A soul from the honeysuckle strays, And the nightingale as from prophet heights Sings to the Earth of her million Mays -
Midsummer nights! O midsummer nights!
Envoy And it's O, for my dear and the charm that stays -
Midsummer days! Midsummer days!
It's O, for my Love and the dark that plights -
Midsummer nights! O midsummer nights!
BALLADE OF DEAD ACTORS--I. M. Edward John Henley (1861-1898)
Where are the passions they essayed, And where the tears they made to flow?
Where the wild humours they portrayed For laughing worlds to see and know?
Othello's wrath and Juliet's woe?
Sir Peter's whims and Timon's gall?
And Millamant and Romeo?
Into the night go one and all.
Where are the braveries, fresh or frayed?
The plumes, the armours--friend and foe?
The cloth of gold, the rare brocade, The mantles glittering to and fro?
The pomp, the pride, the royal show?
The cries of war and festival?
The youth, the grace, the charm, the glow?
Into the night go one and all.
The curtain falls, the play is played:
The Beggar packs beside the Beau;
The Monarch troops, and troops the Maid;
The Thunder huddles with the Snow.
Where are the revellers high and low?
The clashing swords? The lover's call?
The dancers gleaming row on row?
Into the night go one and all.
Envoy Prince, in one common overthrow The Hero tumbles with the Thrall:
As dust that drives, as straws that blow, Into the night go one and all.
BALLADE MADE IN THE HOT WEATHER--To C. M.
Fountains that frisk and sprinkle The moss they overspill;
Pools that the breezes crinkle;
The wheel beside the mill, With its wet, weedy frill;
Wind-shadows in the wheat;
A water-cart in the street;
The fringe of foam that girds An islet's ferneries;
A green sky's minor thirds -
To live, I think of these!
Of ice and glass the tinkle, Pellucid, silver-shrill;
Peaches without a wrinkle;
Cherries and snow at will, From china bowls that fill The senses with a sweet Incuriousness of heat;
A melon's dripping sherds;
Cream-clotted strawberries;
Dusk dairies set with curds -
To live, I think of these!
Vale-lily and periwinkle;
Wet stone-crop on the sill;
The look of leaves a-twinkle With windlets clear and still;
The feel of a forest rill That wimples fresh and fleet About one's naked feet;
The muzzles of drinking herds;
Lush flags and bulrushes;
The chirp of rain-bound birds -
To live, I think of these!
Envoy Dark aisles, new packs of cards, Mermaidens' tails, cool swards, Dawn dews and starlit seas, White marbles, whiter words -
To live, I think of these!
BALLADE OF TRUISMS
Gold or silver, every day, Dies to gray.
There are knots in every skein.
Hours of work and hours of play Fade away Into one immense Inane.
Shadow and substance, chaff and grain, Are as vain As the foam or as the spray.
Life goes crooning, faint and fain, One refrain:
'If it could be always May!'
Though the earth be green and gay, Though, they say, Man the cup of heaven may drain;
Though, his little world to sway, He display Hoard on hoard of pith and brain:
Autumn brings a mist and rain That constrain Him and his to know decay, Where undimmed the lights that wane Would remain, If it could be always May.
YEA, alas, must turn to NAY, Flesh to clay.
Chance and Time are ever twain.
Men may scoff, and men may pray, But they pay Every pleasure with a pain.
Life may soar, and Fortune deign To explain Where her prizes hide and stay;
But we lack the lusty train We should gain, If it could be always May.
Envoy Time, the pedagogue, his cane Might retain, But his charges all would stray Truanting in every lane -
Jack with Jane -
If it could be always May.
DOUBLE BALLADE OF LIFE AND FATE
Fools may pine, and sots may swill, Cynics gibe, and prophets rail, Moralists may scourge and drill, Preachers prose, and fainthearts quail.
Let them whine, or threat, or wail!
Till the touch of Circumstance Down to darkness sink the scale, Fate's a fiddler, Life's a dance.
What if skies be wan and chill?
What if winds be harsh and stale?
Presently the east will thrill, And the sad and shrunken sail, Bellying with a kindly gale, Bear you sunwards, while your chance Sends you back the hopeful hail:-
'Fate's a fiddler, Life's a dance.'
Idle shot or coming bill, Hapless love or broken bail, Gulp it (never chew your pill!), And, if Burgundy should fail, Try the humbler pot of ale!
Over all is heaven's expanse.
Gold's to find among the shale.
Fate's a fiddler, Life's a dance.
Dull Sir Joskin sleeps his fill, Good Sir Galahad seeks the Grail, Proud Sir Pertinax flaunts his frill, Hard Sir AEger dints his mail;
And the while by hill and dale Tristram's braveries gleam and glance, And his blithe horn tells its tale:-
'Fate's a fiddler, Life's a dance.'
Araminta's grand and shrill, Delia's passionate and frail, Doris drives an earnest quill, Athanasia takes the veil:
Wiser Phyllis o'er her pail, At the heart of all romance Reading, sings to Strephon's flail:-
'Fate's a fiddler, Life's a dance.'
Every Jack must have his Jill (Even Johnson had his Thrale!):
Forward, couples--with a will!
This, the world, is not a jail.
Hear the music, sprat and whale!
Hands across, retire, advance!
Though the doomsman's on your trail, Fate's a fiddler, Life's a dance.
Envoy Boys and girls, at slug and snail And their kindred look askance.
Pay your footing on the nail:
Fate's a fiddler, Life's a dance.
DOUBLE BALLADE OF THE NOTHINGNESS OF THINGS
The big teetotum twirls, And epochs wax and wane As chance subsides or swirls;
But of the loss and gain The sum is always plain.
Read on the mighty pall, The weed of funeral That covers praise and blame, The -isms and the -anities, Magnificence and shame:-
'O Vanity of Vanities!'
The Fates are subtile girls!
They give us chaff for grain.
And Time, the Thunderer, hurls, Like bolted death, disdain At all that heart and brain Conceive, or great or small, Upon this earthly ball.
Would you be knight and dame?
Or woo the sweet humanities?
Or illustrate a name?
O Vanity of Vanities!
We sound the sea for pearls, Or drown them in a drain;
We flute it with the merles, Or tug and sweat and strain;
We grovel, or we reign;
