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Sky-what a scowl of cloud
Till, near and far,
Ray on ray split the shroud :
Splendid, a star!

World-how it walled about
Life with disgrace

Till God's own smile came out :
That was thy face!

EPILOGUE

What a pretty tale you told me
Once upon a time

-Said you found it somewhere (scold me!)

Was it prose or was it rhyme, Greek or Latin? Greek, you said, While your shoulder propped my head.

Anyhow there's no forgetting

This much if no more,
That a poet (pray, no petting!)
Yes, a bard, sir, famed of yore,
Went where suchlike used to go,
Singing for a prize, you know.
Well, he had to sing, nor merely
Sing but play the lyre;
Playing was important clearly
Quite as singing: I desire,
Sir, you keep the fact in mind
For a purpose that's behind.

There stood he, while deep attention
Held the judges round,
-Judges able, I should mention,

To detect the slightest sound
Sung or played amiss: such ears
Had old judges, it appears!

None the less he sang out boldly,
Played in time and tune,
Till the judges, weighing coldly
Each note's worth, seemed, late or

soon.

Sure to smile" In vain one tries Picking faults out: take the prize!"

When, a mischief! Were they seven
Strings the lyre possessed?
Oh, and afterwards eleven,

Thank you! Well, sir,-who had guessed

Such ill luck in store?—it happed
One of those same seven strings snapped.

All was lost, then! No! a cricket (What" cicada"? Pooh!) -Some mad thing that left its thicket

For mere love of music-flew
With its little heart on fire,
Lighted on the crippled lyre.

So that when (Ah, joy !) our singer
For his truant string
Feels with disconcerted finger,

What does cricket else but fling Fiery heart forth, sound the note Wanted by the throbbing throat?

Ay and, ever to the ending,
Cricket chirps at need,
Executes the hand's intending,

Promptly, perfectly,-indeed
Saves the singer from defeat
With her chirrup low and sweet.

Till, at ending, all the judges

66

Cry with one assent

Take the prize-a prize who grudges Such a voice and instrument? Why, we took your lyre for harp, So it shrilled us forth F sharp!"

Did the conqueror spurn the creature,
Once its service done?

That 's no such uncommon feature
In the case when Music's son
Finds his Lotte's power too spent
For aiding soul-development.

No! This other, on returning
Homeward, prize in hand,
Satisfied his bosom's yearning:

(Sir, I hope you understand!) -Said "Some record there must be Of this cricket's help to me!"

So, he made himself a statue:
Marble stood, life-size;
On the lyre, he pointed at you,
Perched his partner in the prize;
Never more apart you found

Her, he throned, from him, she crowned.

That's the tale: its application? Somebody I know

Hopes one day for reputation

Through his poetry that 's-Oh, All so learned and so wise And deserving of a prize!

If he gains one, will some ticket,
When his statue 's built,
Tell the gazer ""Twas a cricket

Helped my crippled lyre, whose lilt Sweet and low, when strength usurped Softness' place i' the scale, she chirped?

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Good dog! What, off again? There's

yet

Another child to save? All right!

"How strange we saw no other fall! It 's instinct in the animal.

Good dog! But he's a long while under: If he got drowned I should not wonderStrong current, that against the wall!

"Here he comes, holds in mouth this time

-What may the thing be? Well, that's prime!

Now, did you ever? Reason reigns
In man alone, since all Tray's pains
Have fished--the child's doll from the
slime!'

"And so, amid the laughter gay,
Trotted my hero off,-old Tray,-
Till somebody, prerogatived

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With reason, reasoned: Why he dived, His brain would show us, I should say.

"John, go and catch-or. if needs be, Purchase that animal for me! By vivisection, at expense

Of half-an-hour and eighteenpence, How brain secretes dog's soul, we 'll see!'" 1879.

ECHETLOS

HERE is a story, shall stir you! Stand up, Greeks dead and gone,

Who breasted, beat Barbarians, stemmed Persia rolling on,

Did the deed and saved the world, for the day was Marathon!

No man but did his manliest, kept rank and fought away

In his tribe and file: up, back, out, down-was the spear-arm play : Like a wind-whipt branchy wood, all spear-arms a-swing that day!

But one man kept no rank, and his sole arm plied no spear,

As a flashing came and went, and a form i' the van, the rear, Brightened the battle up, for he blazed now there, now here.

Nor helmed nor shielded, he! but, a goat-skin all his wear,

Like a tiller of the soil, with a clown's limbs broad and bare,

Went he ploughing on and on he pushed with a ploughman's share.

Did the weak mid-line give way, as tunnies on whom the shark Precipitates his bulk?

Did the rightwing halt when, stark

On his heap of slain lay stretched Kallimachos Polemarch?

Did the steady phalanx falter? To the rescue, at the need,

The clown was ploughing Persia, clearing Greek earth of weed,

As he routed through the Sakian and rooted up the Mede.

