Poems & Ballads Volume I Part 34

THE SEA-SWALLOWS

This fell when Christmas lights were done, (Red rose leaves will never make wine) But before the Easter lights begun; The ways are sair fra' the Till to the Tyne.

Two lovers sat where the rowan blows And all the gra.s.s is heavy and fine, By the gathering-place of the sea-swallows When the wind brings them over Tyne.

Blossom of broom will never make bread, Red rose leaves will never make wine; Between her brows she is grown red, That was full white in the fields by Tyne.

"O what is this thing ye have on, Show me now, sweet daughter of mine?"

"O father, this is my little son That I found hid in the sides of Tyne.

"O what will ye give my son to eat, Red rose leaves will never make wine?"

"Fen-water and adder's meat."

The ways are sair fra' the Till to the Tyne.

"Or what will ye get my son to wear?"

(Red rose leaves will never make wine.) "A weed and a web of nettle's hair."

The ways are sair fra' the Till to the Tyne.

"Or what will ye take to line his bed?"

(Red rose leaves will never make wine.) "Two black stones at the kirkwall's head."

The ways are sair fra' the Till to the Tyne.

"Or what will ye give my son for land?"

(Red rose leaves will never make wine.) "Three girl's paces of red sand."

The ways are sair fra' the Till to the Tyne.

"Or what will ye give me for my son?"

(Red rose leaves will never make wine.) "Six times to kiss his young mouth on."

The ways are sair fra' the Till to the Tyne.

"But what have ye done with the bearing-bread, And what have ye made of the washing-wine?

Or where have ye made your bearing-bed, To bear a son in the sides of Tyne?"

"The bearing-bread is soft and new, There is no soil in the straining wine; The bed was made between green and blue, It stands full soft by the sides of Tyne.

"The fair gra.s.s was my bearing-bread, The well-water my washing-wine; The low leaves were my bearing-bed, And that was best in the sides of Tyne."

"O daughter, if ye have done this thing, I wot the greater grief is mine; This was a bitter child-bearing, When ye were got by the sides of Tyne.

"About the time of sea-swallows That fly full thick by six and nine, Ye'll have my body out of the house, To bury me by the sides of Tyne.

"Set nine stones by the wall for twain,"

(Red rose leaves will never make wine) "For the bed I take will measure ten."

The ways are sair fra' the Till to the Tyne.

"Tread twelve girl's paces out for three,"

(Red rose leaves will never make wine) "For the pit I made has taken me."

The ways are sair fra' the Till to the Tyne.

THE YEAR OF LOVE

There were four loves that one by one, Following the seasons and the sun, Pa.s.sed over without tears, and fell Away without farewell.

The first was made of gold and tears, The next of aspen-leaves and fears, The third of rose-boughs and rose-roots, The last love of strange fruits.

These were the four loves faded. Hold Some minutes fast the time of gold When our lips each way clung and clove To a face full of love.

The tears inside our eyelids met, Wrung forth with kissing, and wept wet The faces cleaving each to each Where the blood served for speech.

The second, with low patient brows Bound under aspen-coloured boughs And eyes made strong and grave with sleep And yet too weak to weep--

The third, with eager mouth at ease Fed from late autumn honey, lees Of scarce gold left in latter cells With scattered flower-smells--

Hair sprinkled over with spoilt sweet Of ruined roses, wrists and feet Slight-swathed, as gra.s.sy-girdled sheaves Hold in stray poppy-leaves--

The fourth, with lips whereon has bled Some great pale fruit's slow colour, shed From the rank bitter husk whence drips Faint blood between her lips--

Made of the heat of whole great Junes Burning the blue dark round their moons (Each like a mown red marigold) So hard the flame keeps hold--

These are burnt thoroughly away.

Only the first holds out a day Beyond these latter loves that were Made of mere heat and air.

And now the time is winterly The first love fades too: none will see, When April warms the world anew, The place wherein love grew.

DEDICATION

1865

The sea gives her sh.e.l.ls to the shingle, The earth gives her streams to the sea: They are many, but my gift is single, My verses, the firstfruits of me.

Let the wind take the green and the grey leaf, Cast forth without fruit upon air; Take rose-leaf and vine-leaf and bay-leaf Blown loose from the hair.

The night shakes them round me in legions, Dawn drives them before her like dreams; Time sheds them like snows on strange regions, Swept sh.o.r.eward on infinite streams; Leaves pallid and sombre and ruddy, Dead fruits of the fugitive years; Some stained as with wine and made b.l.o.o.d.y, And some as with tears.

Some scattered in seven years' traces, As they fell from the boy that was then; Long left among idle green places, Or gathered but now among men; On seas full of wonder and peril, Blown white round the capes of the north; Or in islands where myrtles are sterile And loves bring not forth.

O daughters of dreams and of stories That life is not wearied of yet, Faustine, Fragoletta, Dolores, Flise and Yolande and Juliette, Shall I find you not still, shall I miss you, When sleep, that is true or that seems, Comes back to me hopeless to kiss you, O daughters of dreams?