No More Learning

SHOWING HOW THE VOW WAS KEPT.


I.

He dwelt alone, and sun and moon
Were witness that he made
Rejection of his humanness
Until they seemed to fade;
His face did so, for he did grow
Of his own soul afraid.


II.

The self-poised God may dwell alone
With inward glorying,
But God's chief angel waiteth for
A brother's voice, to sing;
And a lonely creature of sinful nature
It is an awful thing.


III.

An awful thing that feared itself;
While many years did roll,
A lonely man, a feeble man,
A part beneath the whole,
He bore by day, he bore by night
That pressure of God's infinite
Upon his finite soul.


IV.

The poet at his lattice sate,
And downward looked he.
Three Christians wended by to prayers,
With mute ones in their ee;
Each turned above a face of love
And called him to the far chapelle
With voice more tuneful than its bell:
But still they wended three.


V.

There journeyed by a bridal pomp,
A bridegroom and his dame;
He speaketh low for happiness,
She blusheth red for shame:
But never a tone of benison
From out the lattice came.


VI.

A little child with inward song,
No louder noise to dare,
Stood near the wall to see at play
The lizards green and rare--
Unblessed the while for his childish smile
Which cometh unaware.


PART THE FOURTH.
SHOWING HOW ROSALIND FARED BY THE KEEPING OF THE VOW.


I.

In death-sheets lieth Rosalind
As white and still as they;
And the old nurse that watched her bed
Rose up with "Well-a-day! "
And oped the casement to let in
The sun, and that sweet doubtful din
Which droppeth from the grass and bough
Sans wind and bird, none knoweth how--
To cheer her as she lay.


II.

The old nurse started when she saw
Her sudden look of woe:
But the quick wan tremblings round her mouth
In a meek smile did go,
And calm she said, "When I am dead,
Dear nurse it shall be so.


III.

"Till then, shut out those sights and sounds,
And pray God pardon me
That I without this pain no more
His blessed works can see!
And lean beside me, loving nurse,
That thou mayst hear, ere I am worse,
What thy last love should be. "


IV.

The loving nurse leant over her,
As white she lay beneath;
The old eyes searching, dim with life,
The young ones dim with death,
To read their look if sound forsook
The trying, trembling breath.


V.

"When all this feeble breath is done,
And I on bier am laid,
My tresses smoothed for never a feast,
My body in shroud arrayed,
Uplift each palm in a saintly calm,
As if that still I prayed.


VI.

"And heap beneath mine head the flowers
You stoop so low to pull,
The little white flowers from the wood
Which grow there in the cool,
Which _he_ and I, in childhood's games,
Went plucking, knowing not their names,
And filled thine apron full.


VII.