No More Learning

I heard the songs of Paradise:
Each bird sat singing in his place; 10
A tender song so full of grace
It soared like incense to the skies.
Each bird sat singing to his mate
Soft cooing notes among the trees:
The nightingale herself were cold
To such as these.

I saw the fourfold River flow,
And deep it was, with golden sand;
It flowed between a mossy land
With murmured music grave and low. 20
It hath refreshment for all thirst,
For fainting spirits strength and rest:
Earth holds not such a draught as this
From east to west.

The Tree of Life stood budding there,
Abundant with its twelvefold fruits;
Eternal sap sustains its roots,
Its shadowing branches fill the air.
Its leaves are healing for the world,
Its fruit the hungry world can feed, 30
Sweeter than honey to the taste
And balm indeed.

I saw the gate called Beautiful;
And looked, but scarce could look, within;
I saw the golden streets begin,
And outskirts of the glassy pool.
Oh harps, oh crowns of plenteous stars,
Oh green palm-branches many-leaved--
Eye hath not seen, nor ear hath heard,
Nor heart conceived. 40

I hope to see these things again,
But not as once in dreams by night;
To see them with my very sight,
And touch, and handle, and attain:
To have all Heaven beneath my feet
For narrow way that once they trod;
To have my part with all the saints,
And with my God.




WITHIN THE VEIL

(_Lyra Eucharistica_, second edition, 1865. )


She holds a lily in her hand,
Where long ranks of Angels stand,
A silver lily for her wand.

All her hair falls sweeping down;
Her hair that is a golden brown,
A crown beneath her golden crown.

Blooms a rose-bush at her knee,
Good to smell and good to see:
It bears a rose for her, for me;

Her rose a blossom richly grown, 10
My rose a bud not fully blown,
But sure one day to be mine own.




PARADISE: IN A SYMBOL

(_Lyra Eucharistica_, second edition, 1865. )


Golden-winged, silver-winged,
Winged with flashing flame,
Such a flight of birds I saw,
Birds without a name:
Singing songs in their own tongue
(Song of songs) they came.
One to another calling,
Each answering each,
One to another calling
In their proper speech: 10
High above my head they wheeled,
Far out of reach.

On wings of flame they went and came
With a cadenced clang,
Their silver wings tinkled,
Their golden wings rang,
The wind it whistled through their wings
Where in Heaven they sang.

They flashed and they darted
Awhile before mine eyes, 20
Mounting, mounting, mounting still
In haste to scale the skies--
Birds without a nest on earth,
Birds of Paradise.

Where the moon riseth not,
Nor sun seeks the west,
There to sing their glory
Which they sing at rest,
There to sing their love-song
When they sing their best: 30

Not in any garden
That mortal foot hath trod,
Not in any flowering tree
That springs from earthly sod,
But in the garden where they dwell,
The Paradise of God.




AMOR MUNDI

(_The Shilling Magazine_, 1865. )


'Oh, where are you going with your love-locks flowing
On the west wind blowing along this valley track? '
'The downhill path is easy, come with me an' it please ye,
We shall escape the uphill by never turning back. '

So they two went together in glowing August weather,
The honey-breathing heather lay to their left and right;
And dear she was to doat on, her swift feet seemed to float on
The air like soft twin pigeons too sportive to alight.

'Oh, what is that in heaven where grey cloud-flakes are seven,
Where blackest clouds hang riven just at the rainy skirt? ' 10
'Oh, that's a meteor sent us, a message dumb, portentous,--
An undeciphered solemn signal of help or hurt. '

'Oh, what is that glides quickly where velvet flowers grow thickly,
Their scent comes rich and sickly? '--'A scaled and hooded worm. '
'Oh, what's that in the hollow, so pale I quake to follow? '
'Oh, that's a thin dead body which waits th' eternal term. '

'Turn again, O my sweetest,--turn again, false and fleetest:
This way whereof thou weetest I fear is hell's own track. '
'Nay, too steep for hill-mounting,--nay, too late for cost-counting:
This downhill path is easy, but there's no turning back.