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DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI.

THE SEA-LIMITS.

CONSIDER the sea's listless chime: Time's self it is, made audible, The murmur of the earth's own shell,

Secret continuance sublime

Is the era's end. Our sight may

pass

No furlong farther. Since time

was,

Her robe, ungirt from clasp to hem,
No wrought flowers did adorn,
But a white rose of Mary's gift,
For service meetly worn;

Her hair that lay along her back
Was yellow like ripe corn.

Herseemed she scarce had been a day

One of God's choristers;

This sound hath told the lapse of The wonder was not yet quite gone

time.

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From that still look of hers: Albeit, to them she left, her day Had counted as ten years.

It was the rampart of God's house
That she was standing on;

By God built over the sheer depth
The which is Space begun;

So high, that looking downward thence

She scarce could see the sun.

It lies in heaven, across the flood
Of ether, as a bridge.
Beneath, the tides of day.and night
With flame and darkness ridge
The void, as low as where this earth
Spins like a fretful midge.

Around her, lovers, newly met

'Mid deathless love's acclaims

Spoke evermore among themselves

Their heart-remembered names; And the souls mounting up to God Went by her like thin flames;

And still she bowed herself and stooped

Out of the circling charm; Until her bosom must have made

The bar she leaned on warm, And the lilies lay as if asleep Along her bended arm.

From the fixed place of heaven she

saw

Time like a pulse shake fierce Through all the worlds. Her gaze

still strove Within the gulf to pierce

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IF I had known in the morning
How wearily all the day [mind
The words unkind would trouble my
That I said when you went away,
I had been more careful, darling,
Nor given you needless pain;
But we vex our own with look and
tone

We may never take back again.

For though in the quiet evening

You may give me the kiss of peace, Yet it well might be that never for me The pain of the heart should cease! How many go forth at morning

Who never come home at night! And hearts have broken for harsh words spoken,

That sorrow can ne'er set right.

We have careful thought for the stranger,

And smiles for the sometime guest; But oft for our own the bitter tone, Though we love our own the best. Ah! lips with the curve impatient,

Ah! brow with the shade of scorn, 'T were a cruel fate, were the night too late

To undo the work of the morn!

SUFFICIENT UNTO THE DAY.

BECAUSE in a day of my days to

come

There waiteth a grief to be, Shall my heart grow faint, and my lips be dumb

In this day that is bright for me?

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Sooner the sunflower might forget to waken

When the first radiance lights the eastern hill,

Than I, by daily thoughts of thee forsaken,

Feel, as they kindle, no expanding thrill.

Oft, when at night the deck I'm pacing lonely

Or when I pause to watch some

fulgent star,

Will Contemplation be retracing only Thy form, and fly to greet thee, though afar.

The winds rise wildly, and thick clouds are rearing

Their ebon flags, that hasten on the night,

Farewell! The pilot leaves us; seaward gliding,

Our brave ship dashes through the foamy swell;

But Hope, forever faithful and abiding,

Hears distant welcomes in this last farewell!

A THOUGHT OF THE PAST.

When storms unleashed, with fearful I WAKED from slumber at the dead

clangor sweeping,

Drive our strained bark along the hollowed sea,

When to the clouds the foam-topped waves are leaping,

Even then I'll not forget, beloved one, thee!

Thy image in my sorrow-shaded hours,

Will, like a sunburst on the waters, shine; [flowers 'Twill be as grateful as the breath of From some green island wafted o'er the brine.

And O sweet lady, when, from home departed,

I count the leagues between us with a sigh,

When, at the thought, perchance a tear has started,

May I not dream in heart thou'rt sometimes nigh?

Ay, thou wilt, sometimes, when the wine-cup passes,

And friends are gathering round in festal glee,

While bright eyes flash, as flash the brimming glasses,

Let silent Memory pledge one health to me.

Farewell! My fatherland is disappearing [sight; Faster and faster from my battled

of night,

Moved by a dream too heavenly fair to last

A dream of boyhood's season of delight;

It flashed along the dim shapes of the past;

And, as I mused upon its strange appeal,

Thrilling me with emotions undefined,

Old memories, bursting from Time's icy seal,

Rushed, like sun-stricken fountains on my mind.

Scenes where my lot was cast in life's young day;

My favorite haunts, the shores, the ancient woods,

Where, with my schoolmates, I was wont to stray;

Green, sloping lawns, majestic solitudes

All rose to view, more beautiful than then;

They faded, and I wept - a child again!

THE spring-time will return.

THE birds are mute, the bloom is fled,

Cold, cold, the north winds blow; And radiant summer lieth dead Beneath a shroud of snow. Sweet summer! well may we regret Thy brief, too brief sojourn;

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The startled flying-fish around us skim,

Glossed like the humming-bird,

with rainbow dyes;

And, as they dip into the water's brim,

Swift in pursuit the preying dolphin hies.

The sea-bird skims along the glassy All, all is fair; and gazing round, we

tide,

With sidelong flight and wing of glittering whiteness,

Or floats upon the sea, outstretching wide

A sheet of gold in the meridian brightness.

Our vessel lies, unstirred by wave or blast,

As she were moored to her dark shadow seeming,

feel

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