No More Learning

VII.

Yet who complains? My heart and I?
In this abundant earth no doubt
Is little room for things worn out:
Disdain them, break them, throw them by!
And if before the days grew rough
We _once_ were loved, used,--well enough,
I think, we've fared, my heart and I.




THE BEST THING IN THE WORLD.


What's the best thing in the world?
June-rose, by May-dew impearled;
Sweet south-wind, that means no rain;
Truth, not cruel to a friend;
Pleasure, not in haste to end;
Beauty, not self-decked and curled
Till its pride is over-plain;
Light, that never makes you wink;
Memory, that gives no pain;
Love, when, _so_, you're loved again.
What's the best thing in the world?
--Something out of it, I think.




WHERE'S AGNES?


I.

Nay, if I had come back so,
And found her dead in her grave,
And if a friend I know
Had said, "Be strong, nor rave:
She lies there, dead below:

II.

"I saw her, I who speak,
White, stiff, the face one blank:
The blue shade came to her cheek
Before they nailed the plank,
For she had been dead a week. "

III.
Why, if he had spoken so,
I might have believed the thing,
Although her look, although
Her step, laugh, voice's ring
Lived in me still as they do.

IV.

But dead that other way,
Corrupted thus and lost?
That sort of worm in the clay?
I cannot count the cost,
That I should rise and pay.

V.

My Agnes false? such shame?
She? Rather be it said
That the pure saint of her name
Has stood there in her stead,
And tricked you to this blame.

VI.

Her very gown, her cloak
Fell chastely: no disguise,
But expression! while she broke
With her clear grey morning-eyes
Full upon me and then spoke.

VII.

She wore her hair away
From her forehead,--like a cloud
Which a little wind in May
Peels off finely: disallowed
Though bright enough to stay.

VIII.