I say, "She was as good as fair,"
   When standing by her mound;
"Such passing sweetness," I declare,
   "No longer treads the ground."
I say, "What living Love can catch
   Her bloom and bonhomie,
And what in newer maidens match
   Her olden warmth to me!"

- There stands within yon vestry-nook
   Where bonded lovers sign,
Her name upon a faded book
   With one that is not mine.
To him she breathed the tender vow

In the Manner of Sir Walter Raleigh.


The Objector.
Each man who lives, the Scriptures prove,
Must as himself his neighbour love;
But though the precept's full of beauty,
'Tis an impracticable duty:
I'll prove how hard it is to find
A lover of this wondrous kind.

Who loves himself to great excess,
You'll grant
must
love his neighbour less;
When self engrosses all the heart
How can another have a part?
Then if self-love most men enthrall,
A neighbour's share is none at all.

Beloved, you may be as all men say
Only a transient spark
Of flickering flame set in loam of clay –
I care not …since you kindle all my dark
With the immortal lustres of the day.

And as all men deem, dearest, you may be
Only a common shell
Chance-winnowed by the sea-winds from the sea –
The subtle murmurs of eternity.

And tho’ you are, like men or mortal race,
Only a hapless thing
That Death may mar and destiny efface –
I care not … since unto my heart you bring
The very vision of God’s dwelling-place.

THE LONDON SEASON

I still love London in the month of May,
By an old habit, spite of dust and din.
I love the fair adulterous world, whose way
Is by the pleasant banks of Serpentine.
I love the worshippers at fashion's shrine,
The flowers, the incense, and the pageantry
Of generations which still ask a sign
Of that dear god, whose votary am I.

I love the ``greetings in the market--place,''
The jargon of the clubs. I love to view
The ``gilded youth'' who at the window pass,
For ever smiling smiles for ever new.

We've lived for forty years, dear wife,
And walked together side by side,
And you to-day are just as dear
As when you were my bride.
I've tried to make life glad for you,
One long, sweet honeymoon of joy,
A dream of marital content,
Without the least alloy.
I've smoothed all boulders from our path,
That we in peace might toil along,
By always hastening to admit
That I was right and you were wrong.

No mad diversity of creed
Has ever sundered me from thee;
For I permit you evermore
To borrow your ideas of me.

EYES caught by beauty, fancy by eyes caught;
Sweet possibilities, question, and wonder--
What did her smile say? What has her brain thought?
Her standard, what? Am I o'er it or under?
Flutter in meeting--in absence dreaming;
Tremor in greeting--for meeting scheming;
Caught by the senses, and yet all through
True with the heart of me, sweetheart, to you.


Only the brute in me yields to the pressure
Of longings inherent--of vices acquired;
All this, my darling, is folly--not pleasure,
Only my fancy--not soul--has been fired.

Would'st thou be happy, would'st thou be free,

Come to our woody islands with me!

Come, while the summer sun is high,

Beneath the peach tree's shade to lie;

Or thy hunter will shield thee the live-long day

In his hut of reeds from the scorching ray.

There countless birds with wings of light

Shall flit and glitter before thy sight,

And their songs from the stately palm trees nigh

Shall charm thee with ceaseless melody.


The Cayman shall not lurk within

Within each living man there doth reside,
In some unrifled chamber of the heart,
A hidden treasure: wayward as thou art
I love thee, man, and bind thee to my side!
By that sweet act I purify my pride
And hasten onward-willing even to part
With pleasant graces: though thy hue is swart,
I bear thee company, thou art my guide!
Even in thy sinning wise beyond thy ken
To thee a subtle debt my soul is owing!
I take an impulse from the worst of men
That lends a wing unto my onward going;
Then let me pay them gladly back again

Unto that love must we through fire attain,
Which those two held as breath of common air;
The hands of whom were given in bond elsewhere;
Whom Honour was untroubled to restrain.

Midway the road of our life's term they met,
And one another knew without surprise;
Nor cared that beauty stood in mutual eyes;
Nor at their tardy meeting nursed regret.

To them it was revealed how they had found
The kindred nature and the needed mind;
The mate by long conspiracy designed;
The flower to plant in sanctuary ground.

Not in thy body is thy life at all
But in this lady's lips and hands and eyes;
Through these she yields thee life that vivifies
What else were sorrow's servant and death's thrall.
Look on thyself without her, and recall
The waste remembrance and forlorn surmise
That liv'd but in a dead-drawn breath of sighs
O'er vanish'd hours and hours eventual.

Even so much life hath the poor tress of hair
Which, stor'd apart, is all love hath to show
For heart-beats and for fire-heats long ago;