For years beyond man's dream
That viewless host of death has held its own:
With trumpet-sound, or with no bugle blown,
No warning lance-point's gleam,

That dim veiled host has crept from town to town
Changing man's mirth to sighs—
Snatching from monarch's brow the lordliest crown,
Closing the fairest eyes.

And yet to those who weep
The shock seems ever new and ever strange:
Though all the world might change,
The form they loved they thought their love could keep.

Ah, love, my love is like a cry in the night,
A long, loud cry to the empty sky,
The cry of a man alone in the desert,
With hands uplifted, with parching lips,

Oh, rescue me, rescue me,
Thy form to mine arms,
The dew of thy lips to my mouth,
Dost thou hear me?--my call thro' the night?

Darling, I hear thee and answer,
Thy fountain am I,
All of the love of my soul will I bring to thee,
All of the pains of my being shall wring to thee,
Deep and forever the song of my loving shall sing to thee,

Dost ask me, why I send thee here,
This firstling of the infant year?
Dost ask me, what this primrose shews,
Bepearled thus with morning dews?—

I must whisper to thy ears,
The sweets of love are wash'd with tears.

This lovely native of the dale
Thou seest, how languid, pensive, pale:
Thou seest this bending stalk so weak,
That each way yielding doth not break?

I must tell thee, these reveal,
The doubts and fears that lovers feel.

“Oh, I will put my ship in order,
And I will set her to the sea;
And I will sail to yonder harbour,
To see if my love will marry me.”

He sailed eastward; he sailed westward;
He sailed far, far by sea and land;
By France and Flanders, Spain and Dover,
He sail'd the world all round and round,

Till he came to his love's sweet bower,
It was to hear what she would say.
“Awake, awake, ye lovely sleeper,
The sun is spreading the break of day.”
“Oh, who is this at my bower window,
That speaks so lovingly to me?”
It is your own true constant lover,

As each one knew and loved him best, so each one saw the figure of the Lord.
The great warrior kings have seen him as it were chivalry incarnate.
The demons who in guile assumed the royal guise: to them the Lord appeared as Death.
The dwellers in His city saw the two brothers: their eyes beholding the jewels of mankind were blessed.
The women's hearts were filled with joy, each seeing Him fashioned according to her own desire.
His loveliness, wearing the fairest of all fair forms, bewitched their minds.

Our first young love resembles
That short but brilliant ray,
Which smiles and weeps and trembles
Thro' April's earliest day.
And not all life before us,
Howe'er its lights may play,
Can shed a lustre o'er us
Like that first April ray.

Our summer sun may squander
A blaze serener, grander;
Our autumn beam
May, like a dream
Of heaven, die calm away;
But no—let life before us
Bring all the light it may,
'T will ne'er shed lustre o'er us
Like that first youthful ray.

Renew me with thy being.—I would take
Thy young sweet soul and press it close to mine,
I would make all my stormy yearning thine
And in thine heart mine endless longing slake;
Just as the mountain in the mountain-lake
Sees its own thunder-crowned fierce image shine
And in the blue depth doth itself outline,
And ceases then with lonely pain to ache.

Give me thyself.—Do I not sorely need
—I who have fought for years amid the dust
Of trampling hoofs, and parried stroke and thrust,
And snapped the spear of sorrow like a reed—

Friend , well I know thou knowest well to bear
Thy sword's-point, that it pierce the close-locked mail:
And like a bird to flit from perch to pale:
And out of difficult ways to find the air:
Largely to take and generously to share:
Thrice to secure advantage: to regale
Greatly the great, and over lands prevail.
In all thou art, one only fault is there:
For still among the wise of wit thou say'st
That Love himself doth weep for thine estate;
And yet, no eyes no tears: lo now, thy whim!
Soft, rather say: This is not held in haste;

Dear , when you came the day was bright;
The moments, roseate to my sight,
Flew by me, and my heart was glad
Without you; but I loved you, lad—
Loved in my own despite!

As morn, I thought, so would be night,
Nor feared eclipsing cloud, nor blight—
Nay, fancied naught to life could add,
Dear, when you came!

And now—the good I deemed my right—
But you with love will still requite
The follies that have made you sad!
You smile—there—whisper! Nothing had
Illumined for me love's altar-light.
Dear, when you came!

When first I saw that dear abode
It was a lovely winter's day;
After a night of perilous storm
The west wind ruled with gentle sway—

A day so mild it might have been
The first day of the gladsome spring;
The robins warbled, and I heard
One solitary throstle sing.