Early Poems (continued 4)

Godiva

First published in 1842. No alteration was made in any subsequent edition.

The poem was written in 1840 when Tennyson was returning from Coventry to London, after his visit to Warwickshire in that year. The Godiva pageant takes place in that town at the great fair on Friday in Trinity week. Earl Leofric was the Lord of Coventry in the reign of Edward the Confessor, and he and his wife Godiva founded a magnificent Benedictine monastery at Coventry. The first writer who mentions this legend is Matthew of Westminster, who wrote in 1307, that is some 250 years after Leofric’s time, and what authority he had for it is not known. It is certainly not mentioned by the many preceding writers who have left accounts of Leofric and Godiva (see Gough’s edition of Camden’s Britannia, vol. ii., p. 346, and for a full account of the legend see W. Reader, The History and Description of Coventry Show Fair, with the History of Leofric and Godiva). With Tennyson’s should be compared Moultrie’s beautiful poem on the same subject, and Landor’s Imaginary Conversation between Leofric and Godiva.

^[1] I waited for the train at Coventry; I hung with grooms and porters on the bridge, To match the three tall spires;^[2] and there I shaped The city’s ancient legend into this: Not only we, the latest seed of Time, New men, that in the flying of a wheel Cry down the past, not only we, that prate Of rights and wrongs, have loved the people well, And loathed to see them overtax’d; but she Did more, and underwent, and overcame, The woman of a thousand summers back, Godiva, wife to that grim Earl, who ruled In Coventry: for when he laid a tax Upon his town, and all the mothers brought Their children, clamouring, “If we pay, we starve!” She sought her lord, and found him, where he strode About the hall, among his dogs, alone, His beard a foot before him, and his hair A yard behind. She told him of their tears, And pray’d him, “If they pay this tax, they starve”. Whereat he stared, replying, half-amazed, “You would not let your little finger ache For such as these?”—“But I would die,” said she. He laugh’d, and swore by Peter and by Paul; Then fillip’d at the diamond in her ear; “O ay, ay, ay, you talk!”—“Alas!” she said, “But prove me what it is I would not do.” And from a heart as rough as Esau’s hand, He answer’d, “Ride you naked thro’ the town, And I repeal it”; and nodding as in scorn, He parted, with great strides among his dogs. So left alone, the passions of her mind, As winds from all the compass shift and blow, Made war upon each other for an hour, Till pity won. She sent a herald forth, And bad him cry, with sound of trumpet, all The hard condition; but that she would loose The people: therefore, as they loved her well, From then till noon no foot should pace the street, No eye look down, she passing; but that all Should keep within, door shut, and window barr’d. Then fled she to her inmost bower, and there Unclasp’d the wedded eagles of her belt, The grim Earl’s gift; but ever at a breath She linger’d, looking like a summer moon Half-dipt in cloud: anon she shook her head, And shower’d the rippled ringlets to her knee; Unclad herself in haste; adown the stair Stole on; and, like a creeping sunbeam, slid From pillar unto pillar, until she reach’d The gateway; there she found her palfrey trapt In purple blazon’d with armorial gold. Then she rode forth, clothed on with chastity: The deep air listen’d round her as she rode, And all the low wind hardly breathed for fear. The little wide-mouth’d heads upon the spout Had cunning eyes to see: the barking cur Made her cheek flame: her palfrey’s footfall shot Light horrors thro’ her pulses: the blind walls Were full of chinks and holes; and overhead Fantastic gables, crowding, stared: but she Not less thro’ all bore up, till, last, she saw The white-flower’d elder-thicket from the field Gleam thro’ the Gothic archways^[3] in the wall. Then she rode back cloth’d on with chastity: And one low churl,^[4] compact of thankless earth, The fatal byword of all years to come, Boring a little auger-hole in fear, Peep’d—but his eyes, before they had their will, Were shrivell’d into darkness in his head, And dropt before him. So the Powers, who wait On noble deeds, cancell’d a sense misused; And she, that knew not, pass’d: and all at once, With twelve great shocks of sound, the shameless noon Was clash’d and hammer’d from a hundred towers,^[5] One after one: but even then she gain’d Her bower; whence reissuing, robed and crown’d, To meet her lord, she took the tax away, And built herself an everlasting name.

The Two Voices

First published in 1842, though begun as early as 1833 and in course of composition in 1834. See Spedding’s letter dated 19th September, 1834. Its original title was The Thoughts of a Suicide. No alterations were made in the poem after 1842.

It adds interest to this poem to know that it is autobiographical. It was written soon after the death of Arthur Hallam when Tennyson’s depression was deepest. “When I wrote The Two Voices I was so utterly miserable, a burden to myself and to my family, that I said, ‘Is life worth anything?’” It is the history—as Spedding put it—of the agitations, the suggestions and counter-suggestions of a mind sunk in hopeless despondency, and meditating self-destruction, together with the manner of its recovery to a more healthy condition. We have two singularly interesting parallels to it in preceding poetry. The one is in the third book of Lucretius (830-1095), where the arguments for suicide are urged, not merely by the poet himself, but by arguments placed by him in the mouth of Nature herself, and urged with such cogency that they are said to have induced one of his editors and translators, Creech, to put an end to his life. The other is in Spenser, in the dialogue between Despair and the Red Cross Knight, where Despair puts the case for self-destruction, and the Red Cross Knight rebuts the arguments (Faerie Queene, I. ix., st. xxxviii.-liv.).

