A Century of Roundels

I.

One of twain, twin-born with flowers that waken,
Now hath passed from sense of sun and rain:
Wind from off the flower-crowned branch hath shaken
   One of twain.

One twin flower must pass, and one remain:
One, the word said soothly, shall be taken,
And another left: can death refrain?

Two years since was love’s light song mistaken,
Blessing then both blossoms, half in vain?
Night outspeeding light hath overtaken
   One of twain.

Night and light?  O thou of heart unwary,
Love, what knowest thou here at all aright,
Lured, abused, misled as men by fairy
   Night and light?

Haply, where thine eyes behold but night,
Soft as o’er her babe the smile of Mary
Light breaks flowerwise into new-born sight.

What though night of light to thee be chary?
What though stars of hope like flowers take flight?
Seest thou all things here, where all see vary
   Night and light?

Death and birth should dwell not near together:
Wealth keeps house not, even for shame, with dearth:
Fate doth ill to link in one brief tether
   Death and birth.

Harsh the yoke that binds them, strange the girth
Seems that girds them each with each: yet whether
Death be best, who knows, or life on earth?

Ill the rose-red and the sable feather
Blend in one crown’s plume, as grief with mirth:
Ill met still are warm and wintry weather,
   Death and birth.

Birth and death, twin-sister and twin-brother,
Night and day, on all things that draw breath,
Reign, while time keeps friends with one another
   Birth and death.

Each brow-bound with flowers diverse of wreath,
Heaven they hail as father, earth as mother,
Faithful found above them and beneath.

Smiles may lighten tears, and tears may smother
Smiles, for all that joy or sorrow saith:
Joy nor sorrow knows not from each other
   Birth and death.

Blest in death and life beyond man’s guessing
Little children live and die, possest
Still of grace that keeps them past expressing
   Blest.

Each least chirp that rings from every nest,
Each least touch of flower-soft fingers pressing
Aught that yearns and trembles to be prest,

Each least glance, gives gifts of grace, redressing
Grief’s worst wrongs: each mother’s nurturing breast
Feeds a flower of bliss, beyond all blessing
   Blest.

I.

A Baby’s feet, like sea-shells pink,
   Might tempt, should heaven see meet,
An angel’s lips to kiss, we think,
   A baby’s feet.

Like rose-hued sea-flowers toward the heat
   They stretch and spread and wink
Their ten soft buds that part and meet.

No flower-bells that expand and shrink
   Gleam half so heavenly sweet
As shine on life’s untrodden brink
   A baby’s feet.

A baby’s hands, like rosebuds furled
   Whence yet no leaf expands,
Ope if you touch, though close upcurled,
   A baby’s hands.

Then, fast as warriors grip their brands
   When battle’s bolt is hurled,
They close, clenched hard like tightening bands.

No rosebuds yet by dawn impearled
   Match, even in loveliest lands,
The sweetest flowers in all the world—
   A baby’s hands.

A baby’s eyes, ere speech begin,
   Ere lips learn words or sighs,
Bless all things bright enough to win
   A baby’s eyes.

Love, while the sweet thing laughs and lies,
   And sleep flows out and in,
Sees perfect in them Paradise.

Their glance might cast out pain and sin,
   Their speech make dumb the wise,
By mute glad godhead felt within
   A baby’s eyes.

I.

A baby shines as bright
If winter or if May be
On eyes that keep in sight
   A baby.

Though dark the skies or grey be,
It fills our eyes with light,
If midnight or midday be.

Love hails it, day and night,
The sweetest thing that may be
Yet cannot praise aright
   A baby.

All heaven, in every baby born,
All absolute of earthly leaven,
Reveals itself, though man may scorn
   All heaven.

Yet man might feel all sin forgiven,
All grief appeased, all pain outworn,
By this one revelation given.

Soul, now forget thy burdens borne:
Heart, be thy joys now seven times seven:
Love shows in light more bright than morn
   All heaven.

What likeness may define, and stray not
   From truth’s exactest way,
A baby’s beauty?  Love can say not
   What likeness may.

