Grass of Parnassus. Lang Andrew

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      Still, Rhodocleia, brooding on the dead,

      Still singing of the meads of asphodel,

         Lands desolate of delight?

      Say, hast thou dreamed of, or rememberèd,

         The shores where shadows dwell,

            Nor know the sun, nor see the stars of night?

      There, ’midst thy music, doth thy spirit gaze

         As a girl pines for home,

         Looking along the way that she hath come,

      Sick to return, and counts the weary days!

      So wouldst thou flee

         Back to the multitude whose days are done,

      Wouldst taste the fruit that lured Persephone,

      The sacrament of death; and die, and be

         No more in the wind and sun!

      Thou hast not dreamed it, but rememberèd

         I know thou hast been there,

      Hast seen the stately dwellings of the dead

         Rise in the twilight air,

      And crossed the shadowy bridge the spirits tread,

         And climbed the golden stair!

      Nay, by thy cloudy hair

         And lips that were so fair,

      Sad lips now mindful of some ancient smart,

         And melancholy eyes, the haunt of Care,

      I know thee who thou art!

         That Rhodocleia, Glory of the Rose,

      Of Hellas, ere her close,

         That Rhodocleia who, when all was done

         The golden time of Greece, and fallen her sun,

      Swayed her last poet’s heart.

      With roses did he woo thee, and with song,

         With thine own rose, and with the lily sweet,

            The dark-eyed violet,

            Garlands of wind-flowers wet,

      And fragrant love-lamps that the whole night long

            Burned till the dawn was burning in the skies,

            Praising thy golden eyes,

         And feet more silvery than Thetis’ feet!

      But thou didst die and flit

         Among the tribes outworn,

            The unavailing myriads of the past:

         Oft he beheld thy face in dreams of morn,

      And, waking, wept for it,

               Till his own time came at last,

            And then he sought thee in the dusky land!

      Wide are the populous places of the dead

      Where souls on earth once wed

            May never meet, nor each take other’s hand,

      Each far from the other fled!

      So all in vain he sought for thee, but thou

         Didst never taste of the Lethæan stream,

               Nor that forgetful fruit,

         The mystic pom’granate;

      But from the Mighty Warden fledst; and now,

         The fugitive of Fate,

         Thou farest in our life as in a dream,

               Still wandering with thy lute,

      Like that sweet paynim lady of old song,

      Who sang and wandered long,

         For love of her Aucassin, seeking him!

      So with thy minstrelsy

         Thou roamest, dreaming of the country dim,

      Below the veilèd sky!

      There doth thy lover dwell,

         Singing, and seeking still to find thy face

         In that forgetful place:

            Thou shalt not meet him here,

            Not till thy singing clear

      Through all the murmur of the streams of hell

            Wins to the Maiden’s ear!

      May she, perchance, have pity on thee and call

            Thine eager spirit to sit beside her feet,

      Passing throughout the long unechoing hall

         Up to the shadowy throne,

            Where the lost lovers of the ages meet;

         Till then thou art alone!

            ‘Our Faith and Troth

         All time and space controules

      Above the highest sphere we meet

      Unseen, unknowne, and greet as Angels greet.’

      Westward I watch the low green hills of Wales,

         The low sky silver grey,

      The turbid Channel with the wandering sails

         Moans through the winter day.

      There is no colour but one ashen light

         On tower and lonely tree,

      The little church upon the windy height

         Is grey as sky or sea.

      But there hath he that woke the sleepless Love

         Slept through these fifty years,

      There is the grave that has been wept above

         With more than mortal tears.

      And far below I hear the Channel sweep

         And all his waves complain,

      As Hallam’s dirge through all the years must keep

         Its monotone of pain.

      Grey sky, brown waters, as a bird that flies,

         My heart flits forth from these

      Back to the winter rose of northern skies,

         Back to the northern seas.

      And lo, the long waves of the ocean beat

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