A still small voice spake unto me, “Thou art so full of misery, Were it not better not to be?” Then to the still small voice I said; “Let me not cast in endless shade What is so wonderfully made”. To which the voice did urge reply; “To-day I saw the dragon-fly Come from the wells where he did lie. “An inner impulse rent the veil Of his old husk: from head to tail Came out clear plates of sapphire mail. “He dried his wings: like gauze they grew: Thro’ crofts and pastures wet with dew A living flash of light he flew.” I said, “When first the world began Young Nature thro’ five cycles ran, And in the sixth she moulded man. “She gave him mind, the lordliest Proportion, and, above the rest, Dominion in the head and breast.” Thereto the silent voice replied; “Self-blinded are you by your pride: Look up thro’ night: the world is wide. “This truth within thy mind rehearse, That in a boundless universe Is boundless better, boundless worse. “Think you this mould of hopes and fears Could find no statelier than his peers In yonder hundred million spheres?” It spake, moreover, in my mind: “Tho’ thou wert scatter’d to the wind, Yet is there plenty of the kind”. Then did my response clearer fall: “No compound of this earthly ball Is like another, all in all”. To which he answer’d scoffingly; “Good soul! suppose I grant it thee, Who’ll weep for thy deficiency? “Or will one beam^[1] be less intense, When thy peculiar difference Is cancell’d in the world of sense?” I would have said, “Thou canst not know,” But my full heart, that work’d below, Rain’d thro’ my sight its overflow. Again the voice spake unto me: “Thou art so steep’d in misery, Surely ’twere better not to be. “Thine anguish will not let thee sleep, Nor any train of reason keep: Thou canst not think, but thou wilt weep.” I said, “The years with change advance: If I make dark my countenance, I shut my life from happier chance. “Some turn this sickness yet might take, Ev’n yet.” But he: “What drug can make A wither’d palsy cease to shake?” I wept, “Tho’ I should die, I know That all about the thorn will blow In tufts of rosy-tinted snow; “And men, thro’ novel spheres of thought Still moving after truth long sought, Will learn new things when I am not.” “Yet,” said the secret voice, “some time, Sooner or later, will gray prime Make thy grass hoar with early rime. “Not less swift souls that yearn for light, Rapt after heaven’s starry flight, Would sweep the tracts of day and night. “Not less the bee would range her cells, The furzy prickle fire the dells, The foxglove cluster dappled bells.” I said that “all the years invent; Each month is various to present The world with some development. “Were this not well, to bide mine hour, Tho’ watching from a ruin’d tower How grows the day of human power?” “The highest-mounted mind,” he said, “Still sees the sacred morning spread The silent summit overhead. “Will thirty seasons render plain Those lonely lights that still remain, Just breaking over land and main? “Or make that morn, from his cold crown And crystal silence creeping down, Flood with full daylight glebe and town? “Forerun thy peers, thy time, and let Thy feet, millenniums hence, be set In midst of knowledge, dream’d not yet. “Thou hast not gain’d a real height, Nor art thou nearer to the light, Because the scale is infinite. “’Twere better not to breathe or speak, Than cry for strength, remaining weak, And seem to find, but still to seek. “Moreover, but to seem to find Asks what thou lackest, thought resign’d, A healthy frame, a quiet mind.” I said, “When I am gone away, ‘He dared not tarry,’ men will say, Doing dishonour to my clay.” “This is more vile,” he made reply, “To breathe and loathe, to live and sigh, Than once from dread of pain to die. “Sick art thou—a divided will Still heaping on the fear of ill The fear of men, a coward still. “Do men love thee? Art thou so bound To men, that how thy name may sound Will vex thee lying underground? “The memory of the wither’d leaf In endless time is scarce more brief Than of the garner’d Autumn-sheaf. “Go, vexed Spirit, sleep in trust; The right ear, that is fill’d with dust, Hears little of the false or just.” “Hard task, to pluck resolve,” I cried, “From emptiness and the waste wide Of that abyss, or scornful pride! “Nay—rather yet that I could raise One hope that warm’d me in the days While still I yearn’d for human praise. “When, wide in soul, and bold of tongue, Among the tents I paused and sung, The distant battle flash’d and rung. “I sung the joyful Paean clear, And, sitting, burnish’d without fear The brand, the buckler, and the spear— “Waiting to strive a happy strife, To war with falsehood to the knife, And not to lose the good of life— “Some hidden principle to move, To put together, part and prove, And mete the bounds of hate and love— “As far as might be, to carve out Free space for every human doubt, That the whole mind might orb about— “To search thro’ all I felt or saw, The springs of life, the depths of awe, And reach the law within the law: “At least, not rotting like a weed, But, having sown some generous seed, Fruitful of further thought and deed, “To pass, when Life her light withdraws, Not void of righteous self-applause, Nor in a merely selfish cause— “In some good cause, not in mine own, To perish, wept for, honour’d, known, And like a warrior overthrown; “Whose eyes are dim with glorious tears, When, soil’d with noble dust, he hears His country’s war-song thrill his ears: “Then dying of a mortal stroke, What time the foeman’s line is broke. And all the war is roll’d in smoke.”^[2] “Yea!” said the voice, “thy dream was good, While thou abodest in the bud. It was the stirring of the blood. “If Nature put not forth her power^[2] About the opening of the flower, Who is it that could live an hour? “Then comes the check, the change, the fall. Pain rises up, old pleasures pall. There is one remedy for all. “Yet hadst thou, thro’ enduring pain, Link’d month to month with such a chain Of knitted purport, all were vain. “Thou hadst not between death and birth Dissolved the riddle of the earth. So were thy labour little worth. “That men with knowledge merely play’d, I told thee—hardly nigher made, Tho’ scaling slow from grade to grade; “Much less this dreamer, deaf and blind, Named man, may hope some truth to find, That bears relation to the mind. “For every worm beneath the moon Draws different threads, and late and soon Spins, toiling out his own cocoon. “Cry, faint not: either Truth is born Beyond the polar gleam forlorn, Or in the gateways of the morn. “Cry, faint not, climb: the summits slope Beyond the furthest nights of hope, Wrapt in dense cloud from base to cope. “Sometimes a little corner shines, As over rainy mist inclines A gleaming crag with belts of pines. “I will go forward, sayest thou, I shall not fail to find her now. Look up, the fold is on her brow. “If straight thy track, or if oblique, Thou know’st not. Shadows thou dost strike, Embracing cloud, Ixion-like; “And owning but a little more Than beasts, abidest lame and poor, Calling thyself a little lower “Than angels. Cease to wail and brawl! Why inch by inch to darkness crawl? There is one remedy for all.” “O dull, one-sided voice,” said I, “Wilt thou make everything a lie, To flatter me that I may die? “I know that age to age succeeds, Blowing a noise of tongues and deeds, A dust of systems and of creeds. “I cannot hide that some have striven, Achieving calm, to whom was given The joy that mixes man with Heaven: “Who, rowing hard against the stream, Saw distant gates of Eden gleam, And did not dream it was a dream”; “But heard, by secret transport led,^[3] Ev’n in the charnels of the dead, The murmur of the fountain-head— “Which did accomplish their desire,— Bore and forbore, and did not tire, Like Stephen, an unquenched fire. “He heeded not reviling tones, Nor sold his heart to idle moans, Tho’ cursed and scorn’d, and bruised with stones: “But looking upward, full of grace, He pray’d, and from a happy place God’s glory smote him on the face.” The sullen answer slid betwixt: “Not that the grounds of hope were fix’d, The elements were kindlier mix’d.”^[4] I said, “I toil beneath the curse, But, knowing not the universe, I fear to slide from bad to worse.^[5]> “And that, in seeking to undo One riddle, and to find the true, I knit a hundred others new: “Or that this anguish fleeting hence, Unmanacled from bonds of sense, Be fix’d and froz’n to permanence: “For I go, weak from suffering here; Naked I go, and void of cheer: What is it that I may not fear?” “Consider well,” the voice replied, “His face, that two hours since hath died; Wilt thou find passion, pain or pride? “Will he obey when one commands? Or answer should one press his hands? He answers not, nor understands. “His palms are folded on his breast: There is no other thing express’d But long disquiet merged in rest. “His lips are very mild and meek: Tho’ one should smite him on the cheek, And on the mouth, he will not speak. “His little daughter, whose sweet face He kiss’d, taking his last embrace, Becomes dishonour to her race— “His sons grow up that bear his name, Some grow to honour, some to shame,— But he is chill to praise or blame.^[6] “He will not hear the north wind rave, Nor, moaning, household shelter crave From winter rains that beat his grave. “High up the vapours fold and swim: About him broods the twilight dim: The place he knew forgetteth him.” “If all be dark, vague voice,” I said, “These things are wrapt in doubt and dread, Nor canst thou show the dead are dead. “The sap dries up: the plant declines.^[7] A deeper tale my heart divines. Know I not Death? the outward signs? “I found him when my years were few; A shadow on the graves I knew, And darkness in the village yew. “From grave to grave the shadow crept: In her still place the morning wept: Touch’d by his feet the daisy slept. “The simple senses crown’d his head:^[8] ‘Omega! thou art Lord,’ they said; ‘We find no motion in the dead.’ “Why, if man rot in dreamless ease, Should that plain fact, as taught by these, Not make him sure that he shall cease? “Who forged that other influence, That heat of inward evidence, By which he doubts against the sense? “He owns the fatal gift of eyes,^[9] That read his spirit blindly wise, Not simple as a thing that dies. “Here sits he shaping wings to fly: His heart forebodes a mystery: He names the name Eternity. “That type of Perfect in his mind In Nature can he nowhere find. He sows himself in every wind. “He seems to hear a Heavenly Friend, And thro’ thick veils to apprehend A labour working to an end. “The end and the beginning vex His reason: many things perplex, With motions, checks, and counterchecks. “He knows a baseness in his blood At such strange war with something good, He may not do the thing he would. “Heaven opens inward, chasms yawn. Vast images in glimmering dawn, Half shown, are broken and withdrawn. “Ah! sure within him and without, Could his dark wisdom find it out, There must be answer to his doubt. “But thou canst answer not again. With thine own weapon art thou slain, Or thou wilt answer but in vain. “The doubt would rest, I dare not solve. In the same circle we revolve. Assurance only breeds resolve.” As when a billow, blown against, Falls back, the voice with which I fenced A little ceased, but recommenced. “Where wert thou when thy father play’d In his free field, and pastime made, A merry boy in sun and shade? “A merry boy they called him then. He sat upon the knees of men In days that never come again, “Before the little ducts began To feed thy bones with lime, and ran Their course, till thou wert also man: “Who took a wife, who rear’d his race, Whose wrinkles gather’d on his face, Whose troubles number with his days: “A life of nothings, nothing-worth, From that first nothing ere his birth To that last nothing under earth!” “These words,” I said, “are like the rest, No certain clearness, but at best A vague suspicion of the breast: “But if I grant, thou might’st defend The thesis which thy words intend— That to begin implies to end; “Yet how should I for certain hold,^[10] Because my memory is so cold, That I first was in human mould? “I cannot make this matter plain, But I would shoot, howe’er in vain, A random arrow from the brain. “It may be that no life is found, Which only to one engine bound Falls off, but cycles always round. “As old mythologies relate, Some draught of Lethe might await The slipping thro’ from state to state. “As here we find in trances, men Forget the dream that happens then, Until they fall in trance again. “So might we, if our state were such As one before, remember much, For those two likes might meet and touch.^[11] “But, if I lapsed from nobler place, Some legend of a fallen race Alone might hint of my disgrace; “Some vague emotion of delight In gazing up an Alpine height, Some yearning toward the lamps of night. “Or if thro’ lower lives I came— Tho’ all experience past became Consolidate in mind and frame— “I might forget my weaker lot; For is not our first year forgot? The haunts of memory echo not. “And men, whose reason long was blind, From cells of madness unconfined,^[12] Oft lose whole years of darker mind. “Much more, if first I floated free, As naked essence, must I be Incompetent of memory: “For memory dealing but with time, And he with matter, could she climb Beyond her own material prime? “Moreover, something is or seems, That touches me with mystic gleams, Like glimpses of forgotten dreams— “Of something felt, like something here; Of something done, I know not where; Such as no language may declare.” The still voice laugh’d. “I talk,” said he, “Not with thy dreams. Suffice it thee Thy pain is a reality.” “But thou,” said I, “hast miss’d thy mark, Who sought’st to wreck my mortal ark, By making all the horizon dark. “Why not set forth, if I should do This rashness, that which might ensue With this old soul in organs new? “Whatever crazy sorrow saith, No life that breathes with human breath Has ever truly long’d for death. “’Tis life, whereof our nerves are scant, Oh life, not death, for which we pant; More life, and fuller, that I want.” I ceased, and sat as one forlorn. Then said the voice, in quiet scorn, “Behold it is the Sabbath morn”. And I arose, and I released The casement, and the light increased With freshness in the dawning east. Like soften’d airs that blowing steal, When meres begin to uncongeal, The sweet church bells began to peal. On to God’s house the people prest: Passing the place where each must rest, Each enter’d like a welcome guest. One walk’d between his wife and child, With measur’d footfall firm and mild, And now and then he gravely smiled. The prudent partner of his blood Lean’d on him, faithful, gentle, good,^[13] Wearing the rose of womanhood. And in their double love secure, The little maiden walk’d demure, Pacing with downward eyelids pure. These three made unity so sweet, My frozen heart began to beat, Remembering its ancient heat. I blest them, and they wander’d on: I spoke, but answer came there none: The dull and bitter voice was gone. A second voice was at mine ear, A little whisper silver-clear, A murmur, “Be of better cheer”. As from some blissful neighbourhood, A notice faintly understood, “I see the end, and know the good”. A little hint to solace woe, A hint, a whisper breathing low, “I may not speak of what I know”. Like an Aeolian harp that wakes No certain air, but overtakes Far thought with music that it makes: Such seem’d the whisper at my side: “What is it thou knowest, sweet voice?” I cried. “A hidden hope,” the voice replied: So heavenly-toned, that in that hour From out my sullen heart a power Broke, like the rainbow from the shower, To feel, altho’ no tongue can prove That every cloud, that spreads above And veileth love, itself is love. And forth into the fields I went, And Nature’s living motion lent The pulse of hope to discontent. I wonder’d at the bounteous hours, The slow result of winter showers: You scarce could see the grass for flowers. I wonder’d, while I paced along: The woods were fill’d so full with song, There seem’d no room for sense of wrong. So variously seem’d all things wrought,^[14] I marvell’d how the mind was brought To anchor by one gloomy thought; And wherefore rather I made choice To commune with that barren voice, Than him that said, “Rejoice! rejoice!”

The Day-Dream

First published in 1842, but written in 1835. In it is incorporated, though with several alterations, The Sleeping Beauty, published among the poems of 1830, but excised in subsequent editions. Half extravaganza and half apologue, like the Midsummer Night’s Dream, this delightful poem may be safely left to deliver its own message and convey its own meaning. It is an excellent illustration of the truth of Tennyson’s own remark: “Poetry is like shot silk with many glancing colours. Every reader must find his own interpretation according to his ability, and according to his sympathy with the poet.”

Prologue

(No alteration has been made in the Prologue since 1842).

