Complete Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Page 119
Then henceforth may earth grow trees!
No more roses! — hard straight lines
To score lies out! none of these
Fluctuant curves, but firs and pines,
Poplars, cedars, cypresses!
DE PROFUNDIS.
I
The face, which, duly as the sun,
Rose up for me with life begun,
To mark all bright hours of the day
With hourly love, is dimmed away —
And yet my days go on, go on.
II
The tongue which, like a stream, could run
Smooth music from the roughest stone,
And every morning with ‘ Good day’
Make each day good, is hushed away,
And yet my days go on, go on.
III
The heart which, like a staff, was one
For mine to lean and rest upon,
The strongest on the longest day
With steadfast love, is caught away,
And yet my days go on, go on.
IV
And cold before my summer’s done,
And deaf in Nature’s general tune,
And fallen too low for special fear,
And here, with hope no longer here,
While the tears drop, my days go on.
V
The world goes whispering to its own,
‘This anguish pierces to the bone;’
And tender friends go sighing round,
‘What love can ever cure this wound ?’
My days go on, my days go on.
VI
The past rolls forward on the sun
And makes all night. O dreams begun,
Not to be ended! Ended bliss,
And life that will not end in this!
My days go on, my days go on.
VII
Breath freezes on my lips to moan:
As one alone, once not alone,
I sit and knock at Nature’s door,
Heart-bare, heart-hungry, very poor,
Whose desolated days go on.
VIII
I knock and cry, — Undone, undone!
Is there no help, no comfort, — none?
No gleaning in the wide wheat plains
Where others drive their loaded wains?
My vacant days go on, go on.
IX
This Nature, though the snows be down,
Thinks kindly of the bird of June:
The little red hip on the tree
Is ripe for such. What is for me,
Whose days so winterly go on?
X
No bird am I, to sing in June,
And dare not ask an equal boon.
Good nests and berries red are Nature’s
To give away to better creatures, —
And yet my days go on, go on.
XI
I ask less kindness to be done, —
Only to loose these pilgrim shoon,
(Too early worn and grimed) with sweet
Cool deadly touch to these tired feet.
Till days go out which now go on.
XII
Only to lift the turf unmown
From off the earth where it has grown,
Some cubit-space, and say ‘Behold,
Creep in, poor Heart, beneath that fold,
Forgetting how the days go on.’
XIII
What harm would that do? Green anon
The sward would quicken, overshone
By skies as blue; and crickets might
Have leave to chirp there day and night
While my new rest went on, went on.
XIV
From gracious Nature have I won
Such liberal bounty? may I run
So, lizard-like, within her side,
And there be safe, who now am tried
By days that painfully go on?
XV
— A Voice reproves me thereupon,
More sweet than Nature’s when the drone
Of bees is sweetest, and more deep
Than when the rivers overleap
The shuddering pines, and thunder on.
XVI
God’s Voice, not Nature’s! Night and noon
He sits upon the great white throne
And listens for the creatures’ praise.
What babble we of days and days?
The Day-spring He, whose days go on.
XVII
He reigns above, He reigns alone;
Systems burn out and have his throne;
Fair mists of seraphs melt and fall
Around Him, changeless amid all,
Ancient of Days, whose days go on.
XVIII
He reigns below, He reigns alone,
And, having life in love forgone
Beneath the crown of sovran thorns,
He reigns the Jealous God. Who mourns
Or rules with Him, while days go on?
XIX
By anguish which made pale the sun,
I hear Him charge his saints that none
Among his creatures anywhere
Blaspheme against Him with despair,
However darkly days go on.
XX
Take from my head the thorn-wreath brown!
No mortal grief deserves that crown.
O supreme Love, chief misery,
The sharp regalia are for Thee
Whose days eternally go on!
XXI
For us, — whatever’s undergone,
Thou knowest, willest what is done,
Grief may be joy misunderstood;
Only the Good discerns the good.
I trust Thee while my days go on.
XXII
Whatever’s lost, it first was won;
We will not struggle nor impugn.
Perhaps the cup was broken here,
That Heaven’s new wine might show more clear.
I praise Thee while my days go on.