The Mayflower loveliest held in May
   Of all that shine and stay not
Laughs not in rosier disarray.

Sleek satin, swansdown, buds that play not
   As yet with winds that play,
Would fain be matched with this, and may not:
   What likeness may?

Rose, round whose bed
Dawn’s cloudlets close,
Earth’s brightest-bred
   Rose!

No song, love knows,
May praise the head
Your curtain shows.

Ere sleep has fled,
The whole child glows
One sweet live red
   Rose.

A little way, more soft and sweet
   Than fields aflower with May,
A babe’s feet, venturing, scarce complete
   A little way.

   Eyes full of dawning day
Look up for mother’s eyes to meet,
   Too blithe for song to say.

Glad as the golden spring to greet
   Its first live leaflet’s play,
Love, laughing, leads the little feet
   A little way.

I.

Three times thrice hath winter’s rough white wing
Crossed and curdled wells and streams with ice
Since his birth whose praises love would sing
   Three times thrice.

Earth nor sea bears flower nor pearl of price
Fit to crown the forehead of my king,
Honey meet to please him, balm, nor spice.

Love can think of nought but love to bring
Fit to serve or do him sacrifice
Ere his eyes have looked upon the spring
   Three times thrice.

Three times thrice the world has fallen on slumber,
Shone and waned and withered in a trice,
Frost has fettered Thames and Tyne and Humber
   Three times thrice,

Fogs have swoln too thick for steel to slice,
Cloud and mud have soiled with grime and umber
Earth and heaven, defaced as souls with vice,

Winds have risen to wreck, snows fallen to cumber,
Ships and chariots, trapped like rats or mice,
Since my king first smiled, whose years now number
   Three times thrice.

Three times thrice, in wine of song full-flowing,
Pledge, my heart, the child whose eyes suffice,
Once beheld, to set thy joy-bells going
   Three times thrice.

Not the lands of palm and date and rice
Glow more bright when summer leaves them glowing,
Laugh more light when suns and winds entice.

Noon and eve and midnight and cock-crowing,
Child whose love makes life as paradise,
Love should sound your praise with clarions blowing
   Three times thrice.

I.

‘Not a child: I call myself a boy,’
Says my king, with accent stern yet mild,
Now nine years have brought him change of joy;
   ‘Not a child.’

How could reason be so far beguiled,
Err so far from sense’s safe employ,
Stray so wide of truth, or run so wild?

Seeing his face bent over book or toy,
Child I called him, smiling: but he smiled
Back, as one too high for vain annoy—
   Not a child.

Not a child? alack the year!
What should ail an undefiled
Heart, that he would fain appear
   Not a child?

Men, with years and memories piled
Each on other, far and near,
Fain again would so be styled:

Fain would cast off hope and fear,
Rest, forget, be reconciled:
Why would you so fain be, dear,
   Not a child?

Child or boy, my darling, which you will,
Still your praise finds heart and song employ,
Heart and song both yearning toward you still,
   Child or boy.

All joys else might sooner pall or cloy
Love than this which inly takes its fill,
Dear, of sight of your more perfect joy.

Nay, be aught you please, let all fulfil
All your pleasure; be your world your toy:
Mild or wild we love you, loud or still,
   Child or boy.

Child of two strong nations, heir
Born of high-souled hope that smiled,
Seeing for each brought forth a fair
   Child,

By thy gracious brows, and wild
Golden-clouded heaven of hair,
By thine eyes elate and mild,

Hope would fain take heart to swear
Men should yet be reconciled,
Seeing the sign she bids thee bear,
   Child.

A roundel is wrought as a ring or a starbright sphere,
With craft of delight and with cunning of sound unsought,
That the heart of the hearer may smile if to pleasure his ear
   A roundel is wrought.

Its jewel of music is carven of all or of aught—
Love, laughter, or mourning—remembrance of rapture or fear—
That fancy may fashion to hang in the ear of thought.

As a bird’s quick song runs round, and the hearts in us hear
Pause answer to pause, and again the same strain caught,
So moves the device whence, round as a pearl or tear,
   A roundel is wrought.

