Delphi Complete Poetical Works of Christina Rossetti

by Christina Rossetti

Of love and parting in exceeding pain,

  Of parting hopeless here to meet again,

  Hopeless on earth, and heaven is out of view.

  But by my heart of love laid bare to you,

  My love that you can make not void nor vain,

  Love that foregoes you but to claim anew

  Beyond this passage of the gate of death,

  I charge you at the Judgment make it plain

  My love of you was life and not a breath.

  12.

  “Amor, che ne la mente mi ragiona.” — Dante.

  “Amor vien nel bel viso di costei.” — Petrarca.

  If there be any one can take my place

  And make you happy whom I grieve to grieve,

  Think not that I can grudge it, but believe

  I do commend you to that nobler grace,

  That readier wit than mine, that sweeter face;

  Yea, since your riches make me rich, conceive

  I too am crowned, while bridal crowns I weave,

  And thread the bridal dance with jocund pace.

  For if I did not love you, it might be

  That I should grudge you someone dear delight;

  But since the heart is yours that was mine own,

  Your pleasure is my pleasure, right my right,

  Your honorable freedom makes me free,

  And you companioned I am not alone.

  13.

  “E drizzeremo glí occhi al Primo Amore.” — Dante.

  “Ma trovo peso non da le mie braccia.” — Petrarca.

  If I could trust mine own self with your fate,

  Shall I not rather trust it in God’s hand?

  Without Whose Will one lily doth not stand,

  Nor sparrow fall at his appointed date;

  Who numbereth the innumerable sand,

  Who weighs the wind and water with a weight,

  To Whom the world is neither small nor great,

  Whose knowledge foreknew every plan we planned.

  Searching my heart for all that touches you,

  I find there only love and love’s goodwill

  Helpless to help and impotent to do,

  Of understanding dull, of sight most dim;

  And therefore I commend you back to Him

  Whose love your love’s capacity can fill.

  14.

  “E la Sua Volontade è nostra pace.” — Dante.

  “Sol con questi pensier, con altre chiome.” — Petrarca.

  Youth gone, and beauty gone if ever there

  Dwelt beauty in so poor a face as this;

  Youth gone and beauty, what remains of bliss?

  I will not bind fresh roses in my hair,

  To shame a cheek at best but little fair, —

  Leave youth his roses, who can bear a thorn, —

  I will not seek for blossoms anywhere,

  Except such common flowers as blow with corn.

  Youth gone and beauty gone, what doth remain?

  The longing of a heart pent up forlorn,

  A silent heart whose silence loves and longs;

  The silence of a heart which sang its songs

  While youth and beauty made a summer morn,

  Silence of love that cannot sing again.

  LUSCIOUS AND SORROWFUL

  Beautiful, tender, wasting away for sorrow;

  Thus today; and how shall it be with thee tomorrow?

  Beautiful, tender — what else?

  A hope tells.

  Beautiful, tender, keeping the jubilee

  In the land of home together, past death and sea;

  No more change or death, no more

  Salt sea-shore.

  DE PROFUNDIS

  Oh why is heaven built so far,

  Oh why is earth set so remote?

  I cannot reach the nearest star

  That hangs afloat.

  I would not care to reach the moon,

  One round monotonous of change;

  Yet even she repeats her tune

  Beyond my range.

  I never watch the scattered fire

  Of stars, or sun’s far-trailing train,

  But all my heart is one desire,

  And all in vain:

  For I am bound with fleshly bands,

  Joy, beauty, lie beyond my scope;

  I strain my heart, I stretch my hands,

  And catch at hope.

  TEMPUS FUGIT

  Lovely Spring,

  A brief sweet thing,

  Is swift on the wing;

  Gracious Summer,

  A slow sweet comer,

  Hastens past;

  Autumn while sweet

  Is all incomplete

  With a moaning blast, —

  Nothing can last,

  Can be cleaved unto,

  Can be dwelt upon;

  It is hurried through,

  It is come and gone,

  Undone it cannot be done,

  It is ever to do,

  Ever old, ever new,

  Ever waxing old

  And lapsing to Winter cold.

  GOLDEN GLORIES

  The buttercup is like a golden cup,

  The marigold is like a golden frill,

  The daisy with a golden eye looks up,

  And golden spreads the flag beside the rill,

  And gay and golden nods the daffodil,

  The gorsey common swells a golden sea,

  The cowslip hangs a head of golden tips,

  And golden drips the honey which the bee

  Sucks from sweet hearts of flowers and stores and sips.

  JOHNNY

  Founded On An Anecdote Of The First French Revolution.

