Fringilla: Some Tales In Verse Part 10

"And grant me?--for I do but find, In seeking more than G.o.d hath shown, I scorn His power and lose my own-- Grant me a lowly mind.

XI

"A lowly mind! Thou wondrous sprite, Whose frolics make their master weep; Anon, endowed with eagle's flight, Anon, too impotent to creep, Or blink aright;--

"Howe'er, thy trumpery flashes play Among the miracles above thee, Be taught to feel thy Maker's sway, To labour, so that He shall love thee, And guide thy way.

"Be led, from out the cloudy dreams Of thy too visionary part, To listen to the whispering heart, And curb thine own extremes.

XII

"Then hope shall shine from heaven, and give To fruit of hard work, sunny cheek, And flowers of grace and love revive, And shrivelled pasturage grow sleek, And corn snail thrive.

"Beholding gladness, Eve and I, Enfolding it also in each other, May talk of heaven without a sigh; Because our heaven in one another Love shall supply.

"For courage, faith, and bended knees, By stress of patience, cure distress, And turn wild _Love-in-idleness_ Into the true _Heartsease_."

_The Lord breathed on the first of men, And strung his limbs to strength again; He scorned a century of ill, And girt his loins to climb the parting hill._

PART II--EVE

_Meanwhile through lowland, holt, and glade, Sad Eve her lonely travel made; Not fierce, or proud, but well content To own the righteous punishment; Yet found, as gentle mourners find, The hearts confession soothe the mind._

I

"Ye valleys, and ye waters vast, Who answer all that look on you With shadows of themselves, that last As long as they, and are as true-- Where hath he past?

"Oh woods, and heights of rugged stone, Oh weariness of sky above me, For ever must I pine and moan, With none to comfort, none to love me, Alone, alone?

"Thou bird, that hoverest at heaven's gate, Or cleavest limpid lines of air, Return--for thou hast one to care-- Return to thy dear mate.

II

"For trie, no joy of earth or sky, No commune with the things I see, But dreary converse of the eye With worlds too grand to look at me-- No smile, no sigh!

"In vain I fall Upon my knees, In vain I weep and sob for ever; All other miseries have ease, All other prayers have ruth--but never Any for these.

"Are we endowed with heavenly breath, And G.o.d's own form, that we should win A proud priority of sin, And teach creation death?

III

"Not, that is too profound for me, Too lofty for a fallen thing.

More keenly do I feel than see; Far liefer would I, than take wing, Beneath it be.

"The night--the dark--will soon be here, The gloom that doth my heart appal so I How can I tell what may be near?

My faith is in the Lord--but also He hath made fear.

"I quail, I cower, I strive to flee; Though oft I watched without affright, The stern magnificence of night, When Adam was with me

IV

"My husband! Ah, I thought sometime That I could do without him well, Communing with the heaven at prime, And in my womanhood could dwell Calm and sublime.

"Declining, with a playful strife, All thoughts below my own transcendence, All common-sense of earth and life, And counting it a poor dependence To be his wife,

"But now I know, by trouble's test, How little my poor strength can bear, What folly wisdom is, whene'er The grief is in the breast!

"The grief is in my breast, because I have not always been as kind As woman should, by nature's laws, But showed sometimes a wilful mind, Carping at straws.

"While he, perhaps, with larger eyne, Was pleased, instead of vexed, at seeing Some little petulance in mine, And loved me all the more, for being; Not too divine.

"Until the pride became a snare, The reason a deceit, wherein I dallied face to face with sinh And made a mortal pair.

VI

"Dark sin, the deadly foe of love, All bowers of bliss thou shalt infest, Implanting thorns the flowers above, And one black feather in the breast Of purest dove.

"Almighty Father, once our friend, And ready even now to love us.

Thy pitying gaze upon us bend, And through the tempest-clouds above us Thine arm extend.

"That so thy children may begin In lieu of bliss, to earn content, And find that sinful Eve was meant Not only for a sin."

_Awhile she ceased; for memory's flow Had drowned the utterance of woe; Until a young hind crossed the lawn, And fondly trotted forth her fawn, Whose frolics of delight made Eve, As in a weeping vision, grieve._

VII

"For me, poor me, no hope to learn That sweeter bliss than Paradise, The joy that makes a mother yearn O'er that bright message from the skies Her pains do earn.

She stoops entranced; she fears to stir, Or think; lest each a thought endanger (While two enraptured hearts confer) That wonderful and wondering stranger, Come home to her,

"He watches her, in solemn style; A world of love flows to and fro; He smiles; that he may learn to know His mother by her smile.

VIII

"Oh, bliss, that to all other bliss Shall be as sunrise unto night, Or heaven to such a place as this, Or G.o.d's own voice, with angels bright, To serpent's hiss!

"I have I betrayed thee, or cast by The pledge in which my soul delighted-- That all this wrong and misery Should be avenged at last, and righted, And so should I?

"Belike, they look on me as dead, Those fiends that found me soft and sweet; But G.o.d hath promised me one treat-- To crush that serpent's head!

IX

"Revenge! Oh, heaven, let some one rise, Some woman, since revenge is small,-- Who shall not care about its size, If only she can get it all, For those black lies!

"Poor Adam is too good and great, I felt it, though he said so little-- To hate his foes, as I can hate-- And pay them every jot, and t.i.ttle, At their own rate.

"For was there none but I to blame?