Poems, with The Ballad of Reading Gaol. Wilde Oscar

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      For lo, what changes time can bring!

         The cycles of revolving years

         May free my heart from all its fears,

      And teach my lips a song to sing.

      Before yon field of trembling gold

         Is garnered into dusty sheaves,

         Or ere the autumn’s scarlet leaves

      Flutter as birds adown the wold,

      I may have run the glorious race,

         And caught the torch while yet aflame,

         And called upon the holy name

      Of Him who now doth hide His face.

      Rome! what a scroll of History thine has been;

         In the first days thy sword republican

         Ruled the whole world for many an age’s span:

      Then of the peoples wert thou royal Queen,

      Till in thy streets the bearded Goth was seen;

         And now upon thy walls the breezes fan

         (Ah, city crowned by God, discrowned by man!)

      The hated flag of red and white and green.

      When was thy glory! when in search for power

         Thine eagles flew to greet the double sun,

         And the wild nations shuddered at thy rod?

      Nay, but thy glory tarried for this hour,

         When pilgrims kneel before the Holy One,

         The prisoned shepherd of the Church of God.

      Nay, Lord, not thus! white lilies in the spring,

      Sad olive-groves, or silver-breasted dove,

         Teach me more clearly of Thy life and love

      Than terrors of red flame and thundering.

      The hillside vines dear memories of Thee bring:

         A bird at evening flying to its nest

         Tells me of One who had no place of rest:

      I think it is of Thee the sparrows sing.

      Come rather on some autumn afternoon,

         When red and brown are burnished on the leaves,

         And the fields echo to the gleaner’s song,

      Come when the splendid fulness of the moon

         Looks down upon the rows of golden sheaves,

         And reap Thy harvest: we have waited long.

      The silver trumpets rang across the Dome:

         The people knelt upon the ground with awe:

         And borne upon the necks of men I saw,

      Like some great God, the Holy Lord of Rome.

      Priest-like, he wore a robe more white than foam,

         And, king-like, swathed himself in royal red,

         Three crowns of gold rose high upon his head:

      In splendour and in light the Pope passed home.

      My heart stole back across wide wastes of years

         To One who wandered by a lonely sea,

         And sought in vain for any place of rest:

      ‘Foxes have holes, and every bird its nest.

         I, only I, must wander wearily,

         And bruise my feet, and drink wine salt with tears.’

      Come down, O Christ, and help me! reach Thy hand,

         For I am drowning in a stormier sea

         Than Simon on Thy lake of Galilee:

      The wine of life is spilt upon the sand,

      My heart is as some famine-murdered land

         Whence all good things have perished utterly,

         And well I know my soul in Hell must lie

      If I this night before God’s throne should stand.

      ‘He sleeps perchance, or rideth to the chase,

         Like Baal, when his prophets howled that name

         From morn to noon on Carmel’s smitten height.’

      Nay, peace, I shall behold, before the night,

         The feet of brass, the robe more white than flame,

         The wounded hands, the weary human face.

      I stood by the unvintageable sea

         Till the wet waves drenched face and hair with spray;

         The long red fires of the dying day

      Burned in the west; the wind piped drearily;

      And to the land the clamorous gulls did flee:

         ‘Alas!’ I cried, ‘my life is full of pain,

         And who can garner fruit or golden grain

      From these waste fields which travail ceaselessly!’

      My nets gaped wide with many a break and flaw,

         Nathless I threw them as my final cast

         Into the sea, and waited for the end.

      When lo! a sudden glory! and I saw

         From the black waters of my tortured past

         The argent splendour of white limbs ascend!

      A lily-girl, not made for this world’s pain,

         With brown, soft hair close braided by her ears,

         And longing eyes half veiled by slumberous tears

      Like bluest water seen through mists of rain:

      Pale cheeks whereon no love hath left its stain,

         Red underlip drawn in for fear of love,

         And white throat, whiter than the silvered dove,

      Through whose wan marble creeps one purple vein.

      Yet, though my lips shall praise her without cease,

         Even to kiss her feet I am not bold,

         Being o’ershadowed by the wings of awe,

      Like Dante, when he stood with Beatrice

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