Aux Italiens 891 And I swear, as I thought of her thus, in that hour, It smelt so faint, and it smelt so sweet, Like the scent that steals from the crumbling sheet And I turned, and looked. She was sitting there I was here; and she was there; And the glittering horseshoe curved between:From my bride-betrothed, with her raven hair, And her sumptuous scornful mien, To my early love, with her eyes downcast, To my early love from my future bride One moment I looked. Then I stole to the door, My thinking of her, or the music's strain, Or something which never will be expressed, Had brought her back from the grave again, With the jasmine in her breast. She is not dead, and she is not wed! But she loves me now, and she loved me then! And the very first word that her sweet lips said, My heart grew youthful again. The Marchioness there, of Carabas, She is wealthy, and young, and handsome still, And but for her . . . well, we'll let that pass, She may marry whomever she will. But I will marry my own first love, With her primrose face: for old things are best, The world is filled with folly and sin, And Love must cling where it can, I say: For Beauty is easy enough to win; But one isn't loved every day. And I think, in the lives of most women and men, There's a moment when all would go smooth and even, If only the dead could find out when To come back, and be forgiven. But O the smell of that jasmine-flower! That voice rang out from the donjon tower, Non ti scordar di me, Non ti scordar di me! Edward Robert Bulwer Lytton [1831–1891] SONG I SAW the day's white rapture Lives like a deathless name. Our lamps of joy are wasted, Gone is Love's hallowed light; But you and I remember Through every starlit night. Charles Hanson Towne (1877 " Evensong 893 THE LONELY ROAD I THINK thou waitest, Love, beyond the Gate- Far have I sought, and flung my wealth of years And wilt thou know me, Love, with bended back, One lonely prize— Thy dream-and dross of sin. . . . O, dim the fields- Yet I await what hope the turning yields Kenneth Rand [1891 EVENSONG BEAUTY calls and gives no warning, It is the season grieves, Not you, not I. All our spring-times, all our summers, To attain the dreams we did not win. Oh, we have wakened, Sweet, and had our birth, And we have toiled and smiled and kept the light, And that's the end of night. Ridgely Torrence [1875– THE NYMPH'S SONG TO HYLAS From "The Life and Death of Jason " I KNOW a little garden-close And though within it no birds sing, There comes a murmur from the shore, For which I cry both day and night, Yet tottering as I am, and weak, An entrance to that happy place; To seek the unforgotten face Once seen, once kissed, once reft from me Anigh the murmuring of the sea. William Morris [1834-1896] "A Little While" NO AND YES IF I could choose my paradise, And please myself with choice of bliss, Your lips, as smooth and tender, child, If fate bade choose some sweet unrest, 895 Thomas Ashe [1836-1889] LOVE IN DREAMS LOVE hath his poppy-wreath, Not Night alone. I laid my head beneath Love's lilied throne: Then to my sleep he brought This anodyne The flower of many a thought And fancy fine: A form, a face, no more; Fairer than truth; A dream from death's pale shore; The soul of youth: A dream so dear, so deep, All dreams above, That still I pray to sleep Bring Love back, Love! John Addington Symonds [1840-1893] "A LITTLE WHILE I FAIN WOULD LINGER YET”. A LITTLE While (my life is almost set!) I fain would pause along the downward way, |