Pagina-afbeeldingen
PDF
ePub

Sae true his heart, sae smooth his speech,
His breath like caller air;
His very foot has music in 't
As he comes up the stair,
And will I see his face again?

And will I hear him speak?

I'm downright dizzy wi' the thought,
In troth I'm like to greet!

If Colin's weel, and weel content,
I hae nae mair to crave:
And gin I live to keep him sae
I'm blest aboon the lave:
And will I see his face again?

And will I hear him speak?
I'm downright dizzy wi' the thought,
In troth I'm like to greet.
For there's nae luck about the house,
There's nae luck at a';

There's little pleasure in the honse
When our gudeman 's awa'.

WILLIAM JAMES MICKLE.

[blocks in formation]

But while she missed from those sweet sounds
The voice she sighed to hear,

The song of bee and bird and stream
Was discord to her ear.

Nor could the bright green world around
A joy to her impart,

For still she missed the eyes that made
The summer of her heart.

ANNE C. LYNCH (MRS. BOTTA)

COME TO ME, DEAREST.

COME to me, dearest, I'm lonely without thee, Daytime and night-time, I'm thinking about thee;

Night-time and daytime, in dreams I behold thee;

Unwelcome the waking which ceases to fold thee. Come to me, darling, my sorrows to lighten, Come in thy beauty to bless and to brighten; Come in thy womanhood, meekly and lowly, Come in thy lovingness, queenly and holy.

Swallows will flit round the desolate ruin,
Telling of spring and its joyous renewing;
And thoughts of thy love, and its manifold treas-

ure,

Are circling my heart with a promise of pleasure. O Spring of my spirit, O May of my bosom, Shine out on my soul, till it bourgeon and blos

som;

The waste of my life has a rose-root within it, And thy fondness alone to the sunshine can win it.

Figure that moves like a song through the even;
Features lit up by a reflex of heaven;
Eyes like the skies of poor Erin, our mother,
Where shadow and sunshine are chasing each

other;

Smiles coming seldom, but childlike and simple,
Planting in each rosy cheek a sweet dimple;
O, thanks to the Saviour, that even thy seeming
Is left to the exile to brighten his dreaming.

You have been glad when you knew I was gladdened;

Dear, are you sad now to hear I am saddened? Our hearts ever answer in tune and in time, love,

As octave to octave, and rhyme unto rhyme,

love:

I cannot weep but your tears will be flowing, You cannot smile but my cheek will be glowing; I would not die without you at my side, love, You will not linger when I shall have died, love.

Come to me, dear, ere I die of my sorrow,
Rise on my gloom like the sun of to-morrow;
Strong, swift, and fond as the words which I
speak, love,

With a song on your lip and a smile on your cheek, love.

Come, for my heart in your absence is weary, Haste, for my spirit is sickened and dreary, Come to the arms which alone should caress thee, Come to the heart that is throbbing to press thee! JOSEPH BRENNAN.

[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]

'T is distance lends enchantment to the view, And robes the mountain in its azure hue.

[blocks in formation]

PRESENCE IN ABSENCE.

Our two souls, therefore, which are one,
Though I must go, endure not yet

A breach, but an expansion,
Like gold to airy thinness beat.
If they be two, they are two so
As stiff twin compasses are two;
Thy soul, the fixt foot, makes no show
To move, but doth if the other do.

And though it in the centre sit,
Yet when the other far doth roam,
It leans and hearkens after it,
And grows erect, as that comes home.
Such wilt thou be to me, who must,
Like the other foot, obliquely run.
Thy firmness makes my circle just,
And makes me end where I begun.

A Valediction forbidding Mourning.

DR. DONNE

DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT.

SONNET.

Young Jamie lo'ed me weel, and sought me for his bride;

WITH how sad steps, O Moon! thou climb'st the But saving a crown, he had naething else beside.

skies,

How silently, and with how wan a face!

What may it be, that even in heavenly place
That busy Aicher his sharp arrows tries?
Sure, if that long with love acquainted eyes
Can judge of love, thou feel'st a lover's case;
I read it in thy looks, thy languished grace
To me that feel the like thy state descries.
Then, even of fellowship, O Moon, tell me,
Is constant love deemed there but want of wit?
Are beauties there as proud as here they be?
Do they above love to be loved, and yet
Those lovers scorn whom that love doth possess?
Do they call virtue there ungratefulness?

