Delphi Complete Poetical Works of Christina Rossetti

by Christina Rossetti

I grow so weary: is it death

  This awful woful weariness?

  It is a weight to heave my breath,

  A weight to wake, a weight to sleep;

  I have no heart to work or weep.

  The sunshine teases and the dark;

  Only the twilight dulls my grief:

  Is this the Ark, the strong safe Ark,

  Or the tempestuous drowning sea

  Whose crested coursers foam for me?

  Why does the sea moan evermore?

  Shut out from Heaven it makes its moan,

  It frets against the boundary shore:

  All earth’s full rivers cannot fill

  The sea, that drinking thirsteth still.

  Sheer miracles of loveliness

  Lie hid in its unlooked-on bed:

  Salt passionless anemones

  Blow flower-like; just enough alive

  To blow and propagate and thrive.

  Shells quaint with curve or spot or spike,

  Encrusted live things argus-eyed,

  All fair alike yet all unlike,

  Are born without a pang and die

  Without a pang and so pass by.

  I would I lived without a pang:

  Oh happy they who day by day

  Quiescent neither sobbed nor sang;

  Unburdened with a what or why

  They live and die and so pass by.

  FOR H. P

  On the land and on the sea,

  Jesus keep both you and me:

  Going out and coming in,

  Christ keep us both from shame and sin:

  In this world, in the world to come,

  Keep us safe and lead us home:

  Today in toil, tonight in rest,

  Be Best Beloved and love us best.

  THEN THEY THAT FEARED THE LORD SPAKE OFTEN ONE TO ANOTHER

  Friend I commend to thee the narrow way:

  Not because I, please God, will walk therein,

  But rather for the love-feast of that day

  The exceeding prize which whoso will may win.

  This world is old and rotting at the core

  Here death’s heads mock us with a toothless grin

  Here heartiest laughter leaves us spent and sore.

  We heap up treasures for the fretting moth,

  Our children heap our fathers heaped before,

  But what shall profit us the cumbrous growth?

  It cannot journey with us, cannot save,

  Stripped in that darkness be we lief or loth

  Stripped bare to what we are from all we have,

  Naked we came, naked we must return

  To one obscure inevitable grave.

  If this the lesson is which we must learn

  Taught by God’s discipline of love or wrath

  (To brand or purify His fire must burn) —

  Friend I commend to thee the narrow path

  That thou and I, please God, may walk therein,

  May taste and see how good is God Who hath

  Loved us while hating even to death our sin.

  WHAT GOOD SHALL MY LIFE DO ME?

  No hope in life; yet is there hope

  In death, the threshold of man’s scope:

  Man yearneth (as the heliotrope

  For ever seeks the sun) thro’ light

  Thro’ dark for Love: all read aright

  Is Love for Love is infinite.

  Shall not this infinite Love suffice

  To feed thy dearth? Lift heart and eyes

  Up to the hills, grow glad and wise.

  The hills are glad because the sun

  Kisses their round tops every one

  Where silver fountains laugh and run:

  Smooth pebbles shine beneath; beside

  The grass, mere green, grows myriad-eyed

  With pomp of blossoms veined or pied.

  So every nest is glad whereon

  The sun in tender strength has shone;

  So every fruit he glows upon;

  So every valley depth, whose herds

  At pasture praise him without words;

  So the winged ecstasies of birds.

  If there be any such thing, what

  Is there by sunlight betters not? —

  Nothing except dead things that rot.

  Thou then who art not dead and fit

  Like blasted tree beside the pit

  But for the axe that levels it,

  Living show life of Love, whereof

  The force wields earth and heaven above:

  Who knows not Love begetteth Love? —

  Love in the gracious rain distils;

  Love moves the subtle fountain rills

  To fertilize uplifted hills

  And seedful vallies fertilize;

  Love stills the hungry lion’s cries

  And the young raven satisfies;

  Love hangs this earth in space; Love rolls

  Fair worlds rejoicing on their poles

  And girds them round with aureoles;

  Love lights the sun; Love thro’ the dark

  Lights the moon’s evanescent arc;

  Same Love lights up the glow-worm’s spark;

  Love rears the great; Love tends the small;

  Breaks off the yoke, breaks down the wall;

  Accepteth all, fulfilleth all.

  O ye who taste that Love is sweet,

  Set waymarks for the doubtful feet

  That stumble on in search of it.

  Sing hymns of Love, that those who hear

  Far off in pain may lend an ear

  Rise up and wonder and draw near.

  Lead lives of Love, that others who

  Behold your lives may kindle too

  With Love and cast their lots with you.

