When at dawn she wakens, and her fair face gazes
Out on the weather through the window panes,
Beauteous she looks! like a white water lily

Bursting out of bud on the rippled river plains.
When from bed she rises clothed from neck to ankle
In her long nightgown, sweet as boughs of May,
Beauteous she looks! like a tall garden lily,

Pure from the night, and perfect for the day!

Happy, happy time, when the gray star twinkles
Over the fields all fresh with blooming dew;
When the cold-cheeked dawn grows ruddy up the twilight,
And the gold sun wakes and weds her in the blue.

Then when my darling tempts the early breezes,

She the only star that dies not with the dark! Powerless to speak all the ardour of my passion,

I catch her little hand as we listen to the lark.

Shall the birds in vain then valentine their sweethearts,
Season after season tell a fruitless tale?

Will not the virgin listen to their voices,

Take the honied meaning, wear the bridal veil? Fears she frosts of winter, fears she the bare branches? Waits she the garlands of spring for her dower?

Is she a nightingale that will not be nested

Till the April woodland has built her bridal bower?

Then come merry April with all thy birds and beauties! With thy crescent brows and thy flowery, showery glee; With thy budding leafage and fresh green pastures;

And may thy lustrous crescent grow a honeymoon for me! Come merry month of the cuckoo and the violet!

Come weeping Loveliness in all thy blue delight!

Lo! the nest is ready, let me not languish longer!
Bring her to my arms on the first May night.

456

THOMAS BUCHANAN READ.

1822.

["Poems." 153.]

A GLIMPSE OF LOVE.

SHE came as comes the summer wind,
A gust of beauty to my heart;
Then swept away, but left behind
Emotions which shall not depart.

Unheralded she came and went,

Like music in the silent night;

Which, when the burthened air is spent
Bequeaths to memory its delight.

Or, like the sudden April bow,

That spans the violet-waking rain:
She bade those blessed flowers to grow,
Which may not fall or fade again.

Far sweeter than all things most sweet,
And fairer than all things most fair,
She came and passed with footsteps fleet,
A shining wonder in the air!

MATTHEW ARNOLD.

["Poems." 1854.]

EXCUSE.

I Too have suffered yet I know She is not cold, though she seems so: She is not cold, she is not light;

But our ignoble souls lack might.

She smiles and smiles, and will not sigh,
While we for hopeless passion die;
Yet she could love, those eyes declare,
Were but men nobler than they are.

Eagerly once her gracious ken Was turned upon the sons of men. But light the serious visage grew;

She looked, and smiled, and saw them through.

Our petty souls, our struggling wits,

Our laboured puny passion-fits-
Ah! may she scorn them still, till we
Scorn them as bitterly as she!

Yet O, that Fate would let her see

One of some worthier race than we;
One for whose sake she once might prove
How deeply she who scorns can love.

His eyes be like the starry lights,
His voice like sounds of summer nights;
In all his lovely mien let pierce
The magic of the universe.

And she to him will reach her hand,
And gazing in his eyes will stand,
And know her friend, and weep for glee,
And cry-Long, long I've looked for thee.

Then she will weep-with smiles, till then, Coldly she marks the sons of men, Till then her lovely eyes maintain Their gay, unwavering, deep disdain.

ROBERT BULWER LYTTON.

"OWEN MEREDITH."

["Clytemnestra." 1854.]

SONG.

In the warm, black mill-pool winking,
The first doubtful star shines blue:

And alone here I lie thinking,

O such happy thoughts of you!

Up the porch the roses clamber,

And the flowers we sowed last June;

And the casement of your chamber

Shines between them to the moon.

Look out, love! fling wide your lattice:
Wind the red rose in your hair,

And the little white clematis

Which I plucked for you to wear:

Or come down, and let me hear you
Singing in the scented grass,
Through tall cowslips, nodding near you,
Just to touch you as you pass.

For, where you pass, the air

With warm hints of love grows wise: