Smiles soon abate; the boisterous throes
Of anger long burst forth;
Inconstantly the south-wind blows,
But steadily the north.

Thy star, O Venus! often changes
Its radiant seat above,
The chilling pole-star never ranges —
'Tis thus with Hate and Love.

Sweet evenings come and go, love,
They came and went of yore:
This evening of our life, love,
Shall go and come no more.

When we have passed away, love,
All things will keep their name;
But yet no life on earth, love,
With ours will be the same.

The daisies will be there, love,
The stars in heaven will shine:
I shall not feel thy wish, love,
Nor thou my hand in thine.

A better time will come, love,
And better souls be born:
I would not be the best, love,
To leave thee now forlorn.

Six hundred years ago, in Dante's time,
Before his cheek was furrowed by deep rhyme —
When Europe, fed afresh from Eastern story,
Was like a garden tangled with the glory
Of flowers hand-planted and of flowers air-sown,
Climbing and trailing, budding and full-blown,
Where purple bells are tossed amid pink stars,
And springing blades, green troops in innocent wars,
Crowd every shady spot of teeming earth,
Making invisible motion visible birth —
Six hundred years ago, Palermo town
Kept holiday. A deed of great renown,

On love, on grief, on every human thing,
Time sprinkles Lethe's water with his wing.

I

In vain, dear Youth, you say you love,
And yet my Marks of Passion blame;
Since Jealousie alone can prove,
The surest Witness of my Flame:
And she who without that, a Love can vow,
Believe me, Shepherd , does not merit you.

II

Then give me leave to doubt, that Fire
I kindle, may another warm:
A Face that cannot move Desire,

My Amoret , since you must know,
The Grief you say my Eyes do show:
Survey my Heart, where you shall find,
More Love then for your self confin'd.
And though you chide, you'l Pity too,
A Passion which even Rivals you.

Amyntas on a Holy-day
As fine as any Lord of May ,
Amongst the Nimphs, and jolly Swaines,
That feed their Flocks upon the Plaines:
Met in a Grove beneath whose shade,
A Match of Dancing they had made.

His Cassock was of Green, as trim
As Grass upon a River brim;
Untoucht or sullied with a spot,

Reading a poet's musing in his rhyme
Of feverish love, kindled by its own dearth,
That dies of surfeit, comes again to birth
In brief fantastic intervals of time;
I thought how love that draws a steadier breath,
Glows in the mind, sets pulsing in the blood,
Is not the frail creation of a mood,
Is plain as life, unqualified as death.

This love long seasoned, tried against the storm,
Not furnished with the trappings of romance,
Will still have power to quicken and grow warm
Beyond the momentary circumstance;

II

I T flows thro' all of time from heart to heart,
This solemn wonder fresh with naked strength,
This source of life where every mouth at length
Must drink and feel the old impulsions start.
It is the whole that moves through every part,
The aspiration dim of things unborn,
The prophecy of life's essential dawn,
That tears the everlasting night apart.
And we who are, and were the splendid spur

I

Sadder and more divine than human tears
Born on the eyes to utter what is dumb,
This simple silence when the heart grows numb
Among the dead desires of perished years.
Such silence quivers with the song it bears,
Unsung within a fabric of old pain,
Till in the dust of tired passions, plain
Through wreaths of light, the naked truth appears.
Then poised upon the moment thou canst lay

Why do I o'er my paper once more bend?
Ask not too closely, dearest one, I pray:
For, to speak truth, I've nothing now to say;
Yet to thy hands at length 'twill come, dear friend.

Since I can come not with it, what I send
My undivided heart shall now convey,
With all its joys, hopes, pleasures, pains, to-day:
All this hath no beginning, hath no end.

Henceforward I may ne'er to thee confide
How, far as thought, wish, fancy, will, can reach,
My faithful heart with thine is surely blended.