Thomas Lovell Beddoes.
1803–1849

IF there were dreams to sell,

    What would you buy?

Some cost a passing bell;

    Some a light sigh,

That shakes from Life’s fresh crown

Only a rose-leaf down.

If there were dreams to sell,

Merry and sad to tell,

And the crier rang the bell,

    What would you buy?

 

A cottage lone and still,

    With bowers nigh,

Shadowy, my woes to still,

    Until I die.

Such pearl from Life’s fresh crown

Fain would I shake me down.

Were dreams to have at will,

This would best heal my ill,

    This would I buy.

 

Sir John Suckling.
1609-1642

O FOR some honest lover’s ghost,

  Some kind unbodied post

    Sent from the shades below!

    I strangely long to know

Whether the noble chaplets wear

Those that their mistress’ scorn did bear

    Or those that were used kindly.

 

For whatsoe’er they tell us here

  To make those sufferings dear,

    ’Twill there, I fear, be found

     That to the being crown’d

T’ have loved alone will not suffice,

Unless we also have been wise

    And have our loves enjoy’d.

 

What posture can we think him in

  That, here unloved, again

    Departs, and ’s thither gone

    Where each sits by his own?

Or how can that Elysium be

Where I my mistress still must see

    Circled in other’s arms?

 

For there the judges all are just,

  And Sophonisba must

    Be his whom she held dear,

    Not his who loved her here.

The sweet Philoclea, since she died,

Lies by her Pirocles his side,

    Not by Amphialus.

 

Some bays, perchance, or myrtle bough

  For difference crowns the brow

    Of those kind souls that were

    The noble martyrs here:

And if that be the only odds

(As who can tell?), ye kinder gods,

    Give me the woman here!

Christina Georgina Rossetti.
1830–1894

REMEMBER me when I am gone away,

  Gone far away into the silent land;

  When you can no more hold me by the hand,

Nor I half turn to go, yet turning stay.

Remember me when no more day by day

  You tell me of our future that you plann’d:

  Only remember me; you understand

It will be late to counsel then or pray.

Yet if you should forget me for a while

  And afterwards remember, do not grieve:

  For if the darkness and corruption leave

  A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,

Better by far you should forget and smile

  Than that you should remember and be sad.

Christina Georgina Rossetti.
1830–1894

 SAFE where I cannot die yet,

  Safe where I hope to lie too,

Safe from the fume and the fret;

      You, and you,

  Whom I never forget.

Safe from the frost and the snow,

  Safe from the storm and the sun,

Safe where the seeds wait to grow

      One by one,

  And to come back in blow.

John Milton.
1608 – 1674

WHEN I consider how my light is spent

  E’re half my days, in this dark world and wide,

  And that one Talent which is death to hide,

  Lodg’d with me useless, though my Soul more bent

To serve therewith my Maker, and present

  My true account, least he returning chide,

  Doth God exact day-labour, light deny’d,

  I fondly ask; But patience to prevent

That murmur, soon replies, God doth not need

  Either man’s work or his own gifts, who best

  Bear his milde yoak, they serve him best, his State

Is Kingly. Thousands at his bidding speed

  And post o’re Land and Ocean without rest:

  They also serve who only stand and waite.

Matthew Arnold.
1822–1888

YES: in the sea of life enisled,

  With echoing straits between us thrown.

Dotting the shoreless watery wild,

  We mortal millions live alone.

The islands feel the enclasping flow,

And then their endless bounds they know.

 

But when the moon their hollows lights,

  And they are swept by balms of spring,

And in their glens, on starry nights,

  The nightingales divinely sing;

And lovely notes, from shore to shore,

Across the sounds and channels pour;

 

O then a longing like despair

  Is to their farthest caverns sent!

For surely once, they feel, we were

  Parts of a single continent.

Now round us spreads the watery plain—

O might our marges meet again!

 

Who order’d that their longing’s fire

  Should be, as soon as kindled, cool’d?

Who renders vain their deep desire?—

  A God, a God their severance ruled;

And bade betwixt their shores to be

The unplumb’d, salt, estranging sea.

Matthew Arnold.
1822–1888

THROUGH the black, rushing smoke-bursts,

Thick breaks the red flame.

All Etna heaves fiercely

Her forest-clothed frame.

 

Not here, O Apollo!

Are haunts meet for thee.

But, where Helicon breaks down

In cliff to the sea.

 

Where the moon-silver’d inlets

Send far their light voice

Up the still vale of Thisbe,

O speed, and rejoice!

 

On the sward at the cliff-top,

Lie strewn the white flocks;

On the cliff-side, the pigeons

Roost deep in the rocks.

 

In the moonlight the shepherds,

Soft lull’d by the rills,

Lie wrapt in their blankets,

Asleep on the hills.

 

—What forms are these coming

So white through the gloom?

What garments out-glistening

The gold-flower’d broom?

 

What sweet-breathing Presence

Out-perfumes the thyme?

What voices enrapture

The night’s balmy prime?—

 

‘Tis Apollo comes leading

His choir, The Nine.

—The Leader is fairest,

But all are divine.

 

They are lost in the hollows.

They stream up again.

What seeks on this mountain

The glorified train?—

 

They bathe on this mountain,

In the spring by their road.

Then on to Olympus,

Their endless abode.

 

—Whose praise do they mention:

Of what is it told?—

What will be for ever.

What was from of old.

 

First hymn they the Father

Of all things: and then,

The rest of Immortals,

The action of men.

 

The Day in his hotness,

The strife with the palm;

The Night in her silence,

The Stars in their calm.

Sir Walter Scott.
1771–1832

O, BRIGNALL banks are wild and fair,

  And Greta woods are green,

And you may gather garlands there,

  Would grace a summer queen:

And as I rode by Dalton Hall,

  Beneath the turrets high,

A Maiden on the castle wall

  Was singing merrily:—

 

‘O, Brignall banks are fresh and fair,

  And Greta woods are green!

I’d rather rove with Edmund there

  Than reign our English Queen.’

 

‘If, Maiden, thou wouldst wend with me

  To leave both tower and town,

Thou first must guess what life lead we,

  That dwell by dale and down:

And if thou canst that riddle read,

  As read full well you may,

Then to the green-wood shalt thou speed

  As blithe as Queen of May.’

 

Yet sung she, ‘Brignall banks are fair,

  And Greta woods are green!

I’d rather rove with Edmund there

  Than reign our English Queen.

 

‘I read you by your bugle horn

  And by your palfrey good,

I read you for a Ranger sworn

  To keep the King’s green-wood.’

‘A Ranger, Lady, winds his horn,

  And ’tis at peep of light;

His blast is heard at merry morn,

  And mine at dead of night.’

 

Yet sung she, ‘Brignall banks are fair,

  And Greta woods are gay!

I would I were with Edmund there,

  To reign his Queen of May!

 

‘With burnish’d brand and musketoon

  So gallantly you come,

I read you for a bold Dragoon,

  That lists the tuck of drum.’

‘I list no more the tuck of drum,

  No more the trumpet hear;

But when the beetle sounds his hum,

  My comrades take the spear.

 

‘And O! though Brignall banks be fair,

  And Greta woods be gay,

Yet mickle must the maiden dare,

  Would reign my Queen of May!

 

‘Maiden! a nameless life I lead,

  A nameless death I’ll die;

The fiend whose lantern lights the mead

  Were better mate than I!

And when I’m with my comrades met

  Beneath the green-wood bough,

What once we were we all forget,

  Nor think what we are now.’

Yet Brignall banks are fresh and fair,

  And Greta woods are green,

And you may gather flowers there

  Would grace a summer queen.