  THE MASSACRE OF PERUGIA

  A trumpet pealed thro’ France. Then Italy

  Stirred, shook, from sea to sea.

  Then many cities broke

  Their lawful yoke.

  Then in an evil hour

  Perugia on her fort-crowned hill

  [The rest of the poem is missing from the notebook.]

  I HAVE DONE WITH HOPE

  I have done with hope;

  Have done with lies from sea to sea:

  How should I lie beneath the cope

  Of Heaven’s star-blazoned verity?

  I will not wear your crown tonight,

  But mine own crown tomorrow morn:

  [The lines of the poem preceding and following

  the above are missing from the notebook.]

  PROMISES LIKE PIECRUST

  Promise me no promises,

  So will I not promise you;

  Keep we both our liberties,

  Never false and never true:

  Let us hold the die uncast,

  Free to come as free to go;

  For I cannot know your past,

  And of mine what can you know?

  You, so warm, may once have been

  Warmer towards another one;

  I, so cold, may once have seen

  Sunlight, once have felt the sun:

  Who shall show us if it was

  Thus indeed in time of old?

  Fades the image from the glass

  And the fortune is not told.

  If you promised, you might grieve

  For lost liberty again;

  If I promised, I believe

  I should fret to break the chain:

  Let us be the friends we were,

  Nothing more but nothing less;

  Many thrive on frugal fare

  Who would perish of excess.

  BY THE WATERS OF BABYLON

  By the waters of Babylon

  We sit down and weep,

  Far from the pleasant land

  Where our fathers sleep;

  Far from our Holy Place

  From which the Glory is gone;

  We sit in dust and weep

  By the waters of Babylon.

  By the waters of
Babylon

  The willow trees grow rank:

  We hang our harps thereon

  Silent upon the bank.

  Before us the days are dark,

  And dark the days that are gone;

  We grope in the very dark

  By the waters of Babylon.

  By the waters of Babylon

  We thirst for Jordan yet,

  We pine for Jerusalem

  Whereon our hearts are set:

  Our priests defiled and slain,

  Our princes ashamed and gone,

  Oh how should we forget

  By the waters of Babylon?

  By the waters of Babylon

  Tho’ the wicked grind the just,

  Our seed shall yet strike root

  And shall shoot up from the dust:

  The captive shall lead captive,

  The slave rise up and begone,

  And thou too shalt sit in dust

  O daughter of Babylon.

  BETTER SO

  Fast asleep, mine own familiar friend,

  Fast asleep at last:

  Tho’ the pain was strong,

  Tho’ the struggle long,

  It is past;

  All thy pangs are at an end.

  Whilst I weep, whilst death bells toll,

  Thou art fast asleep,

  With idle hands upon thy breast

  And heart at rest:

  Whilst I weep

  Angels sing around thy singing soul.

  Who would wish thee back upon the rough

  Wearisome dangerous road?

  Wish back thy toil-spent soul

  Just at the goal?

  My soul, praise God

  For one dear soul which hath enough.

  I would not fetch thee back to hope with me

  A sickening hope deferred,

  To taste the cup that slips

  From thirsty lips:

  Hast thou not heard

  What was to hear, and seen what was to see?

  I would not speak the word if I could raise

  My dead to life:

  I would not speak

  If I could flush thy cheek

  And rouse thy pulses’ strife

  And send thy feet on the once-trodden ways.

  How could I meet the dear rebuke

  If thou should’st say:

  “O friend of little faith,

  Good was my lot of death,

  And good my day

  Of rest, and good the sleep I took” — ?

  OUR WIDOWED QUEEN

  The Husband of the widow care for her,

  The Father of the fatherless:

  The faithful Friend, the abiding Comforter,

  Watch over her to bless.

  Full twenty years of blameless married faith,

  Of love and honor questioned not,

  Joys, griefs imparted: for the first time Death

  Sunders the common lot.

  Christ help the desolate Queen upon her throne,

  Strengthen her hands, confirm her heart:

  For she henceforth must bear a load alone

  Borne until now in part.

  Christ help the desolate Woman in her home,

  Broken of heart, indeed bereft;

  Shrinking from solitary days to come,

  Beggared tho’ much is left.

  Rise up, O Sons and Daughters of the Dead,

  Weep with your Mother where she weeps;

  Yet not as sorrowing without hope be shed

  Your tears: he only sleeps.

  Rise up, O Sons and Daughters of the realm,

  In pale reflected sorrow move;

  Revere the widowed hand that holds the helm,

  Love her with double love.

