To see no more the country half my own,
Nor hear the half familiar speech,
Amen, I say; I turn to that bleak North
Whence I came forth-

The South lies out of reach.

But when our swallows fly back to the South,
To the sweet South, to the sweet South,
The tears may come again into my eyes
On the old wise,

And the sweet name to my mouth.

C. G. Rossetti

CVIII

HOME-THOUGHTS, FROM ABROAD

Oh, to be in England

Now that April's there,

And whoever wakes in England

Sees, some morning, unaware,

That the lowest boughs and the brush-wood sheaf

Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,

While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough
In England-now!

And after April, when May follows,

And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!
Hark, where my blossom'd pear-tree in the hedge
Leans to the field and scatters on the clover
Blossoms and dewdrops-at the bent spray's edge—
That's the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!

And though the fields look rough with hoary dew,
All will be gay when noontide wakes anew
The buttercups, the little children's dower
-Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!

R. Browning

CIX

LOVE AMONG THE RUINS

Where the quiet-colour'd end of evening smiles
Miles and miles

On the solitary pastures where our sheep
Half-asleep

Tinkle homeward thro' the twilight, stray or stop
As they crop-

Was the site once of a city great and gay, (So they say)

Of our country's very capital, its prince

Ages since

Held his court in, gather'd councils, wielding far Peace or war.

Now the country does not even boast a tree,
As you see

To distinguish slopes of verdure, certain rills
From the hills

Intersect and give a rame to, (else they run
Into one)

Where the domed and daring palace shot its spires Up like fires

O'er the hundred-gated circuit of a wall

Bounding all,

Made of marble, men might march on nor be prest, Twelve abreast.

And such plenty and perfection, see, of grass
Never was!

Such a carpet as, this summer-time, o'erspreads
And embeds

Every vestige of the city, guess'd alone,
Stock or stone-

Where a multitude of men breathed joy and woe

Long ago;

Lust of glory prick'd their hearts up, dread of shame
Struck them tame;

And that glory and that shame alike, the gold
Bought and sold.

Now, the single little turret that remains
On the plains,

By the caper overrooted, by the gourd
Overscored,

While the patching houseleek's head of blossom winks
Through the chinks-

Marks the basement whence a tower in ancient time Sprang sublime,

And a burning ring, all round, the chariots traced As they raced,

And the monarch and his minions and his dames View'd the games.

And I know, while thus the quiet-colour'd eve
Smiles to leave

To their folding, all our many-tinkling fleece
In such peace,

And the slopes and rills in undistinguish'd gray
Melt away-

That a girl with eager eyes and yellow hair
Waits me there

In the turret whence the charioteers caught soul
For the goal,

When the king look'd, where she looks now, breathless, dumb

Till I come.

But he look'd upon the city, every side,
Far and wide,

All the mountains topp'd with temples, all the glades'
Colonnades,

All the causeys, bridges, aqueducts,—and then,

All the men !

When I do come, she will speak not, she will stand,
Either hand

On my shoulder, give her eyes the first embrace
Of my face,

Ere we rush, ere we extinguish sight and speech
Each on each.

In one year they sent a million fighters forth
South and North,

And they built their gods a brazen pillar high
As the sky,

Yet reserved a thousand chariots in full force-
Gold, of course.

O, heart! oh, blood that freezes, blood that burns! Earth's returns

For whole centuries of folly, noise and sin!

Shut them in,

With their triumphs and their glories and the rest.

Love is best!

R. Browning

CX

THE SKYLARK

How the blithe Lark runs up the golden stair

That leans thro' cloudy gates from Heaven to Earth,

And all alone in the empyreal air

Fills it with jubilant sweet songs of mirth;

How far he seems, how far

With the light upon his wings,

Is it a bird, or star

That shines, and sings?

What matter if the days be dark and frore,
That sunbeam tells of other days to be,
And singing in the light that floods him o'er
In joy he overtakes Futurity;

Under cloud-arches vast

He peeps, and sees behind

Great Summer coming fast
Adown the wind!

And now he dives into a rainbow's rivers,
In streams of gold and purple he is drown'd,
Shrilly the arrows of his song he shivers,

As tho' the stormy drops were turn'd to sound;
And now he issues thro',

He scales a cloudy tower,
Faintly, like falling dew,
His fast notes shower.

Let every wind be hush'd, that I may hear
The wondrous things he tells the World below,
Things that we dream of he is watching near,
Hopes that we never dream'd he would bestow;
Alas! the storm hath roll'd
Back the gold gates again,

Or surely he had told

All Heaven to men!

So the victorious Poet sings alone,

And fills with light his solitary home,
And thro' that glory sees new worlds foreshown,
And hears high songs, and triumphs yet to come;
He waves the air of Time

With thrills of golden chords,
And makes the world to climb
On linked words.

What if his hair be gray, his eyes be dim,
If wealth forsake him, and if friends be cold,
Wonder unbars her thousand gates to him,
Truth never fails, nor Beauty waxes old;
More than he tells his eyes
Behold, his spirit hears,
Of grief, and joy, and sighs
'Twixt joy and tears.