‘Farewell and adieu’ was the burden prevailing
Long since in the chant of a home-faring crew;
And the heart in us echoes, with laughing or wailing,
   Farewell and adieu.

Each year that we live shall we sing it anew,
With a water untravelled before us for sailing
And a water behind us that wrecks may bestrew.

The stars of the past and the beacons are paling,
The heavens and the waters are hoarier of hue:
But the heart in us chants not an all unavailing
   Farewell and adieu.

What shall be done for sorrow
   With love whose race is run?
Where help is none to borrow,
   What shall be done?

In vain his hands have spun
   The web, or drawn the furrow:
No rest their toil hath won.

His task is all gone thorough,
   And fruit thereof is none:
And who dare say to-morrow
   What shall be done?

Love’s twilight wanes in heaven above,
   On earth ere twilight reigns:
Ere fear may feel the chill thereof,
   Love’s twilight wanes.

Ere yet the insatiate heart complains
   ‘Too much, and scarce enough,’
The lip so late athirst refrains.

Soft on the neck of either dove
   Love’s hands let slip the reins:
And while we look for light of love
   Love’s twilight wanes.

Far-fetched and dear-bought, as the proverb rehearses,
Is good, or was held so, for ladies: but nought
In a song can be good if the turn of the verse is
   Far-fetched and dear-bought.

As the turn of a wave should it sound, and the thought
Ring smooth, and as light as the spray that disperses
Be the gleam of the words for the garb thereof wrought.

Let the soul in it shine through the sound as it pierces
Men’s hearts with possession of music unsought;
For the bounties of song are no jealous god’s mercies,
   Far-fetched and dear-bought.

I.
LOVE LIES BLEEDING.

Love lies bleeding in the bed whereover
Roses lean with smiling mouths or pleading:
Earth lies laughing where the sun’s dart clove her:
   Love lies bleeding.

Stately shine his purple plumes, exceeding
Pride of princes: nor shall maid or lover
Find on earth a fairer sign worth heeding.

Yet may love, sore wounded scarce recover
Strength and spirit again, with life receding:
Hope and joy, wind-winged, about him hover:
   Love lies bleeding.

Light love in a mist, by the midsummer moon misguided,
Scarce seen in the twilight garden if gloom insist,
Seems vainly to seek for a star whose gleam has derided
   Light love in a mist.

All day in the sun, when the breezes do all they list,
His soft blue raiment of cloudlike blossom abided
Unrent and unwithered of winds and of rays that kissed.

Blithe-hearted or sad, as the cloud or the sun subsided,
Love smiled in the flower with a meaning whereof none wist
Save two that beheld, as a gleam that before them glided,
   Light love in a mist.

I.
VENTIMIGLIA.

The sky and sea glared hard and bright and blank:
Down the one steep street, with slow steps firm and free,
A tall girl paced, with eyes too proud to thank
   The sky and sea.

One dead flat sapphire, void of wrath or glee,
Through bay on bay shone blind from bank to bank
The weary Mediterranean, drear to see.

More deep, more living, shone her eyes that drank
The breathless light and shed again on me,
Till pale before their splendour waned and shrank
   The sky and sea.

Again the same strange might of eyes, that saw
In heaven and earth nought fairer, overcame
My sight with rapture of reiterate awe,
   Again the same.

The self-same pulse of wonder shook like flame
The spirit of sense within me: what strange law
Had bid this be, for blessing or for blame?

To what veiled end that fate or chance foresaw
Came forth this second sister face, that came
Absolute, perfect, fair without a flaw,
   Again the same?

Out of the dark pure twilight, where the stream
Flows glimmering, streaked by many a birdlike bark
That skims the gloom whence towers and bridges gleam
   Out of the dark,

Once more a face no glance might choose but mark
Shone pale and bright, with eyes whose deep slow beam
Made quick the twilight, lifeless else and stark.

The same it seemed, or mystery made it seem,
As those before beholden; but St. Mark
Ruled here the ways that showed it like a dream
   Out of the dark.

I.

Eros, from rest in isles far-famed,
With rising Anthesterion rose,
And all Hellenic heights acclaimed
   Eros.