O, Lady Flora, let me speak: A pleasant hour has past away While, dreaming on your damask cheek, The dewy sister-eyelids lay. As by the lattice you reclined, I went thro’ many wayward moods To see you dreaming—and, behind, A summer crisp with shining woods. And I too dream’d, until at last Across my fancy, brooding warm, The reflex of a legend past, And loosely settled into form. And would you have the thought I had, And see the vision that I saw, Then take the broidery-frame, and add A crimson to the quaint Macaw, And I will tell it. Turn your face, Nor look with that too-earnest eye— The rhymes are dazzled from their place, And order’d words asunder fly.

The Sleeping Palace

(No alteration since 1851.)

1

The varying year with blade and sheaf Clothes and reclothes the happy plains; Here rests the sap within the leaf, Here stays the blood along the veins. Faint shadows, vapours lightly curl’d, Faint murmurs from the meadows come, Like hints and echoes of the world To spirits folded in the womb.

2

Soft lustre bathes the range of urns On every slanting terrace-lawn. The fountain to his place returns Deep in the garden lake withdrawn. Here droops the banner on the tower, On the hall-hearths the festal fires, The peacock in his laurel bower, The parrot in his gilded wires.

3

Roof-haunting martins warm their eggs: In these, in those the life is stay’d. The mantles from the golden pegs Droop sleepily: no sound is made, Not even of a gnat that sings. More like a picture seemeth all Than those old portraits of old kings, That watch the sleepers from the wall.

4

Here sits the Butler with a flask Between his knees, half-drain’d; and there The wrinkled steward at his task, The maid-of-honour blooming fair: The page has caught her hand in his: Her lips are sever’d as to speak: His own are pouted to a kiss: The blush is fix’d upon her cheek.

5

Till all the hundred summers pass, The beams, that thro’ the Oriel shine, Make prisms in every carven glass, And beaker brimm’d with noble wine. Each baron at the banquet sleeps, Grave faces gather’d in a ring. His state the king reposing keeps. He must have been a jovial king.^[1]

6

All round a hedge upshoots, and shows At distance like a little wood; Thorns, ivies, woodbine, misletoes, And grapes with bunches red as blood; All creeping plants, a wall of green Close-matted, bur and brake and briar, And glimpsing over these, just seen, High up, the topmost palace-spire.

7

When will the hundred summers die, And thought and time be born again, And newer knowledge, drawing nigh, Bring truth that sways the soul of men? Here all things in there place remain, As all were order’d, ages since. Come, Care and Pleasure, Hope and Pain, And bring the fated fairy Prince.

The Sleeping Beauty

(First printed in 1830, but does not reappear again till 1842. No alteration since 1842.)

1

Year after year unto her feet, She lying on her couch alone, Across the purpled coverlet, The maiden’s jet-black hair has grown,^[1] On either side her tranced form Forth streaming from a braid of pearl: The slumbrous light is rich and warm, And moves not on the rounded curl.

2

The silk star-broider’d^[2]coverlid Unto her limbs itself doth mould Languidly ever; and, amid Her full black ringlets downward roll’d, Glows forth each softly-shadow’d arm, With bracelets of the diamond bright: Her constant beauty doth inform Stillness with love, and day with light.

3

She sleeps: her breathings are not heard In palace chambers far apart.^[3] The fragrant tresses are not stirr’d That lie upon her charmed heart. She sleeps: on either hand^[4] upswells The gold-fringed pillow lightly prest: She sleeps, nor dreams, but ever dwells A perfect form in perfect rest.

The Arrival

(No alteration after 1853.)

1

All precious things, discover’d late, To those that seek them issue forth; For love in sequel works with fate, And draws the veil from hidden worth. He travels far from other skies His mantle glitters on the rocks— A fairy Prince, with joyful eyes, And lighter footed than the fox.

2

The bodies and the bones of those That strove in other days to pass, Are wither’d in the thorny close, Or scatter’d blanching on^[1]the grass. He gazes on the silent dead: “They perish’d in their daring deeds.” This proverb flashes thro’ his head, “The many fail: the one succeeds”.

3

He comes, scarce knowing what he seeks: He breaks the hedge: he enters there: The colour flies into his cheeks: He trusts to light on something fair; For all his life the charm did talk About his path, and hover near With words of promise in his walk, And whisper’d voices at his ear.^[2]

4

More close and close his footsteps wind; The Magic Music^[3] in his heart Beats quick and quicker, till he find The quiet chamber far apart. His spirit flutters like a lark, He stoops—to kiss her—on his knee. “Love, if thy tresses be so dark, How dark those hidden eyes must be!

The Revival

(No alteration after 1853.)

1

A touch, a kiss! the charm was snapt. There rose a noise of striking clocks, And feet that ran, and doors that clapt, And barking dogs, and crowing cocks; A fuller light illumined all, A breeze thro’ all the garden swept, A sudden hubbub shook the hall, And sixty feet the fountain leapt.

2

The hedge broke in, the banner blew, The butler drank, the steward scrawl’d, The fire shot up, the martin flew, The parrot scream’d, the peacock squall’d, The maid and page renew’d their strife, The palace bang’d, and buzz’d and clackt, And all the long-pent stream of life Dash’d downward in a cataract.

3

And last with these^[1] the king awoke, And in his chair himself uprear’d, And yawn’d, and rubb’d his face, and spoke, “By holy rood, a royal beard! How say you? we have slept, my lords, My beard has grown into my lap.” The barons swore, with many words, ’Twas but an after-dinner’s nap.

4

“Pardy,” return’d the king, “but still My joints are something^[2] stiff or so. My lord, and shall we pass the bill I mention’d half an hour ago?” The chancellor, sedate and vain, In courteous words return’d reply: But dallied with his golden chain, And, smiling, put the question by.

The Departure

(No alteration since 1842.)

1

And on her lover’s arm she leant, And round her waist she felt it fold, And far across the hills they went In that new world which is the old: Across the hills and far away Beyond their utmost purple rim, And deep into the dying day The happy princess follow’d him.

2

“I’d sleep another hundred years, O love, for such another kiss;” “O wake for ever, love,” she hears, “O love, ’twas such as this and this.” And o’er them many a sliding star, And many a merry wind was borne, And, stream’d thro’ many a golden bar, The twilight melted into morn.

3

“O eyes long laid in happy sleep!” “O happy sleep, that lightly fled!” “O happy kiss, that woke thy sleep!” “O love, thy kiss would wake the dead!” And o’er them many a flowing range Of vapour buoy’d the crescent-bark, And, rapt thro’ many a rosy change, The twilight died into the dark.

4

“A hundred summers! can it be? And whither goest thou, tell me where?” “O seek my father’s court with me! For there are greater wonders there.” And o’er the hills, and far away Beyond their utmost purple rim, Beyond the night across the day, Thro’ all the world she follow’d him.

Moral

(No alteration since 1842.)

1

So, Lady Flora, take my lay, And if you find no moral there, Go, look in any glass and say, What moral is in being fair. Oh, to what uses shall we put The wildweed-flower that simply blows? And is there any moral shut Within the bosom of the rose?

2

But any man that walks the mead, In bud or blade, or bloom, may find, According as his humours lead, A meaning suited to his mind. And liberal applications lie In Art like Nature, dearest friend;^[1] So ’twere to cramp its use, if I Should hook it to some useful end.

L’Envoi

(No alteration since 1843 except in numbering the stanzas.)

1

You shake your head. A random string Your finer female sense offends. Well—were it not a pleasant thing To fall asleep with all one’s friends; To pass with all our social ties To silence from the paths of men; And every hundred years to rise And learn the world, and sleep again; To sleep thro’ terms of mighty wars, And wake on science grown to more, On secrets of the brain, the stars, As wild as aught of fairy lore; And all that else the years will show, The Poet-forms of stronger hours, The vast Republics that may grow, The Federations and the Powers; Titanic forces taking birth In divers seasons, divers climes; For we are Ancients of the earth, And in the morning of the times.

2

So sleeping, so aroused from sleep Thro’ sunny decads new and strange, Or gay quinquenniads would we reap The flower and quintessence of change.

3

Ah, yet would I—and would I might! So much your eyes my fancy take— Be still the first to leap to light That I might kiss those eyes awake! For, am I right or am I wrong, To choose your own you did not care; You’d have my moral from the song, And I will take my pleasure there: And, am I right or am I wrong, My fancy, ranging thro’ and thro’, To search a meaning for the song, Perforce will still revert to you; Nor finds a closer truth than this All-graceful head, so richly curl’d, And evermore a costly kiss The prelude to some brighter world.

4

For since the time when Adam first Embraced his Eve in happy hour, And every bird of Eden burst In carol, every bud to flower, What eyes, like thine, have waken’d hopes? What lips, like thine, so sweetly join’d? Where on the double rosebud droops The fullness of the pensive mind; Which all too dearly self-involved,^[1] Yet sleeps a dreamless sleep to me; A sleep by kisses undissolved, That lets thee^[2] neither hear nor see: But break it. In the name of wife, And in the rights that name may give, Are clasp’d the moral of thy life, And that for which I care to live.

Epilogue

(No alteration since 1842.)

So, Lady Flora, take my lay, And, if you find a meaning there, O whisper to your glass, and say, “What wonder, if he thinks me fair?” What wonder I was all unwise, To shape the song for your delight Like long-tail’d birds of Paradise, That float thro’ Heaven, and cannot light? Or old-world trains, upheld at court By Cupid-boys of blooming hue— But take it—earnest wed with sport, And either sacred unto you.

Amphion

First published in 1842. No alteration since 1850.

In this humorous allegory the poet bewails his unhappy lot on having fallen on an age so unpropitious to poetry, contrasting it with the happy times so responsive to his predecessors who piped to a world prepared to dance to their music. However, he must toil and be satisfied if he can make a little garden blossom.

