Love's Rosary

Halts before the forsaken dwelling,

Where in the twilight, too spent to roam, Love, whom the fingers of death are quelling, Cries you a cheer from the Norland home.

Marian Drury, Marian Drury,

How are the marshes filled with you!

Grand Pré dreams of your coming home,—
Dreams while the rainbirds all night through,

Far in the uplands calling to win you,

Tease the brown dusk on the marshes wide;
And never the burning heart within you
Stirs in your sleep by the roving tide.

Bliss Carman [1861

979

LOVE'S ROSARY

ALL day I tell my rosary

For now my love's away:

To-morrow he shall come to me
About the break of day;

A rosary of twenty hours,

And then a rose of May;

A rosary of fettered flowers,
And then a holy-day.

All day I tell my rosary,

My rosary of hours:

And here's a flower of memory,

And here's a hope of flowers,

And here's an hour that yearns with pain
For old forgotten years,
An hour of loss, an hour of gain,
And then a shower of tears.

All day I tell my rosary,

Because my love's away;

And never a whisper comes to me,

And never a word to say;

But, if it's parting more endears,
God bring him back, I pray;
my heart will break in the darkness
Before the break of day.

Or

All day I tell my rosary,

My rosary of hours,

Until an hour shall bring to me

The hope of all the flowers

I tell my rosary of hours,

For O, my love's away;

...

And a dream may bring him back to me

About the break of day.

Alfred Noyes [1880

THE TRAGEDY OF LOVE

SONG

My silks and fine array,

My smiles and languished air,

By Love are driven away;

And mournful lean Despair

Brings me yew to deck my grave:
Such end true lovers have.

His face is fair as heaven

When springing buds unfold:

O why to him was't given,

Whose heart is wintry cold?

His breast is Love's all-worshipped tomb,
Where all Love's pilgrims come.

Bring me an ax and spade,

Bring me a winding-sheet;

When I my grave have made,

Let winds and tempests beat:

Then down I'll lie, as cold as clay:

True love doth pass away!

William Blake [1757-1827]

THE FLIGHT OF LOVE

WHEN the lamp is shattered
The light in the dust lies dead-
When the cloud is scattered,

The rainbow's glory is shed.

When the lute is broken,

Sweet tones are remembered not;

When the lips have spoken,

Loved accents are soon forgot.

As music and splendor

Survive not the lamp and the lute,
The heart's echoes render

No song when the spirit is mute-
No song but sad dirges,

Like the wind through a ruined cell,
Or the mournful surges

That ring the dead seaman's knell.

When hearts have once mingled,
Love first leaves the well-built nest;
The weak one is singled

To endure what it once possessed.

O Love! who bewailest

The frailty of all things here,

Why choose you the frailest

For your cradle, your home, and your bier?

Its passions will rock thee

As the storms rock the ravens on high;

Bright reason will mock thee,

Like the sun from a wintry sky.

From thy nest every rafter

Will rot, and thine eagle home

Leave thee naked to laughter,

When leaves fall and cold winds come.

Percy Bysshe Shelley [1792-1822]

"FAREWELL! IF EVER FONDEST PRAYER"

FAREWELL! if ever fondest prayer

For other's weal availed on high,
Mine will not all be lost in air,

But waft thy name beyond the sky.
'Twere vain to speak, to weep, to sigh:
Oh! more than tears of blood can tell,
When wrung from guilt's expiring eye,
Are in that word-Farewell!-Farewell!

Porphyria's Lover

These lips are mute, these eyes are dry:
But in my breast and in my brain
Awake the pangs that pass not by,

The thought that ne'er shall sleep again.
My soul nor deigns nor dares complain,
Though grief and passion there rebel:
I only know we loved in vain-
I only feel-Farewell!-Farewell!

983

George Gordon Byron [1788-1824]

PORPHYRIA'S LOVER

THE rain set early in to-night,
The sullen wind was soon awake,
It tore the elm-tops down for spite,
And did its worst to vex the lake:
I listened with heart fit to break.
When glided in Porphyria; straight

She shut the cold out and the storm,
And kneeled and made the cheerless grate
Blaze up, and all the cottage warm;

Which done, she rose, and from her form
Withdrew the dripping cloak and shawl,
And laid her soiled gloves by, untied
Her hat and let the damp hair fall,

And, last, she sat down by my side

And called me. When no voice replied,

She put my arm about her waist,

And made her smooth white shoulder bare,

And all her yellow hair displaced,

And, stooping, made my cheek lie there,
And spread, o'er all, her yellow hair,
Murmuring how she loved me-she
Too weak, for all her heart's endeavor,
To set its struggling passion free
From pride, and vainer ties dissever,
And give herself to me for ever.
But passion sometimes would prevail,
Nor could to-night's gay feast restrain

A sudden thought of one so pale