the roofs!<br /> +For a heart’s weary pain<br /> +O the song of the rain!</p> + +<p>Vain tears, vain tears, my heart!<br /> +What, none hath done thee wrong?<br /> +Tears without reason start,<br /> +From my disheartened heart.</p> + +<p>This is the weariest woe,<br /> +O heart, of love and hate<br /> +Too weary, not to know<br /> +Why thou hast all this woe.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="71"></a>MOODS AND MEMORIES.</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="72"></a>CITY NIGHTS.</h2> + +<p>I. IN THE TRAIN.</p> + +<p>THE train through the night of the town,<br /> + Through a blackness broken in twain<br /> + By the sudden finger of +streets;<br /> +Lights, red, yellow, and brown,<br /> + From curtain and window-pane,<br /> + The flashing eyes of the +streets.</p> + +<p>Night, and the rush of the train,<br /> + A cloud of smoke through the town,<br /> + Scaring the life of the +streets;<br /> +And the leap of the heart again,<br /> + Out into the night, and down<br /> + The dazzling vista of +streets!</p> + +<p>II. IN THE TEMPLE.</p> + +<p>THE grey and misty night,<br /> + Slim trees that hold the night among<br /> + Their branches, and, along<br /> +The vague Embankment, light on light.</p> + +<p>The sudden, racing lights!<br /> + I can just hear, distinct, aloof,<br /> + The gaily clattering hoof<br /> +Beating the rhythm of festive nights.</p> + +<p>The gardens to the weeping moon<br /> + Sigh back the breath of tears.<br /> + O the refrain of years on years<br /> +’Neath the weeping moon!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="73"></a>A WHITE NIGHT.</h2> + +<p>THE yellow moon across the clouds<br /> + That shiver in the sky;<br /> +White, hurrying travellers, the clouds,<br /> + And, white and aching cold on high,<br /> + Stars in the sky.</p> + +<p>Whiter, along the frozen earth,<br /> + The miracle of snow;<br /> +Close covered as for sleep, the earth<br /> + Lies, mutely slumbering below<br /> + Its shroud of snow.</p> + +<p>Sleepless I wander in the night,<br /> + And, wandering, watch for day;<br /> +Earth sleeps, yet, high in heaven, the night<br /> + Awakens, faint and far away,<br /> + A phantom day.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="74"></a>IN THE VALLEY.</h2> + +<p>DOWN the valley will I wander, singing songs forlorn,<br /> +Waiting for the maiden coming up between the corn.</p> + +<p>Down below I hear the river babbling to the breeze,<br /> +And I see the sunlight kiss the tresses of the trees.</p> + +<p>All the corn is shining with the tears of early rain:<br /> +Come, thou sunlight of mine eyes, and bring the dawn again!</p> + +<p>Down the valley will I wander, singing songs forlorn,<br /> +Till I meet the maiden coming up between the corn.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="75"></a>PEACE AT NOON.</h2> + +<p>HERE there is peace, cool peace,<br /> +Upon these heights, beneath these trees;<br /> +Almost the peace of sleep or death,<br /> +To wearying brain, to labouring breath.</p> + +<p>Here there is rest at last,<br /> +A sweet forgetting of the past;<br /> +There is no future here, nor aught<br /> +Save this soft healing pause of thought.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="76"></a>IN FOUNTAIN COURT.</h2> + +<p>THE fountain murmuring of sleep,<br /> + A drowsy tune;<br /> +The flickering green of leaves that keep<br /> + The light of June;<br /> +Peace, through a slumbering afternoon,<br /> + The peace of June.</p> + +<p>A waiting ghost, in the blue sky,<br /> + The white curved moon;<br /> +June, hushed and breathless, waits, and I<br /> + Wait too, with June;<br /> +Come, through the lingering afternoon,<br /> + Soon, love, come soon.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="77"></a>AT BURGOS.</h2> + +<p>MIRACULOUS silver-work in stone<br /> + Against the blue miraculous skies,<br /> + The belfry towers and turrets rise<br /> +Out of the arches that enthrone<br /> + That airy wonder of the skies.</p> + +<p>Softly against the burning sun<br /> + The great cathedral spreads its wings;<br /> + High up, the lyric belfry sings.<br /> +Behold Ascension Day begun<br /> + Under the shadow of those wings!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="78"></a>AT DAWN.