My father left a park to me, But it is wild and barren, A garden too with scarce a tree And waster than a warren: Yet say the neighbours when they call, It is not bad but good land, And in it is the germ of all That grows within the woodland. O had I lived when song was great In days of old Amphion,^[1] And ta’en my fiddle to the gate, Nor cared for seed or scion! And had I lived when song was great, And legs of trees were limber, And ta’en my fiddle to the gate, And fiddled in the timber! ’Tis said he had a tuneful tongue, Such happy intonation, Wherever he sat down and sung He left a small plantation; Wherever in a lonely grove He set up his forlorn pipes, The gouty oak began to move, And flounder into hornpipes. The mountain stirr’d its bushy crown, And, as tradition teaches, Young ashes pirouetted down Coquetting with young beeches; And briony-vine and ivy-wreath Ran forward to his rhyming, And from the valleys underneath Came little copses climbing. The linden broke her ranks and rent The woodbine wreathes that bind her, And down the middle, buzz! she went, With all her bees behind her.^[2] The poplars, in long order due, With cypress promenaded, The shock-head willows two and two By rivers gallopaded. Came wet-shot alder from the wave, Came yews, a dismal coterie; Each pluck’d his one foot from the grave, Poussetting with a sloe-tree: Old elms came breaking from the vine, The vine stream’d out to follow, And, sweating rosin, plump’d the pine From many a cloudy hollow. And wasn’t it a sight to see When, ere his song was ended, Like some great landslip, tree by tree, The country-side descended; And shepherds from the mountain-caves Look’d down, half-pleased, half-frighten’d, As dash’d about the drunken leaves The random sunshine lighten’d! Oh, nature first was fresh to men, And wanton without measure; So youthful and so flexile then, You moved her at your pleasure. Twang out, my fiddle! shake the twigs! And make her dance attendance; Blow, flute, and stir the stiff-set sprigs, And scirrhous roots and tendons. ’Tis vain! in such a brassy age I could not move a thistle; The very sparrows in the hedge Scarce answer to my whistle; Or at the most, when three-parts-sick With strumming and with scraping, A jackass heehaws from the rick, The passive oxen gaping. But what is that I hear? a sound Like sleepy counsel pleading: O Lord!—’tis in my neighbour’s ground, The modern Muses reading. They read Botanic Treatises. And works on Gardening thro’ there, And Methods of transplanting trees To look as if they grew there. The wither’d Misses! how they prose O’er books of travell’d seamen, And show you slips of all that grows From England to Van Diemen. They read in arbours clipt and cut, And alleys, faded places, By squares of tropic summer shut And warm’d in crystal cases. But these, tho’ fed with careful dirt, Are neither green nor sappy; Half-conscious of the garden-squirt, The spindlings look unhappy,^[3] Better to me the meanest weed That blows upon its mountain, The vilest herb that runs to seed Beside its native fountain. And I must work thro’ months of toil, And years of cultivation, Upon my proper patch of soil To grow my own plantation. I’ll take the showers as they fall, I will not vex my bosom: Enough if at the end of all A little garden blossom.

St. Agnes

This exquisite little poem was first published in 1837 in the Keepsake, an annual edited by Lady Emmeline Stuart Wortley, and was included in the edition of 1842. No alteration has been made in it since 1842.

In 1857 the title was altered from “St. Agnes” to “St. Agnes’ Eve,” thus bringing it near to Keats’ poem, which certainly influenced Tennyson in writing it, as a comparison of the opening of the two poems will show. The saint from whom the poem takes its name was a young girl of thirteen who suffered martyrdom in the reign of Diocletian: she is a companion to Sir Galahad.

Deep on the convent-roof the snows Are sparkling to the moon: My breath to heaven like vapour goes: May my soul follow soon! The shadows of the convent-towers Slant down the snowy sward, Still creeping with the creeping hours That lead me to my Lord: Make Thou^[1] my spirit pure and clear As are the frosty skies, Or this first snowdrop of the year That in^[2] my bosom lies. As these white robes are soiled and dark, To yonder shining ground; As this pale taper’s earthly spark, To yonder argent round; So shows my soul before the Lamb, My spirit before Thee; So in mine earthly house I am, To that I hope to be. Break up the heavens, O Lord! and far, Thro’ all yon starlight keen, Draw me, thy bride, a glittering star, In raiment white and clean. He lifts me to the golden doors; The flashes come and go; All heaven bursts her starry floors, And strows^[3] her lights below, And deepens on and up! the gates Roll back, and far within For me the Heavenly Bridegroom waits,^[4] To make me pure of sin.^[5] The sabbaths of Eternity, One sabbath deep and wide— A light upon the shining sea— The Bridegroom^[6] with his bride!

Sir Galahad

Published in 1842. No alteration has been made in it since. This poem may be regarded as a prelude to The Holy Grail. The character of Galahad is deduced principally from the seventeenth book of the Morte d’Arthur. In the twenty-second chapter of that book St. Joseph of Arimathea says to him: “Thou hast resembled me in two things in that thou hast seen the marvels of the sangreal, and in that thou has been a clean maiden”.

My good blade carves the casques of men, My tough lance thrusteth sure, My strength is as the strength of ten, Because my heart is pure. The shattering trumpet shrilleth high, The hard brands shiver on the steel, The splinter’d spear-shafts crack and fly, The horse and rider reel: They reel, they roll in clanging lists, And when the tide of combat stands, Perfume and flowers fall in showers, That lightly rain from ladies’ hands. How sweet are looks that ladies bend On whom their favours fall! For them I battle till the end, To save from shame and thrall: But all my heart is drawn above, My knees are bow’d in crypt and shrine: I never felt the kiss of love, Nor maiden’s hand in mine. More bounteous aspects on me beam, Me mightier transports move and thrill; So keep I fair thro’ faith and prayer A virgin heart in work and will. When down the stormy crescent goes, A light before me swims, Between dark stems the forest glows, I hear a noise of hymns: Then by some secret shrine I ride; I hear a voice, but none are there; The stalls are void, the doors are wide, The tapers burning fair. Fair gleams the snowy altar-cloth, The silver vessels sparkle clean, The shrill bell rings, the censer swings, And solemn chaunts resound between. Sometimes on lonely mountain-meres I find a magic bark; I leap on board: no helmsman steers: I float till all is dark. A gentle sound, an awful light! Three angels bear the holy Grail: With folded feet, in stoles of white, On sleeping wings they sail. Ah, blessed vision! blood of God! My spirit beats her mortal bars, As down dark tides the glory slides, And star-like mingles with the stars. When on my goodly charger borne Thro’ dreaming towns I go, The cock crows ere the Christmas morn, The streets are dumb with snow. The tempest crackles on the leads, And, ringing, spins from brand and mail; But o’er the dark a glory spreads, And gilds the driving hail. I leave the plain, I climb the height; No branchy thicket shelter yields; But blessed forms in whistling storms Fly o’er waste fens and windy fields. A maiden knight—to me is given Such hope, I know not fear; I yearn to breathe the airs of heaven That often meet me here. I muse on joy that will not cease, Pure spaces clothed in living beams, Pure lilies of eternal peace, Whose odours haunt my dreams; And, stricken by an angel’s hand, This mortal armour that I wear, This weight and size, this heart and eyes, Are touch’d, are turn’d to finest air. The clouds are broken in the sky, And thro’ the mountain-walls A rolling organ-harmony Swells up, and shakes and falls. Then move the trees, the copses nod, Wings flutter, voices hover clear: “O just and faithful knight of God! Ride on! the prize is near”. So pass I hostel, hall, and grange; By bridge and ford, by park and pale, All-arm’d I ride, whate’er betide, Until I find the holy Grail.

Edward Gray

First published in 1842 but written in or before 1840. See Life, i., 209. Not altered since.

Sweet Emma Moreland of yonder town Met me walking on yonder way, “And have you lost your heart?” she said; “And are you married yet, Edward Gray?” Sweet Emma Moreland spoke to me: Bitterly weeping I turn’d away: “Sweet Emma Moreland, love no more Can touch the heart of Edward Gray. “Ellen Adair she loved me well, Against her father’s and mother’s will: To-day I sat for an hour and wept, By Ellen’s grave, on the windy hill. “Shy she was, and I thought her cold; Thought her proud, and fled over the sea; Fill’d I was with folly and spite, When Ellen Adair was dying for me. “Cruel, cruel the words I said! Cruelly came they back to-day: ‘You’re too slight and fickle,’ I said, ‘To trouble the heart of Edward Gray’. “There I put my face in the grass— Whisper’d, ‘Listen to my despair: I repent me of all I did: Speak a little, Ellen Adair!’ “Then I took a pencil, and wrote On the mossy stone, as I lay, ‘Here lies the body of Ellen Adair; And here the heart of Edward Gray!’ “Love may come, and love may go, And fly, like a bird, from tree to tree: But I will love no more, no more, Till Ellen Adair come back to me. “Bitterly wept I over the stone: Bitterly weeping I turn’d away; There lies the body of Ellen Adair! And there the heart of Edward Gray!”

Will Waterproof’s Lyrical Monologue

made at The Cock.

First published 1842. The final text was that of 1853, which has not been altered since, except that in stanza 29 the two “we’s” in the first line and the “thy” in the third line are not in later editions italicised. The Cock Tavern, No. 201 Fleet Street, on the north side of Fleet Street, stood opposite the Temple and was of great antiquity, going back nearly 300 years. Strype, bk. iv., h. 117, describes it as “a noted public-house,” and Pepys’ Diary, 23rd April, 1668, speaks of himself as having been “mighty merry there”. The old carved chimney-piece was of the age of James I., and the gilt bird over the portal was the work of Grinling Gibbons. When Tennyson wrote this poem it was the favourite resort of templars, journalists and literary people generally, as it had long been. But the old place is now a thing of the past. On the evening of 10th April, 1886, it closed its doors for ever after an existence of nearly 300 years. There is an admirable description of it, signed A. J. M., in Notes and Queries, seventh series, vol. i., 442-6. I give a short extract:

“At the end of a long room beyond the skylight which, except a feeble side window, was its only light in the daytime, was a door that led past a small lavatory and up half a dozen narrow steps to the kitchen, one of the strangest and grimmest old kitchens you ever saw. Across a mighty hatch, thronged with dishes, you looked into it and beheld there the white-jacketed man-cook, served by his two robust and red-armed kitchen maids. For you they were preparing chops, pork chops in winter, lamb chops in spring, mutton chops always, and steaks and sausages, and kidneys and potatoes, and poached eggs and Welsh rabbits, and stewed cheese, the special glory of the house. That was the menu and men were the only guests. But of late years, as innovations often precede a catastrophe, two new things were introduced, vegetables and women. Both were respectable and both were good, but it was felt, especially by the virtuous Smurthwaite, that they were de trop in a place so masculine and so carnivorous.”

