Poems by Christina Georgina Rossetti Part 19

THE QUEEN OF HEARTS.

How comes it, Flora, that, whenever we Play cards together, you invariably, However the pack parts, Still hold the Queen of Hearts?

I've scanned you with a scrutinizing gaze, Resolved to fathom these your secret ways: But, sift them as I will, Your ways are secret still.

I cut and shuffle; shuffle, cut, again; But all my cutting, shuffling, proves in vain: Vain hope, vain forethought, too; That Queen still falls to you.

I dropped her once, prepense; but, ere the deal Was dealt, your instinct seemed her loss to feel: "There should be one card more,"

You said, and searched the floor.

I cheated once: I made a private notch In Heart-Queen's back, and kept a lynx-eyed watch; Yet such another back Deceived me in the pack:

The Queen of Clubs a.s.sumed by arts unknown An imitative dint that seemed my own; This notch, not of my doing, Misled me to my ruin.

It baffles me to puzzle out the clew, Which must be skill, or craft, or luck in you: Unless, indeed, it be Natural affinity.

ONE DAY.

I will tell you when they met: In the limpid days of Spring; Elder boughs were budding yet, Oaken boughs looked wintry still, But primrose and veined violet In the mossful turf were set, While meeting birds made haste to sing And build with right good will.

I will tell you when they parted: When plenteous Autumn sheaves were brown, Then they parted heavy-hearted; The full rejoicing sun looked down As grand as in the days before; Only they had lost a crown; Only to them those days of yore Could come back nevermore.

When shall they meet? I cannot tell, Indeed, when they shall meet again, Except some day in Paradise: For this they wait, one waits in pain.

Beyond the sea of death love lies Forever, yesterday, to-day; Angels shall ask them, "Is it well?"

And they shall answer, "Yea."

A BIRD'S-EYE VIEW.

"Croak, croak, croak,"

Thus the Raven spoke, Perched on his crooked tree As hoa.r.s.e as hoa.r.s.e could be.

Shun him and fear him, Lest the Bridegroom hear him; Scout him and rout him With his ominous eye about him.

Yet, "Croak, croak, croak,"

Still tolled from the oak; From that fatal black bird, Whether heard or unheard: "O ship upon the high seas, Freighted with lives and spices, Sink, O ship," croaked the Raven: "Let the Bride mount to heaven."

In a far foreign land Upon the wave-edged sand, Some friends gaze wistfully Across the glittering sea.

"If we could clasp our sister,"

Three say, "now we have missed her!"

"If we could kiss our daughter!"

Two sigh across the water.

O, the ship sails fast, With silken flags at the mast, And the home-wind blows soft; But a Raven sits aloft, Chuckling and choking, Croaking, croaking, croaking:-- Let the beacon-fire blaze higher; Bridegroom, watch; the Bride draws nigher.

On a sloped sandy beach, Which the spring-tide billows reach, Stand a watchful throng Who have hoped and waited long: "Fie on this ship, that tarries With the priceless freight it carries.

The time seems long and longer: O languid wind, wax stronger";--

Whilst the Raven perched at ease Still croaks and does not cease, One monotonous note Tolled from his iron throat: "No father, no mother, But I have a sable brother: He sees where ocean flows to, And he knows what he knows, too."

A day and a night They kept watch worn and white; A night and a day For the swift ship on its way: For the Bride and her maidens,-- Clear chimes the bridal cadence,-- For the tall ship that never Hove in sight forever.

On either sh.o.r.e, some Stand in grief loud or dumb As the dreadful dread Grows certain though unsaid.

For laughter there is weeping, And waking instead of sleeping, And a desperate sorrow Morrow after morrow.

O, who knows the truth, How she perished in her youth, And like a queen went down Pale in her royal crown?

How she went up to glory From the sea-foam chill and h.o.a.ry, From the sea-depth black and riven To the calm that is in Heaven?

They went down, all the crew, The silks and spices too, The great ones and the small, One and all, one and all.

Was it through stress of weather, Quicksands, rocks, or all together?

Only the Raven knows this, And he will not disclose this.--

After a day and a year The bridal bells chime clear; After a year and a day The Bridegroom is brave and gay: Love is sound, faith is rotten; The old Bride is forgotten:-- Two ominous Ravens only Remember, black and lonely.

THE GERMAN-FRENCH CAMPAIGN.

1870-1871.

These two pieces, written during the suspense of a great nation's agony, aim at expressing human sympathy, not political bias.

I.

"THY BROTHER'S BLOOD CRIETH."

All her corn-fields rippled in the sunshine, All her lovely vines, sweets-laden, bowed; Yet some weeks to harvest and to vintage: When, as one man's hand, a cloud Rose and spread, and, blackening, burst asunder In rain and fire and thunder.

Is there nought to reap in the day of harvest?

Hath the vine in her day no fruit to yield?

Yea, men tread the press, but not for sweetness, And they reap a red crop from the field.

Build barns, ye reapers, garner all aright, Though your souls be called to-night.

A cry of tears goes up from blackened homesteads, A cry of blood goes up from reeking earth: Tears and blood have a cry that pierces Heaven Through all its Hallelujah swells of mirth; G.o.d hears their cry, and though He tarry, yet He doth not forget.

Mournful Mother, p.r.o.ne in dust weeping, Who shall comfort thee for those who are not?

As thou didst, men do to thee; and heap the measure, And heat the furnace sevenfold hot: As thou once, now these to thee--who pitieth thee From sea to sea?

O thou King, terrible in strength, and building Thy strong future on thy past!

Though he drink the last, the King of Sheshach, Yet he shall drink at the last.