The sea one pearl, the shore one rose,
All round him all the flower-month flamed
And lightened, laughing off repose.

Earth’s heart, sublime and unashamed,
Knew, even perchance as man’s heart knows,
The thirst of all men’s nature named
   Eros.

Eros, a fire of heart untamed,
A light of spirit in sense that glows,
Flamed heavenward still ere earth defamed
   Eros.

Nor fear nor shame durst curb or close
His golden godhead, marred and maimed,
Fast round with bonds that burnt and froze.

Ere evil faith struck blind and lamed
Love, pure as fire or flowers or snows,
Earth hailed as blameless and unblamed
   Eros.

Eros, with shafts by thousands aimed
At laughing lovers round in rows,
Fades from their sight whose tongues proclaimed
   Eros.

But higher than transient shapes or shows
The light of love in life inflamed
Springs, toward no goal that these disclose.

Above those heavens which passion claimed
Shines, veiled by change that ebbs and flows,
The soul in all things born or framed,
   Eros.

Sorrow, on wing through the world for ever,
Here and there for awhile would borrow
Rest, if rest might haply deliver
   Sorrow.

One thought lies close in her heart gnawn thorough
With pain, a weed in a dried-up river,
A rust-red share in an empty furrow.

Hearts that strain at her chain would sever
The link where yesterday frets to-morrow:
All things pass in the world, but never
   Sorrow.

Sleep, when a soul that her own clouds cover
Wails that sorrow should always keep
Watch, nor see in the gloom above her
   Sleep,

Down, through darkness naked and steep,
Sinks, and the gifts of his grace recover
Soon the soul, though her wound be deep.

God beloved of us, all men’s lover,
All most weary that smile or weep
Feel thee afar or anear them hover,
   Sleep.

Translated by D. C. Rossetti from the French of Villon.

I.

Death, from thy rigour a voice appealed,
And men still hear what the sweet cry saith,
Crying aloud in thine ears fast sealed,
   Death.

As a voice in a vision that vanisheth,
Through the grave’s gate barred and the portal steeled
The sound of the wail of it travelleth.

Wailing aloud from a heart unhealed,
It woke response of melodious breath
From lips now too by thy kiss congealed,
   Death.

Ages ago, from the lips of a sad glad poet
Whose soul was a wild dove lost in the whirling snow,
The soft keen plaint of his pain took voice to show it
   Ages ago.

So clear, so deep, the divine drear accents flow,
No soul that listens may choose but thrill to know it,
Pierced and wrung by the passionate music’s throe.

For us there murmurs a nearer voice below it,
Known once of ears that never again shall know,
Now mute as the mouth which felt death’s wave o’erflow it
   Ages ago.

Low lies the mere beneath the moorside, still
And glad of silence: down the wood sweeps clear
To the utmost verge where fed with many a rill
   Low lies the mere.

The wind speaks only summer: eye nor ear
Sees aught at all of dark, hears aught of shrill,
From sound or shadow felt or fancied here.

Strange, as we praise the dead man’s might and skill,
Strange that harsh thoughts should make such heavy cheer,
While, clothed with peace by heaven’s most gentle will,
   Low lies the mere.

Heart’s ease or pansy, pleasure or thought,
Which would the picture give us of these?
Surely the heart that conceived it sought
   Heart’s ease.

Surely by glad and divine degrees
The heart impelling the hand that wrought
Wrought comfort here for a soul’s disease.

Deep flowers, with lustre and darkness fraught,
From glass that gleams as the chill still seas
Lean and lend for a heart distraught
   Heart’s ease.

Wind and sea and cloud and cloud-forsaking
Mirth of moonlight where the storm leaves free
Heaven awhile, for all the wrath of waking
   Wind and sea.

Bright with glad mad rapture, fierce with glee,
Laughs the moon, borne on past cloud’s o’ertaking
Fast, it seems, as wind or sail can flee.

One blown sail beneath her, hardly making
Forth, wild-winged for harbourage yet to be,
Strives and leaps and pants beneath the breaking
   Wind and sea.

