The Poetical Works Of Robert Bridges Part 44

How art thou every year more beautiful, Younger for all the winters thou hast cast: And I, for all my love grows, grow more dull, Decaying with each season overpast!

In vain to teach him love must man employ thee, The more he learns the less he can enjoy thee.

4

WOOING

I know not how I came, New on my knightly journey, To win the fairest dame That graced my maiden tourney.

Chivalry's lovely prize With all men's gaze upon her, Why did she free her eyes On me, to do me honour?

Ah! ne'er had I my mind With such high hope delighted, Had she not first inclined, And with her eyes invited.

But never doubt I knew, Having their glance to cheer me, Until the day joy grew Too great, too sure, too near me.

When hope a fear became, And pa.s.sion, grown too tender, Now trembled at the shame Of a despised surrender;

And where my love at first Saw kindness in her smiling, I read her pride, and cursed The arts of her beguiling.

Till winning less than won, And liker wooed than wooing, Too late I turned undone Away from my undoing;

And stood beside the door, Whereto she followed, making My hard leave-taking more Hard by her sweet leave-taking.

Her speech would have betrayed Her thought, had mine been colder: Her eyes' distress had made A lesser lover bolder.

But no! Fond heart, distrust, Cried Wisdom, and consider: Go free, since go thou must:-- And so farewell I bid her.

And brisk upon my way I smote the stroke to sever, And should have lost that day My life's delight for ever:

But when I saw her start And turn aside and tremble;-- Ah! she was true, her heart I knew did not dissemble.

5

There is a hill beside the silver Thames, Shady with birch and beech and odorous pine: And brilliant underfoot with thousand gems Steeply the thickets to his floods decline.

Straight trees in every place Their thick tops interlace, And pendant branches trail their foliage fine Upon his watery face.

Swift from the sweltering pasturage he flows: His stream, alert to seek the pleasant shade, Pictures his gentle purpose, as he goes Straight to the caverned pool his toil has made.

His winter floods lay bare The stout roots in the air: His summer streams are cool, when they have played Among their fibrous hair.

A rushy island guards the sacred bower, And hides it from the meadow, where in peace The lazy cows wrench many a scented flower, Robbing the golden market of the bees: And laden barges float By banks of myosote; And scented flag and golden flower-de-lys Delay the loitering boat.

And on this side the island, where the pool Eddies away, are tangled ma.s.s on ma.s.s The water-weeds, that net the fishes cool, And scarce allow a narrow stream to pa.s.s; Where spreading crowfoot mars The drowning nenuphars, Waving the ta.s.sels of her silken gra.s.s Below her silver stars.

But in the purple pool there nothing grows, Not the white water-lily spoked with gold; Though best she loves the hollows, and well knows On quiet streams her broad shields to unfold: Yet should her roots but try Within these deeps to lie, Not her long reaching stalk could ever hold Her waxen head so high.

Sometimes an angler comes, and drops his hook Within its hidden depths, and 'gainst a tree Leaning his rod, reads in some pleasant book, Forgetting soon his pride of fishery; And dreams, or falls asleep, While curious fishes peep About his nibbled bait, or scornfully Dart off and rise and leap.

And sometimes a slow figure 'neath the trees, In ancient-fashioned smock, with tottering care Upon a staff propping his weary knees, May by the pathway of the forest fare: As from a buried day Across the mind will stray Some perishing mute shadow,--and unaware He pa.s.seth on his way.

Else, he that wishes solitude is safe, Whether he bathe at morning in the stream: Or lead his love there when the hot hours chafe The meadows, busy with a blurring steam; Or watch, as fades the light, The gibbous moon grow bright, Until her magic rays dance in a dream, And glorify the night.

Where is this bower beside the silver Thames?

O pool and flowery thickets, hear my vow!

O trees of freshest foliage and straight stems, No sharer of my secret I allow: Lest ere I come the while Strange feet your shades defile; Or lest the burly oarsman turn his prow Within your guardian isle.

6

A WATER-PARTY

Let us, as by this verdant bank we float, Search down the marge to find some shady pool Where we may rest awhile and moor our boat, And bathe our tired limbs in the waters cool.

Beneath the noonday sun, Swiftly, O river, run!

Here is a mirror for Narcissus, see!

I cannot sound it, plumbing with my oar.

Lay the stern in beneath this bowering tree!

Now, stepping on this stump, we are ash.o.r.e.

Guard, Hamadryades, Our clothes laid by your trees!

How the birds warble in the woods! I pick The waxen lilies, diving to the root.

But swim not far in the stream, the weeds grow thick, And hot on the bare head the sunbeams shoot.

Until our sport be done, O merry birds, sing on!

If but to-night the sky be clear, the moon Will serve us well, for she is near the full.

We shall row safely home; only too soon,-- So pleasant 'tis, whether we float or pull.

To guide us through the night, O summer moon, shine bright!

7

THE DOWNS

O bold majestic downs, smooth, fair and lonely; O still solitude, only matched in the skies: Perilous in steep places, Soft in the level races, Where sweeping in phantom silence the cloudland flies; With lovely undulation of fall and rise; Entrenched with thickets thorned, By delicate miniature dainty flowers adorned!

I climb your crown, and lo! a sight surprising Of sea in front uprising, steep and wide: And scattered ships ascending To heaven, lost in the blending Of distant blues, where water and sky divide, Urging their engines against wind and tide, And all so small and slow They seem to be wearily pointing the way they would go.

The acc.u.mulated murmur of soft plashing, Of waves on rocks dashing and searching the sands, Takes my ear, in the veering Baffled wind, as rearing Upright at the cliff, to the gullies and rifts he stands; And his conquering surges scour out over the lands; While again at the foot of the downs He ma.s.ses his strength to recover the topmost crowns.

8

SPRING

ODE I

INVITATION TO THE COUNTRY

Again with pleasant green Has Spring renewed the wood, And where the bare trunks stood Are leafy arbours seen; And back on budding boughs Come birds, to court and pair, Whose rival amorous vows Amaze the scented air.