But the deed done, battle won,-nowhere to be descried

On the meadow, by the stream, at the marsh,--look far and wide From the foot of the mountain, no, to the last blood-plashed sea-side,

Not anywhere on view blazed the large limbs thonged and brown, Shearing and clearing still with the share before which--down

To the dust went Persia's pomp, as he ploughed for Greece, that clown!

How spake the Oracle? "Care for no name at all!

Say but just this: We praise one helpful whom we call

The Holder of the Ploughshare.' The great deed ne'er grows small."

Not the great name! Sing-woe for the great name Miltiadés

And its end at Paros isle! Woe for Themistokles

-Satrap in Sardis court! Name not the clown like these!

1880.

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At the feet of the man who sat betwixt : And Mercy!" cried each-" if I tell the truth

Of a passage in my youth!"

Said This: "Do you mind the morning
I met your love with scorning?
As the worst of the venom left my lips,
I thought, If, despite this lie, he strips
The mask from my soul with a kiss-I
crawl

His slave, soul, body, and all!'”

Said that: "We stood to be married; The priest, or some one, tarried;

1 Having been criticised for speaking thus of his own work (as well he might, if he chose), Browning wrote the following lines in an album, for an American girl, at Venice:

Thus I wrote in London, musing on my betters.
Poets dead and gone; and lo, the critics cried,
"Out on such a boast!" as if I dreamed that
fetters

Binding Dante bind up-me! as if true pride
Were not also humble !....

'If Paradise-door prove locked?' smiled

you.

I thought, as I nodded, smiling too, 'Did one, that 's away, arrive-nor late Nor soon should unlock Hell's gate!'"

It ceased to lighten and thunder.
Up started both in wonder,
Looked round and saw that the sky was
clear,

Then laughed "Confess you believed us, Dear!"

I saw through the joke!" the man replied.

They re-seated themselves beside.

1883.

NEVER THE TIME AND THE PLACE

NEVER the time and the place

And the loved one all together!

This path-how soft to pace!

This May-what magic weather! Where is the loved one's face?

In a dream that loved one's face meets mine,

But the house is narrow, the place is bleak

Where, outside, rain and wind combine With a furtive ear, if I strive to speak, With a hostile eye at my flushing cheek,

With a malice that marks each word, each sign!

O enemy sly and serpentine,

Uncoil thee from the waking man!
Do I hold the Past
Thus firm and fast

Yet doubt if the Future hold I can?
This path so soft to pace shall lead
Through the magic of May to herself
indeed!

Or narrow if needs the house must be,
Outside are the storms and strangers:

we

Oh, close, safe, warm, sleep I and she, I and she. 1883.

SONGS FROM FERISHTAH'S

FANCIES

ROUND us the wild creatures, overhead the trees,

Underfoot the moss-tracks,-life and love with these!

I to wear a fawn-skin, thou to dress in flowers:

All the long lone summer-day, that greenwood life of ours!

Rich-pavilioned, rather,-still the world without,

Inside-gold-roofed silk-walled silence round about!

Queen it thou on purple,-I, at watch and ward,

Couched beneath the columns, gaze, thy slave, love's guard!

So, for us no world? Let throngs press thee to me!

Up and down amid men, heart by heart fare we!

Welcome squalid vesture, harsh voice, hateful face!

God is soul, souls I and thou: with souls should souls have place.

Wish no word unspoken, want no look away!

What if words were but mistake, and looks too sudden, say!

Be unjust for once, Love! Bear it-well I may !

Do me justice always? Bid my heart-their shrine-

Render back its store of gifts, old looks and words of thine

-Oh, so all unjust--the less deserved, the more divine?

Fire is in the flint: true, once a spark

escapes.

Fire forgets the kinship, soars till fancy shapes

Some befitting cradle where the babe had birth

Wholly heaven's the product, unallied to earth.

Splendors recognized as perfect in the star!

In our flint their home was, housed as now they are.

Verse-making was least of my virtues: I viewed with despair

Wealth that never yet was but might be--all that verse-making were

If the life would but lengthen to wish, let the mind be laid bare.

So I said To do little is bad, to do nothing is worse

And made verse.

Love-making,-how simple a matter! No depths to explore,

No heights in a life to ascend! No disheartening Before,

No affrighting Hereafter,-love now will be love evermore.

So I felt "To keep silence were folly:" -all language above, I made love.

Ask not one least word of praise! Words declare your eyes are bright? What then meant that summer day's Silence spent in one long gaze?

Was my silence wrong or right?

Words of praise were all to seek !
Face of you and form of you,
Did they find the praise so weak
When my lips just touched your cheek-
Touch which let my soul come through?

"Why from the world," Ferishtah smiled, "should thanks

Go to this work of mine? If worthy praise,

Praised let it be and welcome: as verse ranks,

So rate my verse: if good therein outweighs

Aught faulty judged, judge justly! Justice says:

Be just to fact, or blaming or approving: But-generous? No, nor loving!

"Loving! what claim to love has work of mine?

Concede my life were emptied of its gains

To furnish forth and fill work's strict confine,

Who works so for the world's sake

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