XXIII
I praise Thee while my days go on;
I love Thee while my days go on:
Through dark and dearth, through fire and frost,
With emptied arms and treasure lost,
I thank Thee while my days go on.
XXIV
And having in thy life-depth thrown
Being and suffering (which are one),
As a child drops his pebble small
Down some deep well, and hears it fall
Smiling — so I. THY DAYS GO ON.
A MUSICAL INSTRUMENT.
What was he doing, the great god Pan,
Down in the reeds by the river?
Spreading ruin and scattering ban,
Splashing and paddling with hoofs of a goat,
And breaking the golden lilies afloat
With the dragon-fly on the river.
He tore out a reed, the great god Pan,
From the deep cool bed of the river:
The limpid water turbidly ran,
And the broken lilies a-dying lay,
And the dragon-fly had fled away,
Ere he brought it out of the river.
High on the shore sat the great god Pan
While turbidly flowed the river;
And hacked and hewed as a great god can,
With his hard bleak steel at the patient reed,
Till there was not a sign of the leaf indeed
To prove it fresh from the river.
He cut it short, did the great god Pan,
(How tall it stood in the river!)
Then drew the pith, like the heart of a man,
Steadily from the outside ring,
And notched the poor dry empty thing
In holes, as he sat by the river.
‘This is the way,’ laughed the great god Pan
(Laughed while he sat by the river),
‘The only way, since gods began
To make sweet music, they c
ould succeed.’
Then, dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed,
He blew in power by the river.
Sweet, sweet, sweet, O Pan!
Piercing sweet by the river!
Blinding sweet, O great god Pan!
The sun on the hill forgot to die,
And the lilies revived, and the dragon-fly
Came back to dream on the river.
Yet half a beast is the great god Pan,
To laugh as he sits by the river,
Making a poet out of a man:
The true gods sigh for the cost and pain, —
For the reed which grows nevermore again
As a reed with the reeds in the river.
FIRST NEWS FROM VILLAFRANCA.
This treaty, signed by the Emperors Francis Joseph of Austria and Napoleon III., on July 11, 1859, ended the war between the Austrians and the French and Sardinians.
I.
PEACE, peace, peace, do you say?
What! — with the enemy’s guns in our ears?
With the country’s wrong not rendered back?
What! — while Austria stands at bay
In Mantua, and our Venice bears 5
The cursed flag of the yellow and black?
II.
Peace, peace, peace, do you say?
And this is the Mincio? Where’s the fleet,
And where’s the sea? Are we all blind
Or mad with the blood shed yesterday, 10
Ignoring Italy under our feet,
And seeing things before, behind?
III.
Peace, peace, peace, do you say?
What! — uncontested, undenied?
Because we triumph, we succumb? 15
A pair of Emperors stand in the way,
(One of whom is a man, beside)
To sign and seal our cannons dumb?
IV.
No, not Napoleon! — he who mused
At Paris, and at Milan spake, 20
And at Solferino led the fight:
Not he we trusted, honored, used
Our hopes and hearts for … till they break —
Even so, you tell us … in his sight.
V.
Peace, peace, is still your word? 25
We say you lie then! — that is plain.
There is no peace, and shall be none.
Our very dead would cry ‘Absurd!’
And clamor that they died in vain,
And whine to come back to the sun. 30
VI.
Hush! more reverence for the Dead!
They’ve done the most for Italy
Evermore since the earth was fair.
Now would that we had died instead,
Still dreaming peace meant liberty, 35
And did not, could not mean despair.
VII.
Peace, you say? — yes, peace, in truth!
But such a peace as the ear can achieve
‘Twixt the rifle’s click and the rush of the ball,
‘Twixt the tiger’s spring and the crunch of the tooth, 40
‘Twixt the dying atheist’s negative
And God’s Face — waiting, after all!
KING VICTOR EMANUEL ENTERING FLORENCE, APRIL, 1860.
I.
King of us all, we cried to thee, cried to thee.
Trampled to earth by the beasts impure,
Dragged by the chariot’s which shame as they roll:
The dust of our torment far and wide to thee
Went up, darkening thy royal soul.
Be witness, Cavour,
That the King was sad for the people in thrall
This King of us all !
II.