O plump head-waiter at The Cock, To which I most resort, How goes the time? ’Tis five o’clock. Go fetch a pint of port: But let it not be such as that You set before chance-comers, But such whose father-grape grew fat On Lusitanian summers. No vain libation to the Muse, But may she still be kind, And whisper lovely words, and use Her influence on the mind, To make me write my random rhymes, Ere they be half-forgotten; Nor add and alter, many times, Till all be ripe and rotten. I pledge her, and she comes and dips Her laurel in the wine, And lays it thrice upon my lips, These favour’d lips of mine; Until the charm have power to make New life-blood warm the bosom, And barren commonplaces break In full and kindly^[1] blossom. I pledge her silent at the board; Her gradual fingers steal And touch upon the master-chord Of all I felt and feel. Old wishes, ghosts of broken plans, And phantom hopes assemble; And that child’s heart within the man’s Begins to move and tremble. Thro’ many an hour of summer suns By many pleasant ways, Against its fountain upward runs The current of my days:^[2] I kiss the lips I once have kiss’d; The gas-light wavers dimmer; And softly, thro’ a vinous mist, My college friendships glimmer. I grow in worth, and wit, and sense, Unboding critic-pen, Or that eternal want of pence, Which vexes public men, Who hold their hands to all, and cry For that which all deny them— Who sweep the crossings, wet or dry, And all the world go by them. Ah yet, tho’^[3] all the world forsake, Tho’^[3] fortune clip my wings, I will not cramp my heart, nor take Half-views of men and things. Let Whig and Tory stir their blood; There must be stormy weather; But for some true result of good All parties work together. Let there be thistles, there are grapes; If old things, there are new; Ten thousand broken lights and shapes, Yet glimpses of the true. Let raffs be rife in prose and rhyme, We lack not rhymes and reasons, As on this whirligig of Time^[4] We circle with the seasons. This earth is rich in man and maid; With fair horizons bound: This whole wide earth of light and shade Comes out, a perfect round. High over roaring Temple-bar, And, set in Heaven’s third story, I look at all things as they are, But thro’ a kind of glory. Head-waiter, honour’d by the guest Half-mused, or reeling-ripe, The pint, you brought me, was the best That ever came from pipe. But tho’^[5] the port surpasses praise, My nerves have dealt with stiffer. Is there some magic in the place? Or do my peptics differ? For since I came to live and learn, No pint of white or red Had ever half the power to turn This wheel within my head, Which bears a season’d brain about, Unsubject to confusion, Tho’^[5] soak’d and saturate, out and out, Thro’ every convolution. For I am of a numerous house, With many kinsmen gay, Where long and largely we carouse As who shall say me nay: Each month, a birthday coming on, We drink defying trouble, Or sometimes two would meet in one, And then we drank it double; Whether the vintage, yet unkept, Had relish, fiery-new, Or, elbow-deep in sawdust, slept, As old as Waterloo; Or stow’d (when classic Canning died) In musty bins and chambers, Had cast upon its crusty side The gloom of ten Decembers. The Muse, the jolly Muse, it is! She answer’d to my call, She changes with that mood or this, Is all-in-all to all: She lit the spark within my throat, To make my blood run quicker, Used all her fiery will, and smote Her life into the liquor. And hence this halo lives about The waiter’s hands, that reach To each his perfect pint of stout, His proper chop to each. He looks not like the common breed That with the napkin dally; I think he came like Ganymede, From some delightful valley. The Cock was of a larger egg Than modern poultry drop, Stept forward on a firmer leg, And cramm’d a plumper crop; Upon an ampler dunghill trod, Crow’d lustier late and early, Sipt wine from silver, praising God, And raked in golden barley. A private life was all his joy, Till in a court he saw A something-pottle-bodied boy, That knuckled at the taw: He stoop’d and clutch’d him, fair and good, Flew over roof and casement: His brothers of the weather stood Stock-still for sheer amazement. But he, by farmstead, thorpe and spire, And follow’d with acclaims, A sign to many a staring shire, Came crowing over Thames. Right down by smoky Paul’s they bore, Till, where the street grows straiter,^[6] One fix’d for ever at the door, And one became head-waiter. But whither would my fancy go? How out of place she makes The violet of a legend blow Among the chops and steaks! ’Tis but a steward of the can, One shade more plump than common; As just and mere a serving-man As any born of woman. I ranged too high: what draws me down Into the common day? Is it the weight of that half-crown, Which I shall have to pay? For, something duller than at first, Nor wholly comfortable, I sit (my empty glass reversed), And thrumming on the table: Half-fearful that, with self at strife I take myself to task; Lest of the fullness of my life I leave an empty flask: For I had hope, by something rare, To prove myself a poet; But, while I plan and plan, my hair Is gray before I know it. So fares it since the years began, Till they be gather’d up; The truth, that flies the flowing can, Will haunt the vacant cup: And others’ follies teach us not, Nor much their wisdom teaches; And most, of sterling worth, is what Our own experience preaches. Ah, let the rusty theme alone! We know not what we know. But for my pleasant hour, ’tis gone, ’Tis gone, and let it go. ’Tis gone: a thousand such have slipt Away from my embraces, And fall’n into the dusty crypt Of darken’d forms and faces. Go, therefore, thou! thy betters went Long since, and came no more; With peals of genial clamour sent From many a tavern-door, With twisted quirks and happy hits, From misty men of letters; The tavern-hours of mighty wits— Thine elders and thy betters. Hours, when the Poet’s words and looks Had yet their native glow: Not yet the fear of little books Had made him talk for show: But, all his vast heart sherris-warm’d, He flash’d his random speeches; Ere days, that deal in ana, swarm’d His literary leeches. So mix for ever with the past, Like all good things on earth! For should I prize thee, couldst thou last, At half thy real worth? I hold it good, good things should pass: With time I will not quarrel: It is but yonder empty glass That makes me maudlin-moral. Head-waiter of the chop-house here, To which I most resort, I too must part: I hold thee dear For this good pint of port. For this, thou shalt from all things suck Marrow of mirth and laughter; And, wheresoe’er thou move, good luck Shall fling her old shoe after. But thou wilt never move from hence, The sphere thy fate allots: Thy latter days increased with pence Go down among the pots: Thou battenest by the greasy gleam In haunts of hungry sinners, Old boxes, larded with the steam Of thirty thousand dinners. We fret, we fume, would shift our skins, Would quarrel with our lot; Thy care is, under polish’d tins, To serve the hot-and-hot; To come and go, and come again, Returning like the pewit, And watch’d by silent gentlemen, That trifle with the cruet. Live long, ere from thy topmost head The thick-set hazel dies; Long, ere the hateful crow shall tread The corners of thine eyes: Live long, nor feel in head or chest Our changeful equinoxes, Till mellow Death, like some late guest, Shall call thee from the boxes. But when he calls, and thou shalt cease To pace the gritted floor, And, laying down an unctuous lease Of life, shalt earn no more; No carved cross-bones, the types of Death, Shall show thee past to Heaven: But carved cross-pipes, and, underneath, A pint-pot neatly graven.

To——

after reading a Life and Letters

Originally published in the Examiner for 24th March, 1849; then in the sixth edition of the poems, 1850, with the second part of the title and the alterations noted. When reprinted in 1851 one more slight alteration was made. It has not been altered since. The work referred to was Moncton Milne’s (afterwards Lord Houghton) Letters and Literary Remains of Keats published in 1848, and the person to whom the poem may have been addressed was Tennyson’s brother Charles, afterwards Charles Tennyson Turner, to the facts of whose life and to whose character it would exactly apply. See Napier,Homes and Haunts of Tennyson, 48-50. But Sir Franklin Lushington tells me that it was most probably addressed to some imaginary person, as neither he nor such of Tennyson’s surviving friends as he kindly consulted for me are able to identify the person.

You might have won the Poet’s name If such be worth the winning now, And gain’d a laurel for your brow Of sounder leaf than I can claim; But you have made the wiser choice, A life that moves to gracious ends Thro’ troops of unrecording friends, A deedful life, a silent voice: And you have miss’d the irreverent doom Of those that wear the Poet’s crown: Hereafter, neither knave nor clown Shall hold their orgies at your tomb. For now the Poet cannot die Nor leave his music as of old, But round him ere he scarce be cold Begins the scandal and the cry: “Proclaim the faults he would not show: Break lock and seal: betray the trust: Keep nothing sacred: ’tis but just The many-headed beast should know”. Ah, shameless! for he did but sing. A song that pleased us from its worth; No public life was his on earth, No blazon’d statesman he, nor king. He gave the people of his best: His worst he kept, his best he gave. My Shakespeare’s curse on^[1] clown and knave Who will not let his ashes rest! Who make it seem more sweet^[2] to be The little life of bank and brier, The bird that pipes his lone desire And dies unheard within his tree, Than he that warbles long and loud And drops at Glory’s temple-gates, For whom the carrion vulture waits To tear his heart before the crowd!

To E. L. on his travels in Greece.

This was first printed in 1853. It has not been altered since. The poem was addressed to Edward Lear, the landscape painter, and refers to his travels.

Illyrian woodlands, echoing falls Of water, sheets of summer glass, The long divine Peneian pass,^[1] The vast Akrokeraunian walls,^[2] Tomohrit,^[3] Athos, all things fair, With such a pencil, such a pen, You shadow forth to distant men, I read and felt that I was there: And trust me, while I turn’d the page, And track’d you still on classic ground, I grew in gladness till I found My spirits in the golden age. For me the torrent ever pour’d And glisten’d—here and there alone The broad-limb’d Gods at random thrown By fountain-urns;-and Naiads oar’d A glimmering shoulder under gloom Of cavern pillars; on the swell The silver lily heaved and fell; And many a slope was rich in bloom From him that on the mountain lea By dancing rivulets fed his flocks, To him who sat upon the rocks, And fluted to the morning sea.

Lady Clare

First published 1842. After 1851 no alterations were made.

This poem was suggested by Miss Ferrier’s powerful novel The Inheritance. A comparison with the plot of Miss Ferrier’s novel will show with what tact and skill Tennyson has adapted the tale to his ballad. Thomas St. Clair, youngest son of the Earl of Rossville, marries a Miss Sarah Black, a girl of humble and obscure birth. He dies, leaving a widow and as is supposed a daughter, Gertrude, who claim the protection of Lord Rossville, as the child is heiress presumptive to the earldom. On Lord Rossville’s death she accordingly becomes Countess of Rossville. She has two lovers, both distant connections, Colonel Delmour and Edward Lyndsay. At last it is discovered that she was not the daughter of Thomas St. Clair and her supposed mother, but of one Marion La Motte and Jacob Leviston, and that Mrs. St. Clair had adopted her when a baby and passed her off as her own child, that she might succeed to the title. Meanwhile Delmour by the death of his elder brother succeeds to the title and estates forfeited by the detected foundling, but instead of acting as Tennyson’s Lord Ronald does, he repudiates her and marries a duchess. But her other lover Lyndsay is true to her and marries her. Delmour not long afterwards dies without issue, and Lyndsay succeeds to the title, Gertrude then becoming after all Countess of Rossville. In details Tennyson follows the novel sometimes very closely. Thus the “single rose,” the poor dress, the bitter exclamation about her being a beggar born, are from the novel.

