MADELINE.

I.

'HOU art not steeped in golden languors,

TH

No tranced summer calm is thine,

Ever varying Madeline.

Through light and shadow thou dost range,

Sudden glances, sweet and strange,

Delicious spites and darling angers,

And airy forms of flitting change.

2.

Smiling, frowning, evermore,

Thou art perfect in love-lore.
Revealings deep and clear are thine

Of wealthy smiles: but who may know
Whether smile or frown be fleeter?
Whether smile or frown be sweeter,
Who may know?

Frowns perfect-sweet along the brow
Light-glooming over eyes divine,
Like little clouds sun-fringed, are thine,
Ever-varying Madeline.

Thy smile and frown are not aloof

From one another,

Each to each is dearest brother;

Hues of the silken sheeny woof

Momently shot into each other,
All the mystery is thine;
Smiling, frowning, evermore,
Thou art perfect in love-lore,

Ever-varying Madeline.

3.

A subtle, sudden flame,

By veering passion fanned,

About thee breaks and dances;
When I would kiss thy hand,
The flush of angered shame

O'erflows thy calmer glances,
And o'er black brows drops down
A sudden-curvèd frown:

But when I turn away,

Thou, willing me to stay,

Wooest not, nor vainly wranglest; But, looking fixedly the while, All my bounding heart entanglest In a golden-netted smile; Then in madness and in bliss, If my lips should dare to kiss Thy taper fingers amorously, Again thou blushest angerly; And o'er black brows drops down A sudden-curvèd frown.

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

2.

Whence that aery bloom of thine,
Like a lily which the sun
Looks through 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 ?

3.

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?

Or in stillest evenings

With what voice the violet woos

To his heart the silver dews?

Or when little airs arise,

How the merry bluebell rings

To the mosses underneath?

Hast thou looked upon the breath

Of the lilies at sunrise?

Wherefore that faint smile of thine,
Shadowy, dreaming Adeline?

4.

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 softened, shadowed brow,

And those dew-lit eyes of thine,
Thou faint smiler, Adeline?

5.

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-dropping 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.

I.

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,

have won

From all things outward you
A tearful grace, as though 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 through a fleecy night.

2.

You love, remaining peacefully,

To hear the murmur of the strife,

But enter not the toil of life.

Your spirit is the calmèd sea,