King, we cried to thee I Strong in replying,
Thy word and thy sword sprang rapid and sure,
Cleaving our way to a nation’s place.
Oh, first soldier of Italy ! — crying
Now grateful, exultant, we look in thy face.
Be witness, Cavour,
That, freedom’s first soldier, the freed should call
First King of them all !
III.
This is our beautiful Italy’s birthday ;
High-thoughted souls, whether many or fewer,
Bring her the gift, and wish her the good.
While Heaven presents on this sunny earth-day
The noble king to the land renewed :
Be witness, Cavour !
Roar, cannon-mouths ! Proclaim, install
The King of us all !
IV.
Grave he rides through the Florence gateway,
Clenching his face into calm, to immure
His struggling heart till it half disappear ;
If he relaxed for a moment, straightway
He would break out into passionate tears —
(Be witness, Cavour!)
While rings the cry without interval,
“Live, King of us all “
V.
Cry, free peoples ! Honour the nation
By crowning the true man — and none is truer :
Pisa is here, and Livorno is here,
And thousands of faces, in wild exultation.
Burn over the windows to feel him near —
(Be witness, Cavour!)
And thousands of faces, in wild exultation,
Burn over the windows to feel him near —
(Be witness, Cavour !)
Burn over from terrace, roof, window and wall,
On this King of us all.
VI.
Grave ! A good man’s ever the graver
For bearing a nation’s trust secure ;
And he, he thinks of the Heart, beside,
Which broke for Italy, failing to save her,
And pining away by Oporto’s tide :
Be witness, Cavour,
That he thinks of his vow on that royal pall.
This King of us all.
VII.
Flowers, flowers, from the flowery city !
Such innocent thanks for a deed so pure.
As, melting away for joy into flowers,
The nation invites him to enter his Pitti
And evermore reign in this Florence of ours.
Be witness, Cavour !
He’ll stand where the reptiles were used to crawl,
This King of us all.
VIII.
Grave, as the manner of noble men is —
Deeds unfinished will weigh on the doer :
And, baring his head to those crape-veiled flags,
He bows to the grief of the South and Venice.
Oh, riddle the last of the yellow to rags,
And swear by Cavour
That the King shall reign where the tyrants fall,
True King of us all !
THE SWORD OF CASTRUCCIO CASTRACANI.
“Questa è per me.” — King Victor Emanuel.
I.
WHEN Victor Emanuel the King,
Went down to his Lucca that day,
The people, each vaunting the thing
As he gave it, gave all things away, —
In burst of fierce gratitude, say,
As they tore out their hearts for the king.
II.
— Gave the green forest-walk on the wall,
With the Apennine blue through the trees;
Gave the palaces, churches, and all
The great pictures which burn out of these:
But the eyes of the King seemed to freeze
As he glanced upon ceiling and wall.
III.
“Good,”said the King as he passed.
Was he cold to the arts? — or else coy
To possession? or crossed, at the last,
(Whispered some) by the vote in Savoy?
Shout! Love him enough for his joy!
“Good,” said the King as he passed.
IV.
He, travelling the whole day through flowers
&n
bsp; And protesting amenities, found
At Pistoia, betwixt the two showers
Of red roses, the ‘ Orphans,’ (renowned
As the heirs of Puccini) who wound
With a sword through the crowd and the flowers.
V.
“‘Tis the sword of Castruccio, O King, —
In that strife of intestinal hate,
Very famous! Accept what we bring,
We who cannot be sons, by our fate,
Rendered citizens by thee of late,
And endowed with a country and king.
VI.
“Read! Puccini has willed that this sword
(Which once made in an ignorant feud
Many orphans) remain in our ward
Till some patriot its pure civic blood
Wipe away in the foe’s and make good,
In delivering the land by the sword.”
VII.
Then the King exclaimed, “This is for me!”
And he dashed out his hand on the hilt,
While his blue eye shot fire openly,
And his heart overboiled till it spilt
A hot prayer,— “God! the rest as Thou wilt!
But grant me this! — This is for me.”
VIII.
O Victor Emanuel, the King,
The sword be for thee, and the deed,
And nought for the alien, next spring,
Nought for Hapsburg and Bourbon agreed —
But, for us, a great Italy freed,
With a hero to head us; — our King!