Poems and Ballads and Atalanta in Calydon

by Algernon Swinburne

  ‘I pray you let me be at peace,

  Get hence, make room for me to die.’

  She said that: her poor lip would cease,

  Put up to mine, and turn to cry.

  I said, ‘Bethink yourself how love

  Fared in us twain, what either did;

  Shall I unclothe my soul thereof?

  That I should do this, God forbid.’

  Yea, though God hateth us, he knows

  90

  That hardly in a little thing

  Love faileth of the work it does

  Till it grow ripe for gathering.

  Six months, and now my sweet is dead

  A trouble takes me; I know not

  If all were done well, all well said,

  No word or tender deed forgot.

  Too sweet, for the least part in her,

  To have shed life out by fragments; yet,

  Could the close mouth catch breath and stir,

  100

  I might see something I forget.

  Six months, and I sit still and hold

  In two cold palms her cold two feet.

  Her hair, half grey half ruined gold,

  Thrills me and burns me in kissing it.

  Love bites and stings me through, to see

  Her keen face made of sunken bones.

  Her worn-off eyelids madden me,

  That were shot through with purple once.

  She said, ‘Be good with me; I grow

  110

  So tired for shame’s sake, I shall die

  If you say nothing:’ even so.

  And she is dead now, and shame put by.

  Yea, and the scorn she had of me

  In the old time, doubtless vexed her then.

  I never should have kissed her. See

  What fools God’s anger makes of men!

  She might have loved me a little too,

  Had I been humbler for her sake.

  But that new shame could make love new

  120

  She saw not – yet her shame did make.

  I took too much upon my love,

  Having for such mean service done

  Her beauty and all the way thereof,

  Her face and all the sweet thereon.

  Yea, all this while I tended her,

  I know the old love held fast his part:

  I know the old scorn waxed heavier,

  Mixed with sad wonder, in her heart.

  It may be all my love went wrong –

  130

  A scribe’s work writ awry and blurred,

  Scrawled after the blind evensong –

  Spoilt music with no perfect word.

  But surely I would fain have done

  All things the best I could. Perchance

  Because I failed, came short of one,

  She kept at heart that other man’s.

  I am grown blind with all these things:

  It may be now she hath in sight

  Some better knowledge; still there clings

  140

  The old question. Will not God do right?*

  A Ballad of Burdens

  The burden of fair women. Vain delight,

  And love self-slain in some sweet shameful way,

  And sorrowful old age that comes by night

  As a thief comes that has no heart by day,

  And change that finds fair cheeks and leaves them grey,

  And weariness that keeps awake for hire,

  And grief that says what pleasure used to say;

  This is the end of every man’s desire.

  The burden of bought kisses. This is sore,

  10

  A burden without fruit in childbearing;

  Between the nightfall and the dawn threescore,

  Threescore between the dawn and evening.

  The shuddering in thy lips, the shuddering

  In thy sad eyelids tremulous like fire,

  Makes love seem shameful and a wretched thing.

  This is the end of every man’s desire.

  The burden of sweet speeches. Nay, kneel down,

  Cover thy head, and weep; for verily

  These market-men that buy thy white and brown

  20

  In the last days shall take no thought for thee.

  In the last days like earth thy face shall be,

  Yea, like sea-marsh made thick with brine and mire,

  Sad with sick leavings of the sterile sea.

  This is the end of every man’s desire.

  The burden of long living. Thou shalt fear

  Waking, and sleeping mourn upon thy bed;

  And say at night ‘Would God the day were here,’

  And say at dawn ‘Would God the day were dead.’

  With weary days thou shalt be clothed and fed,

  30

  And wear remorse of heart for thine attire,

  Pain for thy girdle and sorrow upon thine head;

  This is the end of every man’s desire.

  The burden of bright colours. Thou shalt see

  Gold tarnished, and the grey above the green;

  And as the thing thou seest thy face shall be,

  And no more as the thing beforetime seen.

  And thou shalt say of mercy ‘It hath been,’

  And living, watch the old lips and loves expire,

  And talking, tears shall take thy breath between;

  40

  This is the end of every man’s desire.

  The burden of sad sayings. In that day

  Thou shalt tell all thy days and hours, and tell

  Thy times and ways and words of love, and say

  How one was dear and one desirable,

  And sweet was life to hear and sweet to smell,

  But now with lights reverse the old hours retire

  And the last hour is shod with fire from hell;

  This is the end of every man’s desire.

  The burden of four seasons. Rain in spring,

  50

  White rain and wind among the tender trees;

  A summer of green sorrows gathering,

  Rank autumn in a mist of miseries,

  With sad face set towards the year, that sees

  The charred ash drop out of the dropping pyre,

  And winter wan with many maladies;

  This is the end of every man’s desire.

  The burden of dead faces. Out of sight

  And out of love, beyond the reach of hands,

  Changed in the changing of the dark and light,

  60

  They walk and weep about the barren lands

  Where no seed is nor any garner stands,

  Where in short breaths the doubtful days respire,

  And time’s turned glass lets through the sighing sands;

  This is the end of every man’s desire.

  The burden of much gladness. Life and lust

  Forsake thee, and the face of thy delight;

  And underfoot the heavy hour strews dust,

  And overhead strange weathers burn and bite;

  And where the red was, lo the bloodless white,

  70

  And where truth was, the likeness of a liar,

  And where day was, the likeness of the night;

  This is the end of every man’s desire.

  L’ENVOY

  Princes, and ye whom pleasure quickeneth,

  Heed well this rhyme before your pleasure tire;

  For life is sweet, but after life is death.