  Johnny had a golden head

  Like a golden mop in blow,

  Right and left his curls would spread

  In a glory and a glow,

  And they framed his honest face

  Like stray sunbeams out of place.

  Long and thick, they half could hide

  How threadbare his patched jacket hung;

  They used to be his Mother’s pride;

  She praised them with a tender tongue,

  And stroked them with a loving finger

  That smoothed and stroked and loved to linger.

  On a doorstep Johnny sat,

  Up and down the street looked he;

  Johnny did not own a hat,

  Hot or cold tho’ days might be;

  Johnny did not own a boot

  To cover up his muddy foot.

  Johnny’s face was pale and thin,

  Pale with hunger and with crying;

  For his Mother lay within,

  Talked and tossed and seemed a-dying,

  While Johnny racked his brains to think

  How to get her help and drink,

  Get her physic, get her tea,

  Get her bread and something nice;

  Not a penny piece had he,

  And scarce a shilling might suffice;

  No wonder that his soul was sad,

  When not one penny piece he had.

  As he sat there thinking, moping,

  Because his Mother’s wants were many,

  Wishing much but scarcely hoping

  To earn a shilling or a penny,

  A friendly neighbor passed him by

  And questioned him: Why did he cry?

  Alas! his trouble soon was told:

  He did not cry for cold or hunger,

  Though he was hungry both and cold;

  He only felt more weak and younger,

  Because he wished so to be old

  And apt at earning pence or gold.

  Kindly that neighbor was, but poor,

  Scant coin had he to give or lend;

  And well he guessed there needed more

  Than pence or shillings to befriend

  The helpless woman in her strait,

  So much loved, yet so desolate.

  One way he saw, and only one:

  He wo
uld — he could not — give the advice,

  And yet he must: the widow’s son

  Had curls of gold would fetch their price;

  Long curls which might be clipped, and sold

  For silver, or perhaps for gold.

  Our Johnny, when he understood

  Which shop it was that purchased hair,

  Ran off as briskly as he could,

  And in a trice stood cropped and bare,

  Too short of hair to fill a locket,

  But jingling money in his pocket.

  Precious money — tea and bread,

  Physic, ease, for Mother dear,

  Better than a golden head:

  Yet our hero dropped one tear

  When he spied himself close shorn,

  Barer much than lamb new born.

  His Mother throve upon the money,

  Ate and revived and kissed her son:

  But oh! when she perceived her Johnny,

  And understood what he had done

  All and only for her sake,

  She sobbed as if her heart must break.

  HOLLOW-SOUNDING AND MYSTERIOUS

  There’s no replying

  To the Wind’s sighing,

  Telling, foretelling,

  Dying, undying,

  Dwindling and swelling,

  Complaining, droning,

  Whistling and moaning,

  Ever beginning,

  Ending, repeating,

  Hinting and dinning,

  Lagging and fleeting —

  We’ve no replying

  Living or dying

  To the Wind’s sighing.

  What are you telling,

  Variable Wind-tone?

  What would be teaching,

  O sinking, swelling,

  Desolate Wind-moan?

  Ever for ever

  Teaching and preaching,

  Never, ah never

  Making us wiser —

  The earliest riser

  Catches no meaning,

  The last who hearkens

  Garners no gleaning

  Of wisdom’s treasure,

  While the world darkens: —

  Living or dying,

  In pain, in pleasure,

  We’ve no replying

  To wordless flying

  Wind’s sighing.

  MAIDEN MAY

  Maiden May sat in her bower,

  In her blush rose bower in flower,

  Sweet of scent;

  Sat and dreamed away an hour,

  Half content, half uncontent.

  “Why should rose blossoms be born,

  Tender blossoms, on a thorn

  Though so sweet?

  Never a thorn besets the corn

  Scentless in its strength complete.

  “Why are roses all so frail,

  At the mercy of the gale,

  Of a breath?

  Yet so sweet and perfect pale,

  Still so sweet in life and death.”

  Maiden May sat in her bower,

  In her blush rose bower in flower,

  Where a linnet

  Made one bristling branch the tower

  For her nest and young ones in it.

  “Gay and clear the linnet trills;

  Yet the skylark only, thrills

  Heaven and earth

  When he breasts the height, and fills

  Height and depth with song and mirth.

  “Nightingales which yield to night

  Solitary strange delight,

  Reign alone:

  But the lark for all his height

  Fills no solitary throne;

  “While he sings, a hundred sing;

  Wing their flight below his wing

  Yet in flight;

  Each a lovely joyful thing

  To the measure of its delight.

  “Why then should a lark be reckoned

  One alone, without a second

  Near his throne?

