Poems. Arnold Matthew

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СКАЧАТЬ As he drifts to fatigue, discontent, and dejection,

       Will be brought, thou poor heart, how much nearer to thee!

      For cold is his eye to mere beauty, who, breaking

       The strong band which passion around him hath furled,

       Disenchanted by habit, and newly awaking,

       Looks languidly round on a gloom-buried world.

      Through that gloom he will see but a shadow appearing,

       Perceive but a voice as I come to his side;

       —But deeper their voice grows, and nobler their bearing,

       Whose youth in the fires of anguish hath died.

      So, to wait! But what notes down the wind, hark! are driving?

       ’Tis he! ’tis their flag, shooting round by the trees!

       —Let my turn, if it will come, be swift in arriving! Ah! hope cannot long lighten torments like these.

      Hast thou yet dealt him, O life, thy full measure?

       World, have thy children yet bowed at his knee?

       Hast thou with myrtle-leaf crowned him, O pleasure?

       —Crown, crown him quickly, and leave him for me.

REQUIESCAT.

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      Strew on her roses, roses,

       And never a spray of yew:

       In quiet she reposes;

       Ah! would that I did too!

      Her mirth the world required;

       She bathed it in smiles of glee.

       But her heart was tired, tired,

       And now they let her be.

      Her life was turning, turning,

       In mazes of heat and sound;

       But for peace her soul was yearning,

       And now peace laps her round.

      Her cabined, ample spirit,

       It fluttered and failed for breath;

       To-night it doth inherit

       The vasty hall of death.

YOUTH AND CALM.

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      ’Tis death! and peace indeed is here,

       And ease from shame, and rest from fear.

       There’s nothing can dismarble now

       The smoothness of that limpid brow.

       But is a calm like this, in truth,

       The crowning end of life and youth?

       And when this boon rewards the dead,

       Are all debts paid, has all been said?

       And is the heart of youth so light,

       Its step so firm, its eye so bright,

       Because on its hot brow there blows

       A wind of promise and repose

       From the far grave, to which it goes;

       Because it has the hope to come,

       One day, to harbor in the tomb?

       Ah, no! the bliss youth dreams is one

       For daylight, for the cheerful sun,

       For feeling nerves and living breath;

       Youth dreams a bliss on this side death.

       It dreams a rest, if not more deep,

       More grateful than this marble sleep;

       It hears a voice within it tell—

       Calm’s not life’s crown, though calm is well. ’Tis all, perhaps, which man acquires, But ’tis not what our youth desires.

A MEMORY-PICTURE.

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      Laugh, my friends, and without blame

       Lightly quit what lightly came;

       Rich to-morrow as to-day,

       Spend as madly as you may!

       I, with little land to stir,

       Am the exacter laborer.

       Ere the parting hour go by,

       Quick, thy tablets, Memory!

      Once I said, “A face is gone

       If too hotly mused upon;

       And our best impressions are

       Those that do themselves repair.”

       Many a face I so let flee—

       Ah!-is faded utterly.

       Ere the parting hour go by,

       Quick, thy tablets, Memory!

      Marguerite says, “As last year went,

       So the coming year’ll be spent;

       Some day next year, I shall be,

       Entering heedless, kissed by thee.”

       Ah, I hope! yet, once away,

       What may chain us, who can say?

       Ere the parting hour go by,

       Quick, thy tablets, Memory!

      Paint that lilac kerchief, bound

       Her soft face, her hair around;

       Tied under the archest chin

       Mockery ever ambushed in.

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