Mad March, with the wind in his wings wide-spread,
Leaps from heaven, and the deep dawn’s arch
Hails re-risen again from the dead
   Mad March.

Soft small flames on rowan and larch
Break forth as laughter on lips that said
Nought till the pulse in them beat love’s march.

But the heartbeat now in the lips rose-red
Speaks life to the world, and the winds that parch
Bring April forth as a bride to wed
   Mad March.

Dead love, by treason slain, lies stark,
White as a dead stark-stricken dove:
None that pass by him pause to mark
   Dead love.

His heart, that strained and yearned and strove
As toward the sundawn strives the lark,
Is cold as all the old joy thereof.

Dead men, re-risen from dust, may hark
When rings the trumpet blown above:
It will not raise from out the dark
   Dead love.

Unreconciled by life’s fleet years, that fled
With changeful clang of pinions wide and wild,
Though two great spirits had lived, and hence had sped
   Unreconciled;

Though time and change, harsh time’s imperious child,
That wed strange hands together, might not wed
High hearts by hope’s misprision once beguiled;

Faith, by the light from either’s memory shed,
Sees, radiant as their ends were undefiled,
One goal for each—not twain among the dead
   Unreconciled.

Reconciled by death’s mild hand, that giving
Peace gives wisdom, not more strong than mild,
Love beholds them, each without misgiving
   Reconciled.

Each on earth alike of earth reviled,
Hated, feared, derided, and forgiving,
Each alike had heaven at heart, and smiled.

Both bright names, clothed round with man’s thanksgiving,
Shine, twin stars above the storm-drifts piled,
Dead and deathless, whom we saw not living
   Reconciled.

Alas my brother! the cry of the mourners of old
   That cried on each other,
All crying aloud on the dead as the death-note rolled,
   Alas my brother!

As flashes of dawn that mists from an east wind smother
   With fold upon fold,
The past years gleam that linked us one with another.

Time sunders hearts as of brethren whose eyes behold
   No more their mother:
But a cry sounds yet from the shrine whose fires wax cold,
   Alas my brother!

Strong as death, and cruel as the grave,
Clothed with cloud and tempest’s blackening breath,
Known of death’s dread self, whom none outbrave,
   Strong as death,

Love, brow-bound with anguish for a wreath,
Fierce with pain, a tyrant-hearted slave,
Burns above a world that groans beneath.

Hath not pity power on thee to save,
Love? hath power no pity?  Nought he saith,
Answering: blind he walks as wind or wave,
   Strong as death.

My brother, my Valerius, dearest head
Of all whose crowning bay-leaves crown their mother
Rome, in the notes first heard of thine I read
   My brother.

No dust that death or time can strew may smother
Love and the sense of kinship inly bred
From loves and hates at one with one another.

To thee was Cæsar’s self nor dear nor dread,
Song and the sea were sweeter each than other:
How should I living fear to call thee dead
   My brother?

Sark, fairer than aught in the world that the lit skies cover,
Laughs inly behind her cliffs, and the seafarers mark
As a shrine where the sunlight serves, though the blown clouds hover,
   Sark.

We mourn, for love of a song that outsang the lark,
That nought so lovely beholden of Sirmio’s lover
Made glad in Propontis the flight of his Pontic bark.

Here earth lies lordly, triumphal as heaven is above her,
And splendid and strange as the sea that upbears as an ark,
As a sign for the rapture of storm-spent eyes to discover,
   Sark.

Abreast and ahead of the sea is a crag’s front cloven asunder
With strong sea-breach and with wasting of winds whence terror is shed
As a shadow of death from the wings of the darkness on waters that thunder
   Abreast and ahead.

At its edge is a sepulchre hollowed and hewn for a lone man’s bed,
Propped open with rock and agape on the sky and the sea thereunder,
But roofed and walled in well from the wrath of them slept its dead.

Here might not a man drink rapture of rest, or delight above wonder,
Beholding, a soul disembodied, the days and the nights that fled,
With splendour and sound of the tempest around and above him and under,
   Abreast and ahead?

TO THEODORE WATTS.

I.

