And ye talk together still,
In the language wherewith Spring
Letters cowslips on the hill?

Hence that look and smile of thine,
Spiritual Adeline.

A CHARACTER.

I.

WITH a half-glance upon the sky
At night he said, "The wanderings
Of this most intricate Universe
Teach me the nothingness of things."
Yet could not all creation pierce
Beyond the bottom of his eye.

II.

He spake of beauty: that the dull
Saw no divinity in grass,

Life in dead stones, or spirit in air;

Then looking as 't were in a glass,

He smoothed his chin and sleeked his hair,

And said the earth was beautiful.

III.

He spake of virtue: not the gods

More purely, when they wish to charm Pallas and Juno sitting by:

And with a sweeping of the arm,

And a lack-lustre dead-blue eye,

Devolved his rounded periods.

IV.

Most delicately hour by hour
He canvassed human mysteries,
And trod on silk, as if the winds
Blew his own praises in his eyes,
And stood aloof from other minds
In impotence of fancied power.

V.

With lips depressed as he were meek,

Himself unto himself he sold:

Upon himself himself did feed:

Quiet, dispassionate, and cold,

And other than his form of creed,

With chiselled features clear and sleek.

THE POET.

THE poet in a golden clime was born,

With golden stars above;

Dowered with the hate of hate, the scorn of scorn, The love of love.

He saw through life and death, through good and ill,

He saw through his own soul.

The marvel of the everlasting will,
An open scroll,

Before him lay: with echoing feet he threaded

The secret'st walks of fame:

The viewless arrows of his thoughts were headed And winged with flame,

Like Indian reeds blown from his silver tongue,

And of so fierce a flight,

From Calpe unto Caucasus they sung,
Filling with light

And vagrant melodies the winds which bore
Them earthward till they lit;

Then, like the arrow-seeds of the field-flower,
The fruitful wit,

Cleaving, took root, and springing forth anew
Where'er they fell, behold,

Like to the mother plant in semblance, grew
A flower all gold,

And bravely furnished all abroad to fling

The winged shafts of truth,

To throng with stately blooms the breathing spring Of Hope and Youth.

So many minds did gird their orbs with beams,

Though one did fling the fire.

Heaven flowed upon the soul in

many

dreams

Of high desire.