These tend, I prithee; and for me,
Thy most long-suffering master, bring
In April, when the linnets sing
And the days lengthen more and more,
At sundown to the garden door.
And I, being provided thus,
Shall, with superb asparagus,
A book, a taper, and a cup
Of country wine, divinely sup.
LA SOLITUDE, HYÈRES.
TO MINNIE
(With a hand-glass)
PICTURE-FRAME for you to fill,
A paltry setting for your face,
A thing that has no worth until
You lend it something of your grace,
I send (unhappy I that sing
Laid by awhile upon the shelf) Because I would not send a thing Less charming than you are yourself.
And happier than I, alas!
(Dumb thing, I envy its delight)
'T will wish you well, the looking-glass, And look you in the face to-night.
LOVER of the moorland bare,
And honest country winds, you were;
The silver-skimming rain you took;
And loved the floodings of the brook,
Dew, frost and mountains, fire and seas,
Tumultuary silences,
Winds that in darkness fifed a tune,
And the high-riding virgin moon.
And as the berry, pale and sharp,
Springs on some ditch's counterscarp
In our ungenial, native north-
You put your frosted wildings forth,
And on the heath, afar from man,
A strong and bitter virgin ran.
The berry ripened keeps the rude
And racy flavour of the wood.
And you that loved the empty plain
All redolent of wind and rain,
Around you still the curlew sings
The freshness of the weather clings-
The maiden jewels of the rain
Sit in your dabbled locks again.
HE unfathomable sea, and time, and
The deeds of heroes and the crimes of kings
Dispart us; and the river of events
Has, for an age of years, to east and west
More widely borne our cradles. Thou to me
Art foreign, as when seamen at the dawn
Descry a land far off and know not which.
So I approach uncertain; so I cruise
Round thy mysterious islet, and behold
Surf and great mountains and loud river-
bars,
And from the shore hear inland voices call. Strange is the seaman's heart; he hopes, he fears;
Draws closer and sweeps wider from that
Last, his rent sail refits, and to the deep His shattered prow uncomforted puts back. Yet as he goes he ponders at the helm
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