A Library of Poetry and Song: Being Choice Selections from the Best Poets

The lading of a single pain, And part it, giving half to him.

But I remained, whose hopes were dim,

Whose life, whose thoughts were little worth

To wander on a darkened earth, Where all things round me breathed of him..

O friendship, equal-poised control,

O heart, with kindliest motion warm,

O sacred essence, other form,
O solemn ghost, О crowned soul !

Yet none could better know than I,

How much of act at human hands

The sense of human will demands By which we dare to live or die.

Whatever way my days decline,

I felt and feel, though left alone,

His being working in mine own, The footsteps of his life in mine.

My pulses therefore beat again

For other friends that once I met;

Nor can it suit me to forget The mighty hopes that make us men.

I woo your love : I count it crime

To mourn for any overmuch ;

I, the divided half of such A friendship as had mastered Time ;

Which masters Time, indeed, and is

Eternal, separate from fears :

The all-assuming months and years Can take no part away from this.

O days and hours, your work is this,

To hold me from my proper place,

A little while from his embrace, For fuller gain of after bliss :

That out of distance might ensue

Desire of nearness doubly sweet;

And unto meeting when we meet, Delight a hundred-fold accrue.

The hills are shadows, and they flow

From form to form, and nothing stands ;

They melt like mist, the solid lands, Like clouds they shape themselves and go.

But in my spirit will I dwell,

And dream my dream, and hold it true ;

For though my lips may breathe adieu, I cannot think the thing farewell.

O friend beloved! I sit apart and dumb,

Sometimes in sorrow, oft in joy divine ; My lip will falter, but my prisoned heart Springs forth to measure its faint pulse with

thine.

Thou art to me most like a royal guest,

Whose travels bring him to some lowly roof, Where simple rustics spread their festal fare

And, blushing, own it is not good enough. Bethink thee, then, whene'er thou com'st to me,

From high emprise and noble toil to rest, My thoughts are weak and trivial, matched with

thine ;

But the poor mansion offers thee its best,

JULIA WARD HOWE.

THE DEAD FRIEND.

FROM

IN MEMORIAM."

The path by which we twain did go,

Which led by tracts that pleased us well,

Through four sweet years arose and fell, From flower to flower, from snow to snow.

But where the path we walked began

To slant the fifth autumnal slope,

As we descended following Hope, There sat the Shadow feared of man ;

Who broke our fair companionship,

And spread his mantle dark and cold,

And wrapped thee formless in the fold, And dulled the murmur on thy lip.

When each by turns was guide to each,

And Fancy light from Fancy caught,

And Thought leapt out to wed with Thought Ere Thought could wed itself with Speech ;

And all we met was fair and good,

And all was good that Time could bring,

And all the secret of the Spring Moved in the chambers of the blood;

I know that this was Life, - the track

Whereon with equal feet we fared ;

And then, as now, the day prepared
The daily burden for the back.
But this it was that made me move

As light as carrier-birds in air ;

I loved the weight I had to bear Because it needed help of Love :

Nor could I weary, heart or limb,

When mighty Love would cleave in twain

ALFRED TENNYSON.

COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION.

TO MISTRESS MARGARET HUSSEY.

MERRY Margaret,
As midsummer flower,
Gentle as falcon,
Or hawk of the tower ;
With solace and gladness,
Much mirth and no madness,
All good and no badness;
So joyously,
So maidenly,
So womanly
Her demeaning,
In everything
Far, far passing
That I can indite,
Or suffice to write,
Of merry Margaret,
As midsummer flower,
Gentle as falcon
Or hawk of the tower;
As patient and as still,
And as full of good-will,
As fair Isiphil,
Coliander,
Sweet Pomander,
Good Cassander ;
Steadfast of thought,
Well made, well wrought;
Far may be sought
Ere you can find
So courteous, so kind,
As merry Margaret,
This midsummer flower,
Gentle as falcon,
Or hawk of the tower.

JOHN SKELTON.

'Twixt the souls of friend and friend : But upon the fairest boughs,

Or at every sentence end, Will I Rosalinda write;

Teaching all that read to know The quintessence of every sprite

Heaven would in little show. Therefore Heaven nature charged

That one body should be filled With all graces wide enlarged :

Nature presently distilled Helen's cheek, but not her heart,

Cleopatra's majesty, Atalanta's better part,

Sad Lucretia's modesty. Thus Rosalind of many parts

By heavenly synod was devised ; Of many faces, eyes, and hearts,

To have the touches dearest prized. Heaven would that she these gifts should have,

And I to live and die her slave.

SHAKESPEARE.

PHILLIS THE FAIR.

