The Ascent of Man Part 11

I culled my heart in truth, Wet with the dews of youth, For love to take, forsooth-- Little flowers were springing.

Love sweetly laughed at this, And between kiss and kiss Fled with my heart in his: Winds warmly blowing.

And with his sun and shower Love kept my heart in flower, As in the greenest bower Rose richly glowing.

Till, worn at evensong, Love dropped my heart among Stones by the way ere long; Misprized token.

There in the wind and rain, Trampled and rent in twain, Ne'er to be whole again, My heart lies broken.

XX.

What magic is there in thy mien, What sorcery in thy smile, Which charms away all cark and care, Which turns the foul days into fair, And for a little while Changes this disenchanted scene From the sere leaf into the green, Trans.m.u.ting with love's golden wand This beggared life to fairyland?

My heart goes forth to thee, oh friend, As some poor pilgrim to a shrine, A pilgrim who has come from far To seek his spirit's folding star, And sees the taper shine; The goal to which his wanderings tend, Where want and weariness shall end, And kneels ecstatically blest Because his heart hath entered rest.

_HEART'S-EASE._

As opiates to the sick on wakeful nights, As light to flowers, as flowers in poor men's rooms, As to the fisher when the tempest glooms The cheerful twinkling of his village lights; As emerald isles to flagging swallow flights, As roses garlanding with tendrilled blooms The unweeded hillocks of forgotten tombs, As singing birds on cypress-shadowed heights,

Thou art to me--a comfort past compare-- For thy joy-kindling presence, sweet as May Sets all my nerves to music, makes away With sorrow and the numbing frost of care, Until the influence of thine eyes' bright sway Has made life's gla.s.s go up from foul to fair.

_UNTIMELY LOVE._

Peace, throbbing heart, nor let us shed one tear O'er this late love's unseasonable glow; Sweet as a violet blooming in the snow, The posthumous offspring of the widowed year, That smells of March when all the world is sere, And, while around the hurtling sea-winds blow-- Which twist the oak and lay the pine tree low-- Stands childlike in the storm and has no fear.

Poor helpless blossom orphaned of the sun, How could it thus brave winter's rude estate?

Oh love, more helpless love, why bloom so late, Now that the flower-time of the year is done?

Since thy dear course must end when scarce begun, Nipped by the cold touch of untoward fate.

_THE AFTER-GLOW._

It is a solemn evening, golden-clear-- The Alpine summits flame with rose-lit snow And headlands purpling on wide seas below, And clouds and woods and arid rocks appear Dissolving in the sun's own atmosphere And vast circ.u.mference of light, whose slow Transfiguration--glow and after-glow-- Turns twilight earth to a more luminous sphere.

Oh heart, I ask, seeing that the orb of day Has sunk below, yet left to sky and sea His glory's spiritual after-shine: I ask if Love, whose sun hath set for thee, May not touch grief with his memorial ray, And lend to loss itself a joy divine?

_L'ENVOI._

Thou art the goal for which my spirit longs; As dove on dove, Bound for one home, I send thee all my songs With all my love.

Thou art the haven with fair harbour lights; Safe locked in thee, My heart would anchor after stormful nights Alone at sea.

Thou art the rest of which my life is fain, The perfect peace; Absorbed in thee the world, with all its pain And toil, would cease.

Thou art the heaven to which my soul would go!

O dearest eyes, Lost in your light you would turn h.e.l.l below To Paradise.

Thou all in all for which my heart-blood yearns!

Yea, near or far-- Where the unfathomed ether throbs and burns With star on star,

Or where, enkindled by the fires of June, The fresh earth glows, Blushing beneath the mystical white moon Through rose on rose--

Thee, thee I see, thee feel in all live things, Beloved one; In the first bird which tremulously sings Ere peep of sun;

In the last nestling orphaned in the hedge, Rocked to and fro, When dying summer shudders in the sedge, And swallows go;

When roaring snows rush down the mountain-pa.s.s, March floods with rills, Or April lightens through the living gra.s.s In daffodils;

When poppied cornfields simmer in the heat With tare and thistle, And, like winged clouds above the mellow wheat, The starlings whistle;

When stained with sunset the wide moorlands glare In the wild weather, And clouds with flaming craters smoke and flare Red o'er red heather;

When the bent moon, on frostbound midnights waking, Leans to the snow Like some world-mother whose deep heart is breaking O'er human woe.

As the round sun rolls red into the ocean, Till all the sea Glows fluid gold, even so life's mazy motion Is dyed with thee:

For as the wave-like years subside and roll, O heart's desire, Thy soul glows interfused within my soul, A quenchless fire.

Yea, thee I feel, all storms of life above, Near though afar; O thou my glorious morning star of love, And evening star.

PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES.

WORKS BY MATHILDE BLIND.

Poetry.

THE PROPHECY OF SAINT ORAN, and other Poems.

THE HEATHER ON FIRE.

Prose Fiction.

TARANTELLA: A Romance.

Monographs.

GEORGE ELIOT.

MADAME ROLAND.