  In royal patience of her soul possess’d

  May she fulfill her length of days:

  Then may her children rise and call her bless’d,

  Then may her husband praise.

  IN PROGRESS

  Ten years ago it seemed impossible

  That she should ever grow so calm as this,

  With self-remembrance in her warmest kiss

  And dim dried eyes like an exhausted well.

  Slow-speaking when she has some fact to tell,

  Silent with long-unbroken silences,

  Centred in self yet not unpleased to please,

  Gravely monotonous like a passing bell.

  Mindful of drudging daily common things,

  Patient at pastime, patient at her work,

  Wearied perhaps but strenuous certainly.

  Sometimes I fancy we may one day see

  Her head shoot forth seven stars from where they lurk

  And her eyes lightnings and her shoulders wings.

  OUT OF THE DEEP

  Have mercy, Thou my God; mercy, my God;

  For I can hardly bear life day by day:

  Be I here or there I fret myself away:

  Lo for Thy staff I have but felt Thy rod

  Along this tedious desert path long trod.

  When will Thy judgement judge me, Yea or Nay?

  I pray for grace; but then my sins unpray

  My prayer: on holy ground I fool stand shod.

  While still Thou haunts’t me, faint upon the cross,

  A sorrow beyond sorrow in Thy look,

  Unutterable craving for my soul.

  All faithful Thou, Lord: I, not Thou, forsook

  Myself; I traitor slunk back from the goal:

  Lord, I repent; help Thou my helpless loss.

  FOR A MERCY RECEIVED

  Thank God Who spared me what I feared!

  Once more I gird myself to run.

  Thy promise stands, Thou Faithful One.

  Horror of darkness disappeared

  At length; once more I see the sun,

  And dare to wait in hope for Spring,

  To face and bear the Winter’s cold:

  The dead cocoon shall yet unfold

  And give to light the living wing;

  There’s hidden sap beneath the mould.

  My God, how could my courage flag

  So long as Thou art still the same?

  For what were labor, failure, shame,

  Whilst Thy sure promise doth not lag

  And Thou dost shield me with Thy Name?

  Yet am I weak, my faith is weak,

  My heart is weak that pleads with Thee:

  O Thou That art not far to seek

  Turn to me, hearken when I speak,

  Stretch forth Thy Hand to succour me.

  Thro’ many perils have I pass’d,

  Deaths, plagues, and wonders, have I seen:

  Till now Thy Hand hath held me fast:

  Lord help me, hold me, to the last;

  Still be what Thou hast always been.

  Open Thy Heart of Love to me,

  Give me Thyself, keep nothing back

  Even as I give myself to Thee.

  Love paid by Love doth nothing lack,

  And Love to pay Love is not slack.

  Love doth so grace and dignify

  That beggars sue as King with King

  Before the Throne of Grace on high:

  My God, be gracious to my cry;

  My God, accept what gift I bring:

  A heart that loves; tho’ soiled and bruised,

  Yet chosen by Thee in time of yore:

  Who ever came and was refused

  By Thee? Do, Lord, as Thou art used

  To do, and make me love Thee more.

  SUMMER

  Come, cuckoo, come;

  Come again, swift swallow;

  Come and welcome; where you come

  Summer’s sure to follow.

  June, the month of months,

  Flowers and fruitage brings too;

  When green trees spread shadiest boughs,

  When each wild bird sings too.

  May is scant and crude,

  Generous June is riper;

  Birds fall silent in Jul
y,

  June has its woodland piper:

  Rocks upon the maple-top

  Homely-hearted linnet,

  Full in hearing of his nest

  And the dear ones in it.

  If the year would stand

  Still at June for ever,

  With no further growth on land

  Nor further flow of river,

  If all nights were shortest nights

  And longest days were all the seven, —

  This might be a merrier world

  To my mind to live in.

  A DUMB FRIEND

  I planted a young tree when I was young;

  But now the tree is grown and I am old:

  There wintry robin shelters from the cold

  And tunes his silver tongue.

  A green and living tree I planted it,

  A glossy-foliaged tree of evergreen:

  All thro’ the noontide heat it spread a screen

  Whereunder I might sit.

  But now I only watch it where it towers:

  I, sitting at my window, watch it tossed

  By rattling gale, or silvered by the frost;

  Or, when sweet summer flowers,

  Wagging its round green head with stately grace

  In tender winds that kiss it and go by:

  It shows a green full age; and what show I?

  A faded wrinkled face.

  So often have I watched it, till mine eyes

  Have filled with tears and I have ceased to see;

  That now it seems a very friend to me

  In all my secrets wise.

  A faithful pleasant friend, who year by year