  He in skyward flight unslackened,

  In his music, not alone.”

  Maiden May sat in her bower;

  Her own face was like a flower

  Of the prime,

  Half in sunshine, half in shower,

  In the year’s most tender time.

  Her own thoughts in silent song

  Musically flowed along,

  Wise, unwise,

  Wistful, wondering, weak or strong:

  As brook shallows sink or rise.

  Other thoughts another day,

  Maiden May, will surge and sway

  Round your heart;

  Wake, and plead, and turn at bay,

  Wisdom part, and folly part.

  Time not far remote will borrow

  Other joys, another sorrow,

  All for you;

  Not today, and yet tomorrow

  Reasoning false and reasoning true.

  Wherefore greatest? Wherefore least?

  Hearts that starve and hearts that feast?

  You and I?

  Stammering Oracles have ceased,

  And the whole earth stands at “why?”

  Underneath all things that be

  Lies an unsolved mystery;

  Over all

  Spreads a veil impenetrably,

  Spreads a dense unlifted pall.

  Mystery of mysteries:

  This creation hears and sees

  High and low —

  Vanity of vanities:

  This we test and this we know.

  Maiden May, the days of flowering

  Nurse you now in sweet embowering,

  Sunny days;

  Bright with rainbows all the showering,

  Bright with blossoms all the ways.

  Close the inlet of your bower,

  Close it close with thorn and flower,

  Maiden May;

  Lengthen out the shortening hour, —

  Morrows are not as today.

  Stay today which wanes too soon,

  Stay the sun and stay the moon,

  Stay your youth;

  Bask you in the actual noon,

  Rest you in the present truth.

  Let today suffice today:

  For itself tomorrow may

  Fetch its loss;

  Aim and stumble, say its say,

  Watch and pray and bear its cross.

  TILL TOMORROW

  Long have I longed, till I am tired

  Of longing and desire;

  Farewell my points in vain desired,

  My dying fire;

  Farewell all things that die and fail and tire.

  Springtide and youth and useless pleasure

  And all my useless scheming,

  My hopes of unattainable treasure,

  Dreams not worth dreaming,

  Glow-worms that gleam but yield no warmth in gleaming,

  Farewell all shows that fade in showing:

  My wish and joy stand over

  Until tomorrow; Heaven is glowing

  Through cloudy cover,

  Beyond all clouds loves me my Heavenly Lover.

  DEATH-WATCHES

  The Spring spreads one green lap of flowers

  Which Autumn buries at the fall,

  No chilling showers of Autumn hours

  Can stay them or recall;

  Winds sing a dirge, while earth lays out of sight

  Her garment of delight.

  The cloven East brings forth the sun,

  The cloven West doth bury him

  What time his gorgeous race is run

  And all the world grows dim;

  A funeral moon is lit in heaven’s hollow,

  And pale the star-lights follow.

  TOUCHING NEVER

  Because you never yet have loved me, dear,

  Think you you never can nor ever will?

  Surely while life remains hope lingers still,

  Hope the last blossom of life’s dying year.

  Because the season and mine a
ge grow sere,

  Shall never Spring bring forth her daffodil,

  Shall never sweeter Summer feast her fill

  Of roses with the nightingales they hear?

  If you had loved me, I not loving you,

  If you had urged me with the tender plea

  Of what our unknown years to come might do

  (Eternal years, if Time should count too few),

  I would have owned the point you pressed on me,

  Was possible, or probable, or true.

  BRANDONS BOTH

  Oh fair Milly Brandon, a young maid, a fair maid!

  All her curls are yellow and her eyes are blue,

  And her cheeks were rosy red till a secret care made

  Hollow whiteness of their brightness as a care will do.

  Still she tends her flowers, but not as in the old days,

  Still she sings her songs, but not the songs of old:

  If now it be high Summer her days seem brief and cold days,

  If now it be high Summer her nights are long and cold.

  If you have a secret keep it, pure maid Milly;

  Life is filled with troubles and the world with scorn;

  And pity without love is at best times hard and chilly,

  Chilling sore and stinging sore a heart forlorn.

  Walter Brandon, do you guess Milly Brandon’s secret?

  Many things you know, but not everything,

  With your locks like raven’s plumage, and eyes like an egret,

  And a laugh that is music, and such a voice to sing.

  Nelly Knollys, she is fair, but she is not fairer

  Than fairest Milly Brandon was before she turned so pale:

  Oh, but Nelly’s dearer if she be not rarer,

  She need not keep a secret or blush behind a veil.

  Beyond the first green hills, beyond the nearest valleys,

  Nelly dwells at home beneath her mother’s eyes: