Senex. Saye, cushat, callynge from the brake,
What ayles thee soe to pyne?
Thy carefulle heart shall cease to ake
When dayes be fyne
And greene thynges twyne:
Saye, cushat, what thy griefe to myne?
Turtur. Naye, gossyp, loyterynge soe late,
What ayles thee thus to chyde?
My love is fled by garden-gate;
Since Lammas-tyde
I wayte my bryde.
Saye, gossyp, whom dost thou abyde?
Senex. Loe! I am he, the 'Lonelie Manne,'
Of Time forgotten quite,
That no remembered face may scanne—
Sadde eremyte,
I wayte tonyghte
Pale Death, nor any other wyghte.
O cushat, cushat, callynge lowe,
Goe waken Time from sleepe:
Goe whysper in his ear, that soe
His besom sweepe
Me to that heape
Where all my recollections keepe.
Hath he forgott? Or did I viewe
A ghostlye companye
This even, by the dismalle yewe,
Of faces three
That beckoned mee
To land where no repynynges bee?
O Harrye, Harrye, Tom and Dicke,
Each lost companion!
Why loyter I among the quicke,
When ye are gonne?
Shalle I alone
Delayinge crye 'Anon, Anon'?
Naye, let the spyder have my gowne,
To brayde therein her veste.
My cappe shal serve, now I 'goe downe,'
For mouse's neste.
Loe! this is best.
I care not, soe I gayne my reste.
Not on the neck of prince or hound,
Nor on a woman's finger twin'd,
May gold from the deriding ground
Keep sacred that we sacred bind:
Only the heel
Of splendid steel
Shall stand secure on sliding fate,
When golden navies weep their freight.
The scarlet hat, the laurell'd stave
Are measures, not the springs, of worth;
In a wife's lap, as in a grave,
Man's airy notions mix with earth.
Seek other spur
Bravely to stir
The dust in this loud world, and tread
Alp-high among the whisp'ring dead.
Trust in thyself—then spur amain:
So shall Charybdis wear a grace,
Grim Aetna laugh, the Libyan plain
Take roses to her shrivell'd face.
This orb—this round
Of sight and sound—
Count it the lists that God hath built
For haughty hearts to ride a-tilt.
If a leaf rustled, she would start:
And yet she died, a year ago.
How had so frail a thing the heart
To journey where she trembled so?
And do they turn and turn in fright,
Those little feet, in so much night?
The light above the poet's head
Streamed on the page and on the cloth,
And twice and thrice there buffeted
On the black pane a white-wing'd moth;
'Twas Annie's soul that beat outside
And 'Open, open, open!' cried:
'I could not find the way to God;
There were too many flaming suns
For signposts, and the fearful road
Led over wastes where millions
Of tangled comets hissed and burned—
I was bewilder'd and I turned.
'O, it was easy then! I knew