The 1842 and all editions up to and including 1850 begin with the following stanza and omit stanza 2:—

It was the time when lilies blow, And clouds are highest up in air, Lord Ronald brought a lily-white doe To give his cousin Lady Clare. I trow they did not part in scorn: Lovers long-betroth’d were they: They two will wed the morrow morn! God’s blessing on the day! “He does not love me for my birth, Nor for my lands so broad and fair; He loves me for my own true worth, And that is well,” said Lady Clare. In there came old Alice the nurse, Said, “Who was this that went from thee?” “It was my cousin,” said Lady Clare, “To-morrow he weds with me.” “O God be thank’d!” said Alice the nurse, “That all comes round so just and fair: Lord Ronald is heir of all your lands, And you are not the Lady Clare.” “Are ye out of your mind, my nurse, my nurse?” Said Lady Clare, “that ye speak so wild”; “As God’s above,” said Alice the nurse, “I speak the truth: you are my child. “The old Earl’s daughter died at my breast; I speak the truth, as I live by bread! I buried her like my own sweet child, And put my child in her stead.” “Falsely, falsely have ye done, O mother,” she said, “if this be true, To keep the best man under the sun So many years from his due.” “Nay now, my child,” said Alice the nurse, “But keep the secret for your life, And all you have will be Lord Ronald’s, When you are man and wife.” “If I’m a beggar born,” she said, “I will speak out, for I dare not lie. Pull off, pull off, the broach^[1] of gold, And fling the diamond necklace by.” “Nay now, my child,” said Alice the nurse, “But keep the secret all ye can.” She said, “Not so: but I will know If there be any faith in man”. “Nay now, what faith?” said Alice the nurse, “The man will cleave unto his right.” “And he shall have it,” the lady replied, “Tho’^[2] I should die to-night.” “Yet give one kiss to your mother dear! Alas, my child, I sinn’d for thee.” “O mother, mother, mother,” she said, “So strange it seems to me. “Yet here’s a kiss for my mother dear, My mother dear, if this be so, And lay your hand upon my head, And bless me, mother, ere I go.” She clad herself in a russet gown, She was no longer Lady Clare: She went by dale, and she went by down, With a single rose in her hair. The lily-white doe Lord Ronald had brought Leapt up from where she lay, Dropt her head in the maiden’s hand, And follow’d her all the way.^[3] Down stept Lord Ronald from his tower: “O Lady Clare, you shame your worth! Why come you drest like a village maid, That are the flower of the earth?” “If I come drest like a village maid, I am but as my fortunes are: I am a beggar born,” she said,^[4] “And not the Lady Clare.” “Play me no tricks,” said Lord Ronald, “For I am yours in word and in deed. Play me no tricks,” said Lord Ronald, “Your riddle is hard to read.” O and proudly stood she up! Her heart within her did not fail: She look’d into Lord Ronald’s eyes, And told him all her nurse’s tale. He laugh’d a laugh of merry scorn: He turn’d, and kiss’d her where she stood: “If you are not the heiress born, And I,” said he, “the next in blood— “If you are not the heiress born, And I,” said he, “the lawful heir, We two will wed to-morrow morn, And you shall still be Lady Clare.”

The Lord of Burleigh

Written, as we learn from Life, i., 182, by 1835. First published in 1842. No alteration since with the exception of “tho’” for “though”.

This poem tells the well-known story of Sarah Hoggins who married under the circumstances related in the poem. She died in January, 1797, sinking, so it was said, but without any authority for such a statement, under the burden of an honour “unto which she was not born”. The story is that Henry Cecil, heir presumptive to his uncle, the ninth Earl of Exeter, was staying at Bolas, a rural village in Shropshire, where he met Sarah Hoggins and married her. They lived together at Bolas, where the two eldest of his children were born, for two years before he came into the title. She bore him two other children after she was Countess of Exeter, dying at Burleigh House near Stamford at the early age of twenty-four. The obituary notice runs thus: “January, 1797. At Burleigh House near Stamford, aged twenty-four, to the inexpressible surprise and concern of all acquainted with her, the Right Honbl. Countess of Exeter.” For full information about this romantic incident see Walford’s Tales of Great Families, first series, vol. i., 65-82, and two interesting papers signed W. O. Woodall in Notes and Queries, seventh series, vol. xii., 221-23; ibid., 281-84, and Napier’s Homes and Haunts of Tennyson, 104-111.

In her ear he whispers gaily, “If my heart by signs can tell, Maiden, I have watch’d thee daily, And I think thou lov’st me well”. She replies, in accents fainter, “There is none I love like thee”. He is but a landscape-painter, And a village maiden she. He to lips, that fondly falter, Presses his without reproof: Leads her to the village altar, And they leave her father’s roof. “I can make no marriage present; Little can I give my wife. Love will make our cottage pleasant, And I love thee more than life.” They by parks and lodges going See the lordly castles stand: Summer woods, about them blowing, Made a murmur in the land. From deep thought himself he rouses, Says to her that loves him well, “Let us see these handsome houses Where the wealthy nobles dwell”. So she goes by him attended, Hears him lovingly converse, Sees whatever fair and splendid Lay betwixt his home and hers; Parks with oak and chestnut shady, Parks and order’d gardens great, Ancient homes of lord and lady, Built for pleasure and for state. All he shows her makes him dearer: Evermore she seems to gaze On that cottage growing nearer, Where they twain will spend their days. O but she will love him truly! He shall have a cheerful home; She will order all things duly, When beneath his roof they come. Thus her heart rejoices greatly, Till a gateway she discerns With armorial bearings stately, And beneath the gate she turns; Sees a mansion more majestic Than all those she saw before: Many a gallant gay domestic Bows before him at the door. And they speak in gentle murmur, When they answer to his call, While he treads with footstep firmer, Leading on from hall to hall. And, while now she wonders blindly, Nor the meaning can divine, Proudly turns he round and kindly, “All of this is mine and thine”. Here he lives in state and bounty, Lord of Burleigh, fair and free, Not a lord in all the county Is so great a lord as he. All at once the colour flushes Her sweet face from brow to chin: As it were with shame she blushes, And her spirit changed within. Then her countenance all over Pale again as death did prove: But he clasp’d her like a lover, And he cheer’d her soul with love. So she strove against her weakness, Tho’ at times her spirits sank: Shaped her heart with woman’s meekness To all duties of her rank: And a gentle consort made he, And her gentle mind was such That she grew a noble lady, And the people loved her much. But a trouble weigh’d upon her, And perplex’d her, night and morn, With the burthen of an honour Unto which she was not born. Faint she grew, and ever fainter, As she murmur’d “Oh, that he Were once more that landscape-painter Which did win my heart from me!” So she droop’d and droop’d before him, Fading slowly from his side: Three fair children first she bore him, Then before her time she died. Weeping, weeping late and early, Walking up and pacing down, Deeply mourn’d the Lord of Burleigh, Burleigh-house by Stamford-town. And he came to look upon her, And he look’d at her and said, “Bring the dress and put it on her, That she wore when she was wed”. Then her people, softly treading, Bore to earth her body, drest In the dress that she was wed in, That her spirit might have rest.

Sir Launcelot and Queen Guinevere

a fragment

First published in 1842. Not altered since 1853.

See for what may have given the hint for this fragment Morte D’Arthur, bk. xix., ch. i., and bk. xx., ch. i., and cf. Coming of Arthur:—

Like souls that balance joy and pain, With tears and smiles from heaven again The maiden Spring upon the plain Came in a sun-lit fall of rain. In crystal vapour everywhere Blue isles of heaven laugh’d between, And, far in forest-deeps unseen, The topmost elm-tree^[1] gather’d green From draughts of balmy air. Sometimes the linnet piped his song: Sometimes the throstle whistled strong: Sometimes the sparhawk, wheel’d along, Hush’d all the groves from fear of wrong: By grassy capes with fuller sound In curves the yellowing river ran, And drooping chestnut-buds began To spread into the perfect fan, Above the teeming ground. Then, in the boyhood of the year, Sir Launcelot and Queen Guinevere Rode thro’ the coverts of the deer, With blissful treble ringing clear. She seem’d a part of joyous Spring: A gown of grass-green silk she wore, Buckled with golden clasps before; A light-green tuft of plumes she bore Closed in a golden ring. Now on some twisted ivy-net, Now by some tinkling rivulet, In mosses mixt^[2] with violet Her cream-white mule his pastern set: And fleeter now^[3] she skimm’d the plains Than she whose elfin prancer springs By night to eery warblings, When all the glimmering moorland rings With jingling bridle-reins. As she fled fast thro’ sun and shade, The happy winds upon her play’d, Blowing the ringlet from the braid: She look’d so lovely, as she sway’d The rein with dainty finger-tips, A man had given all other bliss, And all his worldly worth for this, To waste his whole heart in one kiss Upon her perfect lips.

A Farewell

First published in 1842. Not altered since 1843.

This poem was dedicated to the brook at Somersby described in the Ode to Memory and referred to so often in In Memoriam. Possibly it may have been written in 1837 when the Tennysons left Somersby. Cf. In Memoriam, sect. ci.

Flow down, cold rivulet, to the sea, Thy tribute wave deliver: No more by thee my steps shall be, For ever and for ever. Flow, softly flow, by lawn and lea, A rivulet then a river: No where by thee my steps shall be, For ever and for ever. But here will sigh thine alder tree, And here thine aspen shiver; And here by thee will hum the bee, For ever and for ever. A thousand suns^[1] will stream on thee, A thousand moons will quiver; But not by thee my steps shall be, For ever and for ever.

The Beggar Maid

First published in 1842, not altered since.

Suggested probably by the fine ballad in Percy’s Reliques, first series, book ii., ballad vi.