On a hill there grows a flower,

Fair befall the dainty sweet !
By that flower there is a bower

Where the heavenly muses meet.

In that bower there is a chair,

Fringéd all about with gold,
Where doth sit the fairest fair

That ever eye did yet behold.

It is Phillis, fair and bright,

She that is the shepherd's joy,
She that Venus did despite,

And did blind her little boy.

Who would not that face admire ?

Who would not this saint adore !
Who would not this sight desire ?

Though he thought to see no more.

Thou that art the shepherd's queen,

Look upon thy love-sick swain ;
By thy comfort have been seen

Dead men brought to life again.

NICHOLAS BRETON

A VIOLET in her lovely hair,
A rose upon her bosom fair !

But O, her eyes
A lovelier violet disclose,
And her ripe lips the sweetest rose

That's 'neath the skies.

Fair Portia's counterfeit? What demi-god
Hath come so near creation ? Move these eyes ?
Or whether, riding on the balls of mine,
Seem they in motion ? Here are severed lips,
Parted with sugar breath ; so sweet a bar
Should sunder such sweet friends : Here in her

hairs
The painter plays the spider; and hath woven
A golden mesh to entrap the hearts of men,
Faster than gnats in cobwebs : But her eyes,
How could he see to do them? having made one,
Methinks it should have power to steal both his,
And leave itself unfurnished.

SHAKESPEARE.

A lute beneath her graceful hand Breathes music forth at her command ;

But still her tongue Far richer music calls to birth Than all the minstrel power on earth

Can give to song

A third, nor red nor white, had stol'n of both,
And to this robbery had annexed thy breath ;
But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth
A vengeful canker eat him up to death.
More flowers I noted, yet I none could see,
But sweet or color it had stolen from thee.

SHAKESPEARE.

GIVE PLACE, YE LOVERS. GIVE place, ye lovers, here before

That spent your boasts and brags in vain ; My lady's beauty passeth more

The best of yours, I dare well sayen,
Than doth the sun the candle-light,
Or brightest day the darkest night.
And thereto hath a troth as just

As had Penelope the fair ;
For what she saith, ye may it trust,

As it by writing sealed were :
And virtues hath she many mo'
Than I with pen have skill to show.
I could rehearse, if that I would,

The whole effect of Nature's plaint, When she had lost the perfect mould,

The like to whom she could not paint : With wringing nds, how she did cry, And what she said, I know it aye. I know she swore with raging mind,

Her kingdom only set apart, There was no loss by law of kind

That could have gone so near her heart; And this was chiefly all her pain ; “She could not make the like again.” Sith Nature thus gave her the praise,

To be the chiefest work she wrought,
In faith, methink, some better ways

On your behalf might well be sought,
Than to compare, as ye have done,
To match the candle with the sun.

LORD SURREY.

YOU MEANER BEAUTIES.

WHENAS IN SILKS MY JULIA GOES.

WHENAs in silks my Julia goes
Then, then (methinks) how sweetly flows
That liquefaction of her clothes.

Next, when I cast mine eyes and see
That brave vibration each way free ;
O, how that glittering taketh me!

R. HERRICK.

I DO NOT LOVE THEE FOR THAT FAIR.

I do not love thee for that fair
Rich fan of thy most curious hair,
Though the wires thereof be drawn
Finer than the threads of lawn,
And are softer than the leaves
On which the subtle spider weaves.

I do not love thee for those flowers
Growing on thy cheeks, -- love's bowers,
Though such cunning them hath spread,
None can paint them white and red.
Love's golden arrows thence are shot,
Yet for them I love thee not.

I do not love thee for those soft
Red coral lips I 've kissed so oft ;
Nor teeth of pearl, the double guard
To speech whence music still is heard,
Though from those lips a kiss being taken
Might tyrants melt, and death awaken.

I do not love thee, O my fairest,
For that richest, for that rarest
Silver pillar, which stands under
Thy sound head, that globe of wonder ;
Though that neck be whiter far
Than towers of polished ivory are.

THOMAS CAREW.

*THE FORWARD VIOLET THUS DID I

CHIDE.

SONNET.

The forward violet thus did I chide :-
Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet

that smells,
If not from my love's breath ? the purple pride
Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells,
In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dyed.
The lily I condemnéd for thy hand,
And buds of marjoram had stol'n thy hair :
The roses fearfully on thorns did stand,
me blushing shame, another white despair ;

You meaner beauties of the night,

That poorly satisfy our eyes
More by your number than your light,

You common people of the skies,

What are you when the moon shall rise ? You curious chanters of the wood,

That warble forth Dame Nature's lays,
Thinking your passions understood

By your weak accents,— what's your praise
When Philomel her voice shall raise ?

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