No More Learning

Beating heart and burning brow, ye are very patient now--
_Toll slowly. _
And the children might be bold to pluck the kingcups from your mould
Ere a month had let them grow.

VIII.

And you let the goldfinch sing in the alder near in spring--
_Toll slowly. _
Let her build her nest and sit all the three weeks out on it,
Murmuring not at anything.

IX.

In your patience ye are strong, cold and heat ye take not wrong--
_Toll slowly. _
When the trumpet of the angel blows eternity's evangel,
Time will seem to you not long.

X.

Oh, the little birds sang east, and the little birds sang west--
_Toll slowly. _
And I said in underbreath,--All our life is mixed with death,
And who knoweth which is best?

XI.

Oh, the little birds sang east, and the little birds sang west--
_Toll slowly. _
And I smiled to think God's greatness flowed around our
incompleteness,--
Round our restlessness, His rest.




_THE ROMANCE OF THE SWAN'S NEST.
_

So the dreams depart,
So the fading phantoms flee,
And the sharp reality
Now must act its part.

WESTWOOD'S _Beads from a Rosary_


I.

Little Ellie sits alone
'Mid the beeches of a meadow,
By a stream-side on the grass,
And the trees are showering down
Doubles of their leaves in shadow
On her shining hair and face.

II.

She has thrown her bonnet by,
And her feet she has been dipping
In the shallow water's flow:
Now she holds them nakedly
In her hands, all sleek and dripping,
While she rocketh to and fro.

III.

Little Ellie sits alone,
And the smile she softly uses
Fills the silence like a speech
While she thinks what shall be done,
And the sweetest pleasure chooses
For her future within reach.

IV.

Little Ellie in her smile
Chooses--"I will have a lover
Riding on a steed of steeds:
He shall love me without guile,
And to _him_ I will discover
The swan's nest among the reeds.

V.

"And the steed shall be red-roan,
And the lover shall be noble,
With an eye that takes the breath:
And the lute he plays upon
Shall strike ladies into trouble,
As his sword strikes men to death.

VI.

"And the steed it shall be shod
All in silver, housed in azure,
And the mane shall swim the wind;
And the hoofs along the sod
Shall flash onward and keep measure,
Till the shepherds look behind.

VII.

"But my lover will not prize
All the glory that he rides in,
When he gazes in my face:
He will say, 'O Love, thine eyes
Build the shrine my soul abides in,
And I kneel here for thy grace! '

VIII.