Her arms across her breast she laid; She was more fair than words can say: Bare-footed came the beggar maid Before the king Cophetua. In robe and crown the king stept down, To meet and greet her on her way; “It is no wonder,” said the lords, “She is more beautiful than day”. As shines the moon in clouded skies, She in her poor attire was seen: One praised her ancles, one her eyes, One her dark hair and lovesome mien: So sweet a face, such angel grace, In all that land had never been: Cophetua sware a royal oath: “This beggar maid shall be my queen!”

The Vision of Sin

First published in 1842. No alteration made in it after 1851, except in the insertion of a couplet afterwards omitted.

This remarkable poem may be regarded as a sort of companion poem to The Palace of Art; the one traces the effect of callous indulgence in mere intellectual and æsthetic pleasures, the other of profligate indulgence in the grosser forms of sensual enjoyment. At first all is ecstasy and intoxication, then comes satiety, and all that satiety brings in its train, cynicism, pessimism, the drying up of the very springs of life. “The body chilled, jaded and ruined, the cup of pleasure drained to the dregs, the senses exhausted of their power to enjoy, the spirit of its wish to aspire, nothing left but loathing, craving and rottenness.” See Spedding in Edinburgh Review for April, 1843. The poem concludes by leaving as an answer to the awful question, “can there be final salvation for the poor wretch?” a reply undecipherable by man, and dawn breaking in angry splendour. The best commentary on the poem would be Byron’s lyric: “There’s not a joy the world can give like that it takes away,” and Don Juan, biography and daily life are indeed full of comments on the truth of this fine allegory.

1

I had a vision when the night was late: A youth came riding toward a palace-gate. He rode a horse with wings, that would have flown,^[1] But that his heavy rider kept him down. And from the palace came a child of sin, And took him by the curls, and led him in, Where sat a company with heated eyes, Expecting when a fountain should arise: A sleepy light upon their brows and lips— As when the sun, a crescent of eclipse, Dreams over lake and lawn, and isles and capes— Suffused them, sitting, lying, languid shapes, By heaps of gourds, and skins of wine, and piles of grapes.

2

Then methought I heard a mellow sound, Gathering up from all the lower ground;^[2] Narrowing in to where they sat assembled Low voluptuous music winding trembled, Wov’n in circles: they that heard it sigh’d, Panted hand in hand with faces pale, Swung themselves, and in low tones replied; Till the fountain spouted, showering wide Sleet of diamond-drift and pearly hail; Then the music touch’d the gates and died; Rose again from where it seem’d to fail, Storm’d in orbs of song, a growing gale; Till thronging in and in, to where they waited, As ’twere a hundred-throated nightingale, The strong tempestuous treble throbb’d and palpitated; Ran into its giddiest whirl of sound, Caught the sparkles, and in circles, Purple gauzes, golden hazes, liquid mazes, Flung the torrent rainbow round: Then they started from their places, Moved with violence, changed in hue, Caught each other with wild grimaces, Half-invisible to the view, Wheeling with precipitate paces To the melody, till they flew, Hair, and eyes, and limbs, and faces, Twisted hard in fierce embraces, Like to Furies, like to Graces, Dash’d together in blinding dew: Till, kill’d with some luxurious agony, The nerve-dissolving melody Flutter’d headlong from the sky.

3

And then I look’d up toward a mountain-tract, That girt the region with high cliff and lawn: I saw that every morning, far withdrawn Beyond the darkness and the cataract, God made himself an awful rose of dawn,^[3] Unheeded: and detaching, fold by fold, From those still heights, and, slowly drawing near, A vapour heavy, hueless, formless, cold, Came floating on for many a month and year, Unheeded: and I thought I would have spoken, And warn’d that madman ere it grew too late: But, as in dreams, I could not. Mine was broken, When that cold vapour touch’d the palace-gate, And link’d again. I saw within my head A gray and gap-tooth’d man as lean as death, Who slowly rode across a wither’d heath, And lighted at a ruin’d inn, and said:

4

“Wrinkled ostler, grim and thin! Here is custom come your way; Take my brute, and lead him in, Stuff his ribs with mouldy hay. “Bitter barmaid, waning fast! See that sheets are on my bed; What! the flower of life is past: It is long before you wed. “Slip-shod waiter, lank and sour, At the Dragon on the heath! Let us have a quiet hour, Let us hob-and-nob with Death. “I am old, but let me drink; Bring me spices, bring me wine; I remember, when I think, That my youth was half divine. “Wine is good for shrivell’d lips, When a blanket wraps the day, When the rotten woodland drips, And the leaf is stamp’d in clay. “Sit thee down, and have no shame, Cheek by jowl, and knee by knee: What care I for any name? What for order or degree? “Let me screw thee up a peg: Let me loose thy tongue with wine: Callest thou that thing a leg? Which is thinnest? thine or mine? “Thou shalt not be saved by works: Thou hast been a sinner too: Ruin’d trunks on wither’d forks, Empty scarecrows, I and you! “Fill the cup, and fill the can: Have a rouse before the morn: Every moment dies a man, Every moment one is born.^[4] “We are men of ruin’d blood; Therefore comes it we are wise. Fish are we that love the mud. Rising to no fancy-flies. “Name and fame! to fly sublime Thro’ the courts, the camps, the schools, Is to be the ball of Time, Bandied by the hands of fools. “Friendship!—to be two in one— Let the canting liar pack! Well I know, when I am gone, How she mouths behind my back. “Virtue!—to be good and just— Every heart, when sifted well, Is a clot of warmer dust, Mix’d with cunning sparks of hell. “O! we two as well can look Whited thought and cleanly life As the priest, above his book Leering at his neighbour’s wife. “Fill the cup, and fill the can: Have a rouse before the morn: Every moment dies a man, Every moment one is born.^[4] “Drink, and let the parties rave: They are fill’d with idle spleen; Rising, falling, like a wave, For they know not what they mean. “He that roars for liberty Faster binds a tyrant’s^[5] power; And the tyrant’s cruel glee Forces on the freer hour. “Fill the can, and fill the cup: All the windy ways of men Are but dust that rises up, And is lightly laid again. “Greet her with applausive breath, Freedom, gaily doth she tread; In her right a civic wreath, In her left a human head. “No, I love not what is new; She is of an ancient house: And I think we know the hue Of that cap upon her brows. “Let her go! her thirst she slakes Where the bloody conduit runs: Then her sweetest meal she makes On the first-born of her sons. “Drink to lofty hopes that cool— Visions of a perfect State: Drink we, last, the public fool, Frantic love and frantic hate. “Chant me now some wicked stave, Till thy drooping courage rise, And the glow-worm of the grave Glimmer in thy rheumy eyes. “Fear not thou to loose thy tongue; Set thy hoary fancies free; What is loathsome to the young Savours well to thee and me. “Change, reverting to the years, When thy nerves could understand What there is in loving tears, And the warmth of hand in hand. “Tell me tales of thy first love— April hopes, the fools of chance; Till the graves begin to move, And the dead begin to dance. “Fill the can, and fill the cup: All the windy ways of men Are but dust that rises up, And is lightly laid again. “Trooping from their mouldy dens The chap-fallen circle spreads: Welcome, fellow-citizens, Hollow hearts and empty heads! “You are bones, and what of that? Every face, however full, Padded round with flesh and fat, Is but modell’d on a skull. “Death is king, and Vivat Rex! Tread a measure on the stones, Madam—if I know your sex, From the fashion of your bones. “No, I cannot praise the fire In your eye—nor yet your lip: All the more do I admire Joints of cunning workmanship. “Lo! God’s likeness—the ground-plan— Neither modell’d, glazed, or framed: Buss me thou rough sketch of man, Far too naked to be shamed! “Drink to Fortune, drink to Chance, While we keep a little breath! Drink to heavy Ignorance! Hob-and-nob with brother Death! “Thou art mazed, the night is long, And the longer night is near: What! I am not all as wrong As a bitter jest is dear. “Youthful hopes, by scores, to all, When the locks are crisp and curl’d; Unto me my maudlin gall And my mockeries of the world. “Fill the cup, and fill the can! Mingle madness, mingle scorn! Dregs of life, and lees of man: Yet we will not die forlorn.”

5

The voice grew faint: there came a further change: Once more uprose the mystic mountain-range: Below were men and horses pierced with worms, And slowly quickening into lower forms; By shards and scurf of salt, and scum of dross, Old plash of rains, and refuse patch’d with moss, Then some one spake^[6]: “Behold! it was a crime Of sense avenged by sense that wore with time”. ^[7]Another said: “The crime of sense became The crime of malice, and is equal blame”. And one: “He had not wholly quench’d his power; A little grain of conscience made him sour”. At last I heard a voice upon the slope Cry to the summit, “Is there any hope?” To which an answer peal’d from that high land. But in a tongue no man could understand; And on the glimmering limit far withdrawn God made Himself an awful rose of dawn.^[8]

Come not, when I am dead...

First published in The Keepsake for 1851.

Come not, when I am dead, To drop thy foolish tears upon my grave, To trample round my fallen head, And vex the unhappy dust thou wouldst not save. There let the wind sweep and the plover cry; But thou, go by.^[1] Child, if it were thine error or thy crime I care no longer, being all unblest: Wed whom thou wilt, but I am sick of Time,^[2] And I desire to rest. Pass on, weak heart, and leave me where I lie: Go by, go by.

The Eagle

(fragment)

First published in 1851. It has not been altered.

He clasps the crag with hooked hands; Close to the sun in lonely lands, Ring’d with the azure world, he stands. The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;^[1] He watches from his mountain walls, And like a thunderbolt he falls.

Move eastward, happy earth...

First published in 1842.

Move eastward, happy earth, and leave Yon orange sunset waning slow: From fringes of the faded eve, O, happy planet, eastward go; Till over thy dark shoulder glow Thy silver sister-world, and rise To glass herself in dewy eyes That watch me from the glen below. Ah, bear me with thee, smoothly^[1] borne, Dip forward under starry light, And move me to my marriage-morn, And round again to happy night.

Break, break, break...

First published in 1842. No alteration.

This exquisite poem was composed in a very different scene from that to which it refers, namely in “a Lincolnshire lane at five o’clock in the morning between blossoming hedges”. See Life of Tennyson, vol. i., p. 223.