  This is the end of every man’s desire.

  Rondel

  Kissing her hair I sat against her feet,

  Wove and unwove it, wound and found it sweet;

  Made fast therewith her hands, drew down her eyes,

  Deep as deep flowers and dreamy like dim skies;

  With her own tresses bound and found her fair,

  Kissing her hair.

  Sleep were no sweeter than her face to me,

  Sleep of c
old sea-bloom under the cold sea;

  What pain could get between my face and hers?

  10

  What new sweet thing would love not relish worse?

  Unless, perhaps, white death had kissed me there,

  Kissing her hair?

  Before the Mirror

  (VERSES WRITTEN UNDER A PICTURE)

  Inscribed to J. A. Whistler

  I

  White rose in red rose-garden

  Is not so white;

  Snowdrops that plead for pardon

  And pine for fright

  Because the hard East blows

  Over their maiden rows

  Grow not as this face grows from pale to bright.

  Behind the veil, forbidden,

  Shut up from sight,

  10

  Love, is there sorrow hidden,

  Is there delight?

  Is joy thy dower or grief,

  White rose of weary leaf,

  Late rose whose life is brief, whose loves are light?

  Soft snows that hard winds harden

  Till each flake bite

  Fill all the flowerless garden

  Whose flowers took flight

  Long since when summer ceased,

  20

  And men rose up from feast,

  And warm west wind grew east, and warm day night.

  II

  ‘Come snow, come wind or thunder

  High up in air,

  I watch my face, and wonder

  At my bright hair;

  Nought else exalts or grieves

  The rose at heart, that heaves

  With love of her own leaves and lips that pair.

  ‘She knows not loves that kissed her

  30

  She knows not where.

  Art thou the ghost, my sister,

  White sister there,

  Am I the ghost, who knows?

  My hand, a fallen rose,

  Lies snow-white on white snows, and takes no care.

  ‘I cannot see what pleasures

  Or what pains were;

  What pale new loves and treasures

  New years will bear;

  40

  What beam will fall, what shower,

  What grief or joy for dower;

  But one thing knows the flower; the flower is fair.’

  III

  Glad, but not flushed with gladness,

  Since joys go by;

  Sad, but not bent with sadness,

  Since sorrows die;

  Deep in the gleaming glass

  She sees all past things pass,

  And all sweet life that was lie down and lie.

  50

  There glowing ghosts of flowers

  Draw down, draw nigh;

  And wings of swift spent hours

  Take flight and fly;

  She sees by formless gleams,

  She hears across cold streams,

  Dead mouths of many dreams that sing and sigh.

  Face fallen and white throat lifted,

  With sleepless eye

  She sees old loves that drifted,

  60

  She knew not why,

  Old loves and faded fears

  Float down a stream that hears

  The flowing of all men’s tears beneath the sky.

  Erotion

  Sweet for a little even to fear, and sweet,

  O love, to lay down fear at love’s fair feet;

  Shall not some fiery memory of his breath

  Lie sweet on lips that touch the lips of death?

  Yet leave me not; yet, if thou wilt, be free;

  Love me no more, but love my love of thee.

  Love where thou wilt, and live thy life; and I,

  One thing I can, and one love cannot – die.

  Pass from me; yet thine arms, thine eyes, thine hair,

  10

  Feed my desire and deaden my despair.

  Yet once more ere time change us, ere my cheek

  Whiten, ere hope be dumb or sorrow speak,

  Yet once more ere thou hate me, one full kiss;

  Keep other hours for others, save me this.

  Yea, and I will not (if it please thee) weep,

  Lest thou be sad; I will but sigh, and sleep.

  Sweet, does death hurt? thou canst not do me wrong:

  I shall not lack thee, as I loved thee, long.

  Hast thou not given me above all that live

  20

  Joy, and a little sorrow shalt not give?

  What even though fairer fingers of strange girls

  Pass nestling through thy beautiful boy’s curls

  As mine did, or those curled lithe lips of thine

  Meet theirs as these, all theirs come after mine;

  And though I were not, though I be not, best,

  I have loved and love thee more than all the rest.

  0 love, O lover, loose or hold me fast,

  I had thee first, whoever have thee last;

  Fairer or not, what need I know, what care?

  30

  To thy fair bud my blossom once seemed fair.

  Why am I fair at all before thee, why

  At all desired? seeing thou art fair, not I.

  I shall be glad of thee, O fairest head,

  Alive, alone, without thee, with thee, dead;

  I shall remember while the light lives yet,

  And in the night-time I shall not forget.

  Though (as thou wilt) thou leave me ere life leave,

  I will not, for thy love I will not, grieve;

  Not as they use who love not more than I,

  40

  Who love not as I love thee though I die;

  And though thy lips, once mine, be oftener prest

  To many another brow and balmier breast,

  And sweeter arms, or sweeter to thy mind,

  Lull thee or lure, more fond thou wilt not find.

  In Memory of Walter Savage Landor

  Back to the flower-town, side by side,

  The bright months bring,

  New-born, the bridegroom and the bride,

  Freedom and spring.

  The sweet land laughs from sea to sea,

  Filled full of sun;

  All things come back to her, being free;

  All things but one.

  In many a tender wheaten plot

  10

  Flowers that were dead

  Live, and old suns revive; but not

  That holier head.

  By this white wandering waste of sea,

  Far north, I hear

  One face shall never turn to me

  As once this year.

  Shall never smile and turn and rest