SIR PHILIP SIDNEY.

THE BANKS O' DOON.

YE banks and braes o' bonnie Doon,
How can ye bloom sae fresh and fair?
How can ye chant, ye little birds,

And I sae weary, fu' o' care?

Thou 'lt break my heart, thou warbling bird,
That wantons through the flowering thorn;
Thou minds me o' departed joys,
Departed never to return.

Thou'lt break my heart, thou bonnie bird,

That sings beside thy mate; For sae I sat, and sae I sang, And wistna o' my fate.

Aft hae I roved by bonnie Doon,

To see the rose and woodbine twine;
And ilka bird sang o' its luve,
And, fondly, sae did I o' mine.
Wi' lightsome heart I pou'd a rose,
Fu' sweet upon its thorny tree;
And my fause luver stole my rose,
But ah! he left the thorn wi' me.

ROBERT BURNS.

AULD ROBIN GRAY.

To make the crown a pound, my Jamie gaed to

[blocks in formation]

WHEN the sheep are in the fauld, and the kye a' I gang like a ghaist, and I carena to spin ;

at hame,

When a' the weary world to sleep are gane,
The waes o' my heart fa' in showers frae my e'e,
While my gudeman lies sound by me.

I darena think o' Jamie, for that wad be a sin. But I will do my best a gude wife aye to be, For Auld Robin Gray, he is kind to me.

LADY ANNE BARNARD.

THE COURSE OF TRUE LOVE.

FROM "MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM," ACT I. SC. 1.

For aught that ever I could read,
Could ever hear by tale or history,

The course of true love never did run smooth:
But, either it was different in blood,
Or else misgraffed in respect of years;
Or else it stood upon the choice of friends;
Or, if there were a sympathy in choice,
War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it,
Making it momentary as a sound,
Swift as a shadow, short as any dream;
Brief as the lightning in the collied night,
That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth,
And ere a man hath power to say, Behold!
The jaws of darkness do devour it up:
So quick bright things come to confusion.

[blocks in formation]
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors]

They build a wall between us twain,
Which may not be thrown down again,
Alas! for 1, the long years through,
Have loved you better than you knew.

Your life's proud aim, your art's high truth,
Have kept the promise of your youth;
And while you won the crown, which now
Breaks into bloom upon your brow,
My soul cried strongly out to you
Across the ocean's yearning blue,
While, unremembered and afar,
I watched you, as I watch a star
Through darkness struggling into view,
And loved you better than you knew.

I used to dream in all these years
Of patient faith and silent tears,
That Love's strong hand would put aside
The barriers of place and pride,
Would reach the pathless darkness through,
And draw me softly up to you;

But that is past. If you should stray
Beside my grave, some future day,
Perchance the violets o'er my dust
Will half betray their buried trust,
And say, their blue eyes full of dew,
"She loved you better than you knew."

ELIZABETH AKERS ALLEN (Florence Percy).

LINDA TO HAFED.

FROM "THE FIRE-WORSHIPPERS.'

"How sweetly," said the trembling maid,
Of her own gentle voice afraid,
So long had they in silence stood,
Looking upon that moonlight flood,
"How sweetly does the moonbeam smile
To-night upon yon leafy isle!
Oft in my fancy's wanderings,
I've wished that little isle had wings,
And we, within its fairy bowers,

Were wafted off to seas unknown, Where not a pulse should beat but ours, And we might live, love, die alone! Far from the cruel and the cold,

Where the bright eyes of angels only Should come around us, to behold

A paradise so pure and lonely! Would this be world enough for thee?" Playful she turned, that he might see

The passing smile her cheek put on; But when she marked how mournfully

His eyes met hers, that smile was gone; And, bursting into heartfelt tears, "Yes, yes," she cried, "my hourly fears, My dreams, have boded all too right, We part forever part to-night!

I knew, I knew it could not last,

'T was bright, 't was heavenly, but 't is past! O, ever thus, from childhood's hour,

I've seen my fondest hopes decay; I never loved a tree or flower

But 't was the first to fade away.
I never nursed a dear gazelle,

To glad me with its soft black eye,
But when it came to know me well,
And love me, it was sure to die!
Now, too, the joy most like divine
Of all I ever dreamt or knew,
To see thee, hear thee, call thee mine,
O misery! must I lose that too?"

[blocks in formation]
« VorigeDoorgaan »