For though we never spoke
Of the grey water and the shaded rock,
Dark wave and stone unconsciously were fused
Into the plaintive speaking that we used
Of absent friends and memories unforsook;
And, had we seen each other's face, we had
Seen haply each was sad.
Of the grey water and the shaded rock,
Dark wave and stone unconsciously were fused
Into the plaintive speaking that we used
Of absent friends and memories unforsook;
And, had we seen each other's face, we had
Seen haply each was sad.
Elizabeth Browning
_
A sad man on a summer day
Did look upon the earth and say--
"Purple cloud the hill-top binding;
Folded hills the valleys wind in;
Valleys with fresh streams among you;
Streams with bosky trees along you;
Trees with many birds and blossoms;
Birds with music-trembling bosoms;
Blossoms dropping dews that wreathe you
To your fellow flowers beneath you;
Flowers that constellate on earth;
Earth that shakest to the mirth
Of the merry Titan Ocean,
All his shining hair in motion!
Why am I thus the only one
Who can be dark beneath the sun? "
But when the summer day was past,
He looked to heaven and smiled at last,
Self-answered so--
"Because, O cloud,
Pressing with thy crumpled shroud
Heavily on mountain top,--
Hills that almost seem to drop
Stricken with a misty death
To the valleys underneath,--
Valleys sighing with the torrent,--
Waters streaked with branches horrent,--
Branchless trees that shake your head
Wildly o'er your blossoms spread
Where the common flowers are found,--
Flowers with foreheads to the ground,--
Ground that shriekest while the sea
With his iron smiteth thee--
I am, besides, the only one
Who can be bright _without_ the sun. "
_A SEA-SIDE WALK. _
I.
We walked beside the sea
After a day which perished silently
Of its own glory--like the princess weird
Who, combating the Genius, scorched and seared,
Uttered with burning breath, "Ho! victory! "
And sank adown, a heap of ashes pale:
So runs the Arab tale.
II.
The sky above us showed
A universal and unmoving cloud
On which the cliffs permitted us to see
Only the outline of their majesty,
As master-minds when gazed at by the crowd:
And shining with a gloom, the water grey
Swang in its moon-taught way.
III.
Nor moon, nor stars were out;
They did not dare to tread so soon about,
Though trembling, in the footsteps of the sun:
The light was neither night's nor day's, but one
Which, life-like, had a beauty in its doubt,
And silence's impassioned breathings round
Seemed wandering into sound.
IV.
O solemn-beating heart
Of nature! I have knowledge that thou art
Bound unto man's by cords he cannot sever;
And, what time they are slackened by him ever,
So to attest his own supernal part,
Still runneth thy vibration fast and strong
The slackened cord along:
V.
For though we never spoke
Of the grey water and the shaded rock,
Dark wave and stone unconsciously were fused
Into the plaintive speaking that we used
Of absent friends and memories unforsook;
And, had we seen each other's face, we had
Seen haply each was sad.
_THE SEA-MEW. _
AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED TO M. E. H.
I.
How joyously the young sea-mew
Lay dreaming on the waters blue
Whereon our little bark had thrown
A little shade, the only one,
But shadows ever man pursue.
II.
Familiar with the waves and free
As if their own white foam were he,
His heart upon the heart of ocean
Lay learning all its mystic motion,
And throbbing to the throbbing sea.
III.
And such a brightness in his eye
As if the ocean and the sky
Within him had lit up and nurst
A soul God gave him not at first,
To comprehend their majesty.
IV.
We were not cruel, yet did sunder
His white wing from the blue waves under,
And bound it, while his fearless eyes
Shone up to ours in calm surprise,
As deeming us some ocean wonder.
V.
We bore our ocean bird unto
A grassy place where he might view
The flowers that curtsey to the bees,
The waving of the tall green trees,
The falling of the silver dew.
VI.
A sad man on a summer day
Did look upon the earth and say--
"Purple cloud the hill-top binding;
Folded hills the valleys wind in;
Valleys with fresh streams among you;
Streams with bosky trees along you;
Trees with many birds and blossoms;
Birds with music-trembling bosoms;
Blossoms dropping dews that wreathe you
To your fellow flowers beneath you;
Flowers that constellate on earth;
Earth that shakest to the mirth
Of the merry Titan Ocean,
All his shining hair in motion!
Why am I thus the only one
Who can be dark beneath the sun? "
But when the summer day was past,
He looked to heaven and smiled at last,
Self-answered so--
"Because, O cloud,
Pressing with thy crumpled shroud
Heavily on mountain top,--
Hills that almost seem to drop
Stricken with a misty death
To the valleys underneath,--
Valleys sighing with the torrent,--
Waters streaked with branches horrent,--
Branchless trees that shake your head
Wildly o'er your blossoms spread
Where the common flowers are found,--
Flowers with foreheads to the ground,--
Ground that shriekest while the sea
With his iron smiteth thee--
I am, besides, the only one
Who can be bright _without_ the sun. "
_A SEA-SIDE WALK. _
I.
We walked beside the sea
After a day which perished silently
Of its own glory--like the princess weird
Who, combating the Genius, scorched and seared,
Uttered with burning breath, "Ho! victory! "
And sank adown, a heap of ashes pale:
So runs the Arab tale.
II.
The sky above us showed
A universal and unmoving cloud
On which the cliffs permitted us to see
Only the outline of their majesty,
As master-minds when gazed at by the crowd:
And shining with a gloom, the water grey
Swang in its moon-taught way.
III.
Nor moon, nor stars were out;
They did not dare to tread so soon about,
Though trembling, in the footsteps of the sun:
The light was neither night's nor day's, but one
Which, life-like, had a beauty in its doubt,
And silence's impassioned breathings round
Seemed wandering into sound.
IV.
O solemn-beating heart
Of nature! I have knowledge that thou art
Bound unto man's by cords he cannot sever;
And, what time they are slackened by him ever,
So to attest his own supernal part,
Still runneth thy vibration fast and strong
The slackened cord along:
V.
For though we never spoke
Of the grey water and the shaded rock,
Dark wave and stone unconsciously were fused
Into the plaintive speaking that we used
Of absent friends and memories unforsook;
And, had we seen each other's face, we had
Seen haply each was sad.
_THE SEA-MEW. _
AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED TO M. E. H.
I.
How joyously the young sea-mew
Lay dreaming on the waters blue
Whereon our little bark had thrown
A little shade, the only one,
But shadows ever man pursue.
II.
Familiar with the waves and free
As if their own white foam were he,
His heart upon the heart of ocean
Lay learning all its mystic motion,
And throbbing to the throbbing sea.
III.
And such a brightness in his eye
As if the ocean and the sky
Within him had lit up and nurst
A soul God gave him not at first,
To comprehend their majesty.
IV.
We were not cruel, yet did sunder
His white wing from the blue waves under,
And bound it, while his fearless eyes
Shone up to ours in calm surprise,
As deeming us some ocean wonder.
V.
We bore our ocean bird unto
A grassy place where he might view
The flowers that curtsey to the bees,
The waving of the tall green trees,
The falling of the silver dew.
VI.
