conjoin’d in such a peace
That Hope, so not to cease,
Must still gaze back,
And count, along our love’s most happy track,
The landmarks of like inconceiv’d increase,
Promise me this:
If thou alone should’st win
God’s perfect bliss,
And I, beguiled by gracious-seeming sin,
Say, loving too much thee,
Love’s last goal miss,
And any vows may then have memory,
Never, by grief for what I bear or lack,
To mar thy joyance of heav’n’s jubilee.
Promise me this;
For else I should be hurl’d,
Beyond just doom
And by thy deed, to Death’s interior gloom,
From the mild borders of the banish’d world
Wherein they dwell
Who builded not unalterable fate
On pride, fraud, envy, cruel lust, or hate;
Yet loved too laxly sweetness and heart’s ease,
And strove the creature more than God to please.
For such as these
Loss without measure, sadness without end!
Yet not for this do thou disheaven’d be
With thinking upon me.
Though black, when scann’d from heaven’s surpassing bright,
This might mean light,
Foil’d with the dim days of mortality.
For God is everywhere.
Go down to deepest Hell, and He is there,
And, as a true but quite estranged Friend,
He works, ’gainst gnashing teeth of devilish ire,
With love deep hidden lest it be blasphemed,
If possible, to blend
Ease with the pangs of its inveterate fire;
Yea, in the worst
And from His Face most wilfully accurst
Of souls in vain redeem’d,
He does with potions of oblivion kill
Remorse of the lost Love that helps them still.
Apart from these,
Near the sky-borders of that banish’d world,
Wander pale spirits among willow’d leas,
Lost beyond measure, sadden’d without end,
But since, while erring most, retaining yet
Some ineffectual fervour of regret,
Retaining still such weal
As spurned Lovers feel,
Preferring far to all the world’s delight
Their loss so infinite,
Or Poets, when they mark
In the clouds dun
A loitering flush of the long sunken sun,
And turn away with tears into the dark.
Know, Dear, these are not mine
But Wisdom’s words, confirmed by divine
Doctors and Saints, though fitly seldom heard
Save in their own prepense-occulted word,
Lest fools be fool’d the further by false hope,
And wrest sweet knowledge to their own decline;
And (to approve I speak within my scope)
The Mistress of that dateless exile gray
Is named in surpliced Schools Tristitia.
But, O, my Darling, look in thy heart and see
How unto me,
Secured of my prime care, thy happy state,
In the most unclean cell
Of sordid Hell,
And worried by the most ingenious hate,
It never could be anything but well,
Nor from my soul, full of thy sanctity,
Such pleasure die
As the poor harlot’s, in whose body stirs
The innocent life that is and is not hers:
Unless, alas, this fount of my relief
By thy unheavenly grief
Were closed.
So, with a consecrating kiss
And hearts made one in past all previous peace,
And on one hope reposed,
Promise me this!
VII. THE AZALEA
There, where the sun shines first
Against our room,
She train’d the gold Azalea, whose perfume
She, Spring-like, from her breathing grace dispersed.
Last night the delicate crests of saffron bloom,
For this their dainty likeness watch’d and nurst,
Were just at point to burst.
At dawn I dream’d, O God, that she was dead,
And groan’d aloud upon my wretched bed,
And waked, ah, God, and did not waken her,
But lay, with eyes still closed,
Perfectly bless’d in the delicious sphere
By which I knew so well that she was near,
My heart to speechless thankfulness composed.
Till ’gan to stir
A dizzy somewhat in my troubled head—
It was the azalea’s breath, and she was dead!
The warm night had the lingering buds disclosed,
And I had fall’n asleep with to my breast
A chance-found letter press’d
In which she said,
‘So, till to-morrow eve, my Own, adieu!
Parting’s well-paid with soon again to meet,
Soon in your arms to feel so small and sweet,
Sweet to myself that am so sweet to you!’
VIII. DEPARTURE
It was not like your great and gracious ways!
Do you, that have nought other to lament,
Never, my Love, repent
Of how, that July afternoon,
You went,
With sudden, unintelligible phrase,
And frighten’d eye,
Upon your journey of so many days,
Without a single kiss, or a good-bye?
I knew, indeed, that you were parting soon;
And so we sate, within the low sun’s rays,
You whispering to me, for your voice was weak,
Your harrowing praise.
Well, it was well,
To hear you such things speak,
And