The Works of Alfred Tennyson, Poet Laureate

They should have stabb'd me where I lay, Thou liest beneath the greenwood tree, I dare not die and come to thee, Oriana.

Oriana!

How could I rise and come away,

To the pale-green sea-groves straight and I would sing to myself the whole of the

high,

Chasing each other merrily.

III.

There would be neither moon nor star;
But the wave would make music above
us afar-

Low thunder and light in the magic night—
Neither moon nor star.

day;

With a comb of pearl I would comb my

hair;

And still as I comb'd I would sing and say,

Who is it loves me? who loves not me?' I would comb my hair till my ringlets would fall

Low adown, low adown,

We would call aloud in the dreamy dells, From under my starry sea bud crown
Call to each other and whoop and cry

All night, merrily, merrily;
They would pelt me with starry spangles

and shells,

Laughing and clapping their hands be-
tween,

All night, merrily, merrily:
But I would throw to them back in mine
Turkis and agate and almondine :
Then leaping out upon them unseen
I would kiss them often under the sea,
And kiss them again till they kiss'd me
Laughingly, laughingly.
Oh! what a happy life were mine
Under the hollow-hung ocean green!
Soft are the moss-beds under the sea;
We would live merrily, merrily.

Low adown and around,
And I should look like a fountain of gold
Springing alone

With a shrill inner sound,

Over the throne

In the midst of the hall;
Till that great sea-snake under the sea
From his coiled sleeps in the central deeps
Would slowly trail himself sevenfold
Round the hall where I sate, and look in
at the gate

With his large calm eyes for the love of

me.

And all the mermen under the sea
Would feel their immortality
Die in their hearts for the love of me.

We would run to and fro, and hide and Thy rose-lips and full blue eyes

seek,

Take the heart from out my breast. Wherefore those dim looks of thine, Shadowy, dreaming Adeline?

II.

Whence that aery bloom of thine,

Like a lily which the sun
Looks thro' in his sad decline,

And a rose-bush leans upon,
Thou that faintly smilest still,
As a Naiad in a well,
Looking at the set of day,
Or a phantom two hours old

Of a maiden past away,
Ere the placid lips be cold?
Wherefore those faint smiles of thine,
Spiritual Adeline ?

III.

What hope or fear or joy is thine?
Who talketh with thee, Adeline?
For sure thou art not all alone.
Do beating hearts of salient springs
Keep measure with thine own?

Hast thou heard the butterflies
What they say betwixt their wings?
With what voice the violet woos
Or in stillest evenings
To his heart the silver dews?

Or when little airs arise,
How the merry bluebell rings

To the mosses underneath?
Hast thou look'd upon the breath
Of the lilies at sunrise?
Wherefore that faint smile of thine,
Shadowy, dreaming Adeline?

IV.

Some honey-converse feeds thy mind,
Some spirit of a crimson rose
In love with thee forgets to close
His curtains, wasting odorous sighs
All night long on darkness blind.

What aileth thee? whom waitest thou With thy soften'd, shadow'd brow, And those dew-lit eyes of thine, Thou faint smiler, Adeline?

Lovest thou the doleful wind

When thou gazest at the skies?
Doth the low-tongued Orient
Wander from the side of the morn,

Dripping with Sabæan spice
On thy pillow, lowly bent

With melodious airs lovelorn,
Breathing Light against thy face,
While his locks a-drooping twined
Round thy neck in subtle ring
Make a carcanet of rays,

And ye talk together still,
In the language wherewith Spring
Letters cowslips on the hill?
Hence that look and smile of thine,
Spiritual Adeline.

MARGARET.

O SWEET pale Margaret, O rare pale Margaret, What lit your eyes with tearful power, Like moonlight on a falling shower? Who lent you, love, your mortal dower Of pensive thought and aspect pale, Your melancholy sweet and frail As perfume of the cuckoo-flower? From the westward-winding flood, From the evening-lighted wood,

From all things outward you have

won

A tearful grace, as tho' you stood

Between the rainbow and the sun. The very smile before you speak, That dimples your transparent cheek,

Encircles all the heart, and feedeth The senses with a still delight

Of dainty sorrow without sound, Like the tender amber round, Which the moon about her spreadeth, Moving thro' a fleecy night.

II.

You love, remaining peacefully,

To hear the murmur of the strife, But enter not the toil of life. Your spirit is the calmed sea,

Laid by the tumult of the fight. You are the evening star, alway

Remaining betwixt dark and bright: Lull'd echoes of laborious day

Come to you, gleams of mellow light
Float by you on the verge of night.

III.

What can it matter, Margaret,

What songs below the waning stars The lion-heart, Plantagenet,

Sang looking thro' his prison bars? Exquisite Margaret, who can tell The last wild thought of Chatelet, Just ere the falling axe did part The burning brain from the true heart, Even in her sight he loved so well?

IV.

A fairy shield your Genius made

And gave you on your natal day.
Your sorrow, only sorrow's shade,

Keeps real sorrow far away.
You move not in such solitudes,
You are not less divine,
But more human in your moods,

Than your twin-sister, Adeline.
Your hair is darker, and your eyes

Touch'd with a somewhat darker hue,
And less aërially blue,

But ever trembling thro' the dew
Of dainty-woeful sympathies.

O sweet pale Margaret,

O rare pale Margaret,

Come down, come down, and hear me speak :

Tie up the ringlets on your cheek:

The sun is just about to set,
The arching limes are tall and shady,
And faint, rainy lights are seen,
Moving in the leavy beech.
Rise from the feast of sorrow, lady,
Where all day long you sit between

Joy and woe, and whisper each.

Or only look across the lawn,

Look out below your bower-eaves, Look down, and let your blue eyes dawn Upon me thro' the jasmine-leaves.

ELEÄNORE.

THY dark eyes open'd not,

Nor first reveal'd themselves to English

air,

For there is nothing here,

And shadow'd coves on a sunny shore,

The choicest wealth of all the earth, Jewel or shell, or starry ore,

To deck thy cradle, Eleänore.

II.

Or the yellow-banded bees,
Thro' half-open lattices
Coming in the scented breeze,

Fed thee, a child, lying alone,
With whitest honey in fairy gar

dens cull'd

A glorious child, dreaming alone,
In silk-soft folds, upon yielding down,
With the hum of swarming bees

Into dreamful slumber lull'd.

III.

Who may minister to thee?

Summer herself should minister

To thee, with fruitage golden-rinded On golden salvers, or it may be, Youngest Autumn, in a bower

Grape-thicken'd from the light, and

blinded

With many a deep-hued bell-like flower

Which, from the outward to the inward Of fragrant trailers, when the air

brought,

Moulded thy baby thought.

Far off from human neighbourhood,

Sleepeth over all the heaven,

And the crag that fronts the Even,
All along the shadowy shore,

Thou wert born, on a summer morn, | Crimsons over an inland mere,

A mile beneath the cedar-wood.
Thy bounteous forehead was not fann'd

With breezes from our oaken glades, But thou wert nursed in some delicious land

Of lavish lights, and floating shades: And flattering thy childish thought

The oriental fairy brought,

At the moment of thy birth,

From old well-heads of haunted rills,
And the hearts of purple hills,

Eleanore !

IV.

How may full-sail'd verse express,
How may measured words adore
The full-flowing harmony

Of thy swan-like stateliness,
Eleanore?

The luxuriant symmetry

Of thy floating gracefulness,
Eleanore?

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