Break, break, break, On thy cold gray stones, O Sea! And I would that my tongue could utter The thoughts that arise in me. O well for the fisherman’s boy, That he shouts with his sister at play! O well for the sailor lad, That he sings in his boat on the bay! And the stately ships go on To their haven under the hill; But O for the touch of a vanish’d hand, And the sound of a voice that is still! Break, break, break, At the foot of thy crags, O Sea! But the tender grace of a day that is dead Will never come back to me.

The Poet’s Song

First published in 1842.

The rain had fallen, the Poet arose, He pass’d by the town and out of the street, A light wind blew from the gates of the sun, And waves of shadow went over the wheat, And he sat him down in a lonely place, And chanted a melody loud and sweet, That made the wild-swan pause in her cloud, And the lark drop down at his feet. The swallow stopt as he hunted the bee,^[1] The snake slipt under a spray, The wild hawk stood with the down on his beak, And stared, with his foot on the prey, And the nightingale thought, “I have sung many songs, But never a one so gay, For he sings of what the world will be When the years have died away”.

Appendix

The Poems published in MDCCCXXX and in MDCCCXXXIII which were temporarily or finally suppressed.

Poems published in MDCCCXXX

Elegiacs

Reprinted in Collected Works among Juvenilia, with title altered to Leonine Elegiacs. The only alterations made in the text were “wood-dove” for “turtle,” and the substitution of “or” for “and” in the last line but one.

Lowflowing breezes are roaming the broad valley dimm’d in the gloaming: Thoro’ the black-stemm’d pines only the far river shines. Creeping thro’ blossomy rushes and bowers of rose-blowing bushes, Down by the poplar tall rivulets babble and fall. Barketh the shepherd-dog cheerily; the grasshopper carolleth clearly; Deeply the turtle coos; shrilly the owlet halloos; Winds creep; dews fell chilly: in her first sleep earth breathes stilly: Over the pools in the burn watergnats murmur and mourn. Sadly the far kine loweth: the glimmering water outfloweth: Twin peaks shadow’d with pine slope to the dark hyaline. Lowthroned Hesper is stayed between the two peaks; but the Naiad Throbbing in mild unrest holds him beneath in her breast. The ancient poetess singeth, that Hesperus all things bringeth, Smoothing the wearied mind: bring me my love, Rosalind. Thou comest morning and even; she cometh not morning or even. False-eyed Hesper, unkind, where is my sweet Rosalind?

The “How” and the “Why”

I am any man’s suitor, If any will be my tutor: Some say this life is pleasant, Some think it speedeth fast: In time there is no present, In eternity no future, In eternity no past. We laugh, we cry, we are born, we die, Who will riddle me the how and the why? The bulrush nods unto its brother, The wheatears whisper to each other: What is it they say? What do they there? Why two and two make four? Why round is not square? Why the rocks stand still, and the light clouds fly? Why the heavy oak groans, and the white willows sigh? Why deep is not high, and high is not deep? Whether we wake, or whether we sleep? Whether we sleep, or whether we die? How you are you? Why I am I? Who will riddle me the how and the why? The world is somewhat; it goes on somehow; But what is the meaning of then and now? I feel there is something; but how and what? I know there is somewhat; but what and why? I cannot tell if that somewhat be I. The little bird pipeth, “why? why?” In the summerwoods when the sun falls low And the great bird sits on the opposite bough, And stares in his face and shouts, “how? how?” And the black owl scuds down the mellow twilight, And chaunts, “how? how?” the whole of the night. Why the life goes when the blood is spilt? What the life is? where the soul may lie? Why a church is with a steeple built; And a house with a chimneypot? Who will riddle me the how and the what? Who will riddle me the what and the why?

Supposed Confessions...

of a second-rate sensitive mind not in unity with itself.

There has been only one important alteration made in this poem, when it was reprinted among the Juvenilia in 1871, and that was the suppression of the verses beginning “A grief not uninformed and dull” to “Indued with immortality” inclusive, and the substitution of “rosy” for “waxen”. Capitals are in all cases inserted in the reprint where the Deity is referred to, “through” is altered into “thro’” all through the poem, and hyphens are inserted in the double epithets. No further alterations were made in the edition of 1830.

Oh God! my God! have mercy now. I faint, I fall. Men say that thou Didst die for me, for such as me, Patient of ill, and death, and scorn, And that my sin was as a thorn Among the thorns that girt thy brow, Wounding thy soul.—That even now, In this extremest misery Of ignorance, I should require A sign! and if a bolt of fire Would rive the slumbrous summernoon While I do pray to thee alone, Think my belief would stronger grow! Is not my human pride brought low? The boastings of my spirit still? The joy I had in my freewill All cold, and dead, and corpse-like grown? And what is left to me, but thou, And faith in thee? Men pass me by; Christians with happy countenances— And children all seem full of thee! And women smile with saint-like glances Like thine own mother’s when she bow’d Above thee, on that happy morn When angels spake to men aloud, And thou and peace to earth were born. Goodwill to me as well as all— I one of them: my brothers they: Brothers in Christ—a world of peace And confidence, day after day; And trust and hope till things should cease, And then one Heaven receive us all. How sweet to have a common faith! To hold a common scorn of death! And at a burial to hear The creaking cords which wound and eat Into my human heart, whene’er Earth goes to earth, with grief, not fear, With hopeful grief, were passing sweet! A grief not uninformed, and dull Hearted with hope, of hope as full As is the blood with life, or night And a dark cloud with rich moonlight. To stand beside a grave, and see The red small atoms wherewith we Are built, and smile in calm, and say— “These little moles and graves shall be Clothed on with immortality More glorious than the noon of day— All that is pass’d into the flowers And into beasts and other men, And all the Norland whirlwind showers From open vaults, and all the sea O’er washes with sharp salts, again Shall fleet together all, and be Indued with immortality.” Thrice happy state again to be The trustful infant on the knee! Who lets his waxen fingers play About his mother’s neck, and knows Nothing beyond his mother’s eyes. They comfort him by night and day; They light his little life alway; He hath no thought of coming woes; He hath no care of life or death, Scarce outward signs of joy arise, Because the Spirit of happiness And perfect rest so inward is; And loveth so his innocent heart, Her temple and her place of birth, Where she would ever wish to dwell, Life of the fountain there, beneath Its salient springs, and far apart, Hating to wander out on earth, Or breathe into the hollow air, Whose dullness would make visible Her subtil, warm, and golden breath, Which mixing with the infant’s blood, Fullfills him with beatitude. Oh! sure it is a special care Of God, to fortify from doubt, To arm in proof, and guard about With triple-mailed trust, and clear Delight, the infant’s dawning year. Would that my gloomed fancy were As thine, my mother, when with brows Propped on thy knees, my hands upheld In thine, I listen’d to thy vows, For me outpour’d in holiest prayer— For me unworthy!—and beheld Thy mild deep eyes upraised, that knew The beauty and repose of faith, And the clear spirit shining through. Oh! wherefore do we grow awry From roots which strike so deep? why dare Paths in the desert? Could not I Bow myself down, where thou hast knelt, To th’ earth—until the ice would melt Here, and I feel as thou hast felt? What Devil had the heart to scathe Flowers thou hadst rear’d—to brush the dew From thine own lily, when thy grave Was deep, my mother, in the clay? Myself? Is it thus? Myself? Had I So little love for thee? But why Prevail’d not thy pure prayers? Why pray To one who heeds not, who can save But will not? Great in faith, and strong Against the grief of circumstance Wert thou, and yet unheard. What if Thou pleadest still, and seest me drive Thro’ utter dark a fullsailed skiff, Unpiloted i’ the echoing dance Of reboant whirlwinds, stooping low Unto the death, not sunk! I know At matins and at evensong, That thou, if thou were yet alive, In deep and daily prayers wouldst strive To reconcile me with thy God. Albeit, my hope is gray, and cold At heart, thou wouldest murmur still— “Bring this lamb back into thy fold, My Lord, if so it be thy will”. Wouldst tell me I must brook the rod, And chastisement of human pride; That pride, the sin of devils, stood Betwixt me and the light of God! That hitherto I had defied And had rejected God—that grace Would drop from his o’erbrimming love, As manna on my wilderness, If I would pray—that God would move And strike the hard hard rock, and thence, Sweet in their utmost bitterness, Would issue tears of penitence Which would keep green hope’s life. Alas! I think that pride hath now no place Nor sojourn in me. I am void, Dark, formless, utterly destroyed. Why not believe then? Why not yet Anchor thy frailty there, where man Hath moor’d and rested? Ask the sea At midnight, when the crisp slope waves After a tempest, rib and fret The broadimbasèd beach, why he Slumbers not like a mountain tarn? Wherefore his ridges are not curls And ripples of an inland mere? Wherefore he moaneth thus, nor can Draw down into his vexed pools All that blue heaven which hues and paves The other? I am too forlorn, Too shaken: my own weakness fools My judgment, and my spirit whirls, Moved from beneath with doubt and fear. “Yet” said I, in my morn of youth, The unsunned freshness of my strength, When I went forth in quest of truth, “It is man’s privilege to doubt, If so be that from doubt at length, Truth may stand forth unmoved of change, An image with profulgent brows, And perfect limbs, as from the storm Of running fires and fluid range Of lawless airs, at last stood out This excellence and solid form Of constant beauty. For the Ox Feeds in the herb, and sleeps, or fills The horned valleys all about, And hollows of the fringed hills In summerheats, with placid lows Unfearing, till his own blood flows About his hoof. And in the flocks The lamb rejoiceth in the year, And raceth freely with his fere, And answers to his mother’s calls From the flower’d furrow. In a time, Of which he wots not, run short pains Through his warm heart; and then, from whence He knows not, on his light there falls A shadow; and his native slope, Where he was wont to leap and climb, Floats from his sick and filmed eyes, And something in the darkness draws His forehead earthward, and he dies. Shall man live thus, in joy and hope As a young lamb, who cannot dream, Living, but that he shall live on? Shall we not look into the laws Of life and death, and things that seem, And things that be, and analyse Our double nature, and compare All creeds till we have found the one, If one there be?” Ay me! I fear All may not doubt, but everywhere Some must clasp Idols. Yet, my God, Whom call I Idol? Let thy dove Shadow me over, and my sins Be unremembered, and thy love Enlighten me. Oh teach me yet Somewhat before the heavy clod Weighs on me, and the busy fret Of that sharpheaded worm begins In the gross blackness underneath. O weary life! O weary death! O spirit and heart made desolate! O damnèd vacillating state!