The heavenly bay, ringed round with cliffs and moors,
Storm-stained ravines, and crags that lawns inlay,
Soothes as with love the rocks whose guard secures
   The heavenly bay.

O friend, shall time take ever this away,
This blessing given of beauty that endures,
This glory shown us, not to pass but stay?

Though sight be changed for memory, love ensures
What memory, changed by love to sight, would say—
The word that seals for ever mine and yours
   The heavenly bay.

My mother sea, my fostress, what new strand,
What new delight of waters, may this be,
The fairest found since time’s first breezes fanned
   My mother sea?

Once more I give me body and soul to thee,
Who hast my soul for ever: cliff and sand
Recede, and heart to heart once more are we.

My heart springs first and plunges, ere my hand
Strike out from shore: more close it brings to me,
More near and dear than seems my fatherland,
   My mother sea.

Across and along, as the bay’s breadth opens, and o’er us
Wild autumn exults in the wind, swift rapture and strong
Impels us, and broader the wide waves brighten before us
   Across and along.

The whole world’s heart is uplifted, and knows not wrong;
The whole world’s life is a chant to the sea-tide’s chorus;
Are we not as waves of the water, as notes of the song?

Like children unworn of the passions and toils that wore us,
We breast for a season the breadth of the seas that throng,
Rejoicing as they, to be borne as of old they bore us
   Across and along.

On Dante’s track by some funereal spell
Drawn down through desperate ways that lead not back
We seem to move, bound forth past flood and fell
   On Dante’s track.

The grey path ends: the gaunt rocks gape: the black
Deep hollow tortuous night, a soundless shell,
Glares darkness: are the fires of old grown slack?

Nay, then, what flames are these that leap and swell
As ’twere to show, where earth’s foundations crack,
The secrets of the sepulchres of hell
   On Dante’s track?

By mere men’s hands the flame was lit, we know,
From heaps of dry waste whin and casual brands:
Yet, knowing, we scarce believe it kindled so
   By mere men’s hands.

Above, around, high-vaulted hell expands,
Steep, dense, a labyrinth walled and roofed with woe,
Whose mysteries even itself not understands.

The scorn in Farinata’s eyes aglow
Seems visible in this flame: there Geryon stands:
No stage of earth’s is here, set forth to show
   By mere men’s hands.

Night, in utmost noon forlorn and strong, with heart athirst and fasting,
Hungers here, barred up for ever, whence as one whom dreams affright
Day recoils before the low-browed lintel threatening doom and casting
   Night.

All the reefs and islands, all the lawns and highlands, clothed with light,
Laugh for love’s sake in their sleep outside: but here the night speaks, blasting
Day with silent speech and scorn of all things known from depth to height.

Lower than dive the thoughts of spirit-stricken fear in souls forecasting
Hell, the deep void seems to yawn beyond fear’s reach, and higher than sight
Rise the walls and roofs that compass it about with everlasting
   Night.

The house accurst, with cursing sealed and signed,
Heeds not what storms about it burn and burst:
No fear more fearful than its own may find
   The house accurst.

Barren as crime, anhungered and athirst,
Blank miles of moor sweep inland, sere and blind,
Where summer’s best rebukes not winter’s worst.

The low bleak tower with nought save wastes behind
Stares down the abyss whereon chance reared and nursed
This type and likeness of the accurst man’s mind,
   The house accurst.

Beloved and blest, lit warm with love and fame,
The house that had the light of the earth for guest
Hears for his name’s sake all men hail its name
   Beloved and blest.

This eyrie was the homeless eagle’s nest
When storm laid waste his eyrie: hence he came
Again, when storm smote sore his mother’s breast.

Bow down men bade us, or be clothed with blame
And mocked for madness: worst, they sware, was best:
But grief shone here, while joy was one with shame,
   Beloved and blest.

Fly, white butterflies, out to sea,
Frail pale wings for the winds to try,
Small white wings that we scarce can see
   Fly.

Here and there may a chance-caught eye
Note in a score of you twain or three
Brighter or darker of tinge or dye.

Some fly light as a laugh of glee,
Some fly soft as a low long sigh:
All to the haven where each would be
   Fly.