</h2> + +<p>SHE only knew the birth and death<br /> + Of days, when each that died<br /> +Was still at morn a hope, at night<br /> + A hope unsatisfied.</p> + +<p>The dark trees shivered to behold<br /> + Another day begin;<br /> +She, being hopeless, did not weep<br /> + As the grey dawn came in.</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="79"></a>IN AUTUMN.</h2> + +<p>FRAIL autumn lights upon the leaves<br /> + Beacon the ending of the year.<br /> + The windy rains are here,<br /> +Wet nights and blowing winds about the eaves.</p> + +<p>Here in the valley, mists begin<br /> + To breathe about the river side<br /> + The breath of autumn-tide.<br /> +The dark fields wait to take the harvest in.</p> + +<p>And you, and you are far away.<br /> + Ah, this it is, and not the rain<br /> + Now loud against the pane,<br /> +That takes the light and colour from the day!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="80"></a>ON THE ROADS.</h2> + +<p>THE road winds onward long and white,<br /> + It curves in mazy coils, and crooks<br /> +A beckoning finger down the height;<br /> + It calls me with the voice of brooks<br /> +To thirsty travellers in the night.</p> + +<p>I leave the lonely city street,<br /> + The awful silence of the crowd;<br /> +The rhythm of the roads I beat,<br /> + My blood leaps up, I shout aloud,<br /> +My heart keeps measure with my feet.</p> + +<p>Nought know, nought care I whither I wend:<br /> + ’Tis on, on, on, or here or there.<br /> +What profiteth it an aim or end?<br /> + I walk, and the road leads anywhere.<br /> +Then forward, with the Fates to friend!</p> + +<p>’Tis on and on! Who knows but thus<br /> + Kind Chance shall bring us luck at last?<br /> +Adventures to the adventurous!<br /> + Hope flies before, and the hours slip past:<br /> +O what have the hours in store for us?</p> + +<p>A bird sings something in my ear,<br /> + The wind sings in my blood a song<br /> +Tis good at times for a man to hear;<br /> + The road winds onward white and long,<br /> +And the best of Earth is here!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="81"></a>PIERROT IN HALF-MOURNING.</h2> + +<p>I THAT am Pierrot, pray you pity me!<br /> +To be so young, so old in misery:<br /> +See me, and how the winter of my grief<br /> +Wastes me, and how I whiten like a leaf,<br /> +And how, like a lost child, lost and afraid,<br /> +I seek the shadow, I that am a shade,<br /> +I that have loved a moonbeam, nor have won<br /> +Any Diana to Endymion.<br /> +Pity me, for I have but loved too well<br /> +The hope of the too fair impossible.<br /> +Ah, it is she, she, Columbine: again<br /> +I see her, and I woo her, and in vain.<br /> +She lures me with her beckoning finger-tip;<br /> +How her eyes shine for me, and how her lips<br /> +Bloom for me, roses, roses, red and rich!<br /> +She waves to me the white arms of a witch<br /> +Over the world: I follow, I forget<br /> +All, but she’ll love me yet, she’ll love me yet!</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="82"></a>FOR A PICTURE OF WATTEAU.</h2> + +<p>HERE the vague winds have rest;<br /> +The forest breathes in sleep,<br /> +Lifting a quiet breast;<br /> +It is the hour of rest.</p> + +<p>How summer glides away!<br /> +An autumn pallor blooms<br /> +Upon the check of day.<br /> +Come, lovers, come away!</p> + +<p>But here, where dead leaves fall<br /> +Upon the grass, what strains,<br /> +Languidly musical,<br /> +Mournfully rise and fall?</p> + +<p>Light loves that woke with spring<br /> +This autumn afternoon<br /> +Beholds meandering,<br /> +Still, to the strains of spring.</p> + +<p>Your dancing feet are faint,<br /> +Lovers: the air recedes<br /> +Into a sighing plaint,<br /> +Faint, as your loves are faint.</p> + +<p>It is the end, the end,<br /> +The dance of love’s decease.<br /> +Feign no more now, fair friend!<br /> +It is the end, the end.</p><br /> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Silhouettes, by Arthur Symons + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SILHOUETTES *** + +***** This file should be named 29531-h.htm or 29531-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/9/5/3/29531/ + +Produced by Ruth Hart + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. 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