300POEMS

173.ONE DAY I WROTE HER NAME UPON THE STRAND

One day I wrote her name upon the strand,

But came the waves and washed it away:

Again I wrote it with a second hand,

But came the tide and made my pains his prey.

Vain man(said she)that dost in vain assay

A mortal thing so to immortalise;

For I myself shall like to this decay,

And eke my name be wiped out likewise.

Not so(quod I); let baser things devise

To die in dust, but you shall live by fame;

My verse your virtues rare shall eternise,

And in the heavens write your glorious name

Where, when as death shall all the world sudue,

Our love shall live, and later life renew.

174."OUT, OUT—"

...Then the boy saw all—

Since he was old enough to know, big boy

Doing a man's work, though a child at heart—

...They listened at his heart.

Little—less—nothing!—and that ended it.

No more to build oon there. And they, since they

Were not the one dead, turned to their affairs.

179.PIANO

So now it is vain for the singer to burst into clamor

With the great black piano apassionato. The glamor

Of childhood days is upon me, my manhood is cast

Down in the flood of remembrance, I weep like a child for the past.

180.PITY

They never saw my lover's face,

They only know our love was brief,

Wearing awhile a windy grace

And passing like an autumn leaf.

They wonder why I do not weep,

They think it stange that I can sing,

They say, "Her love was scarcely deep

Since it has left so slight a sting."

They never saw my love, nor knew

That in my heart's most secret place

I pity them as angels do

Men who have never seen God's face.

181.POET TO HIS LOVE

An old silver church in a forest

Is my love for you.

The trees around it

Are words that I have stolen from your heart.

An old silver bell, the last smile you gave,

Hangs at the top of my church.

It rings only when you come through the forest

And stand beside it.

And then, it has no need for ringing,

For your voice takes its place.

182.A POISON TREE

(William Blake的"杀敌方式")

I was angry with my friend:

I told my wrath, my wrath did end.

I was angry with my foe:

I told it not, my wrath did grow.

And I watered it in fears

Night and morning with my tears,

And I sunned it with smiles

And with soft deceitful wiles.

And it grew both day and night,

Till it bore an apple bright,

And my foe beheld it shine,

And he knew that it was mine,—

And into my garden stole

When the night had veiled the pole;

In the morning, I glad, I see

My foe outstretched beneath the tree.

183.POOR EARTH

I kiss the scars upon its face.

185.PRAYER FOR INDIFFERENCE

I ask no kind return of love,

No tempting charm to please;

Far from heart those gifts remove,

That sighs for peace and ease...

Far as distress the soul can wound,

'Tis pain in each degree:

'Tis bliss but to a certain bound,

Beyond is agony.

190.THE RAINY DAY

The day is cold, and dark, and dreary

It rains, and the wind is never weary;

The vine still clings to the mouldering wall,

But at every gust the dead leaves fall,

And the day is dark and dreary.

My life is cold, and dark, and dreary;

It rains, and the wind is never weary;

My thoughts still cling to the mouldering Past,

But the hopes of youth fall thick in the blast,

And the days are dark and dreary.

Be still, sad heart! And cease repining;

Behind the clouds is the sun still shining;

Thy fate is the common fate of all,

Into each life some rain must fall,

Some day must be dark and dreary.

192.A RED, RED ROSE

O my luve's like a red, red rose

That's newly sprung in June:

O my luve's like the melodie

That's sweetly play'd in tune!

As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,

So deep in luve am I:

And I will luve thee still, my dear,

Till a' the seas gang dry:

Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear,

And the rocks melt wi' the sun;

I will luve thee still, my dear,

While the sands o'life shall run.

And fare thee weel, my onlu luve,

And fare thee weel a while!

And I will come again, my luve,

Tho' it were ten thousand mile.

193.REMEMBER

Remember me when I am gone away,

Gone far away into the silent land;

When you can no more hold me by the hand,

...You tell me of our future that you pkann'd

202.THE ROSE-BUD

To the Lady Jane Wharton

Queen of Fragrance, lovely Rose,

The beauties of thy Leaves disclose!

Tge Winter's past, the Tempests fly,

Soft Gales breathe gently thro' the Sky;

The lark sweet warbling on the Wing

Salutes the gay return of spring:

The silver dews, the vernal show'rs,

Call forth a bloomy waste of flow'rs;

The joyous fields, the shady woods,

Are cloth'd with green, or swell with buds;

Then haste thy beauties to disclose,

Queen of fragrance, lovely rose!

Thou, beateous flow'r, a welcome Guest,

Shalt flourish on the Fair-One's Breast,

Shalt flourish on the Fair-One's Breast,

Shalt grace her hand, or deck her hair.

The flow'r most sweet, the Nymph most fair;

Breathe soft, ye winds! be calm, ye skies!

Arise ye flow'ry race, arise!

And haste thy beauties to disclose,

Queen of fragrance, lovely rose!

But thou, fair Nymph, thy self survey

In this sweet Offspring of a day;

That miracle of face must fail,

Thy charms are sweet, but charms are frail...

204.SEA ROSE

Rose, harsh rose,

Marred and with stint of petals,

Meager flower, thin,

Sparse of leaf,

More precious

Than a,wet rose

Single on a stem—

You are caught in the drift.

Stunted, with small leaf,

You are flung on the sand,

You are lifted

In the ceisp sand

That drives in the wind.

Can the spice-rose

Drip such acrid fragrance

Hardened in a leaf?

207.SELF-DEPENDENCE

Weary of myself, and sick of asking

What I am, and what I ought to be...

208.SENTENCE

Shall I say that what heaven gave

Earth has taken?—

Or that sleepers in the grave

Reawaken?

One sole sentence can I know,

Can I say:

You, my comrade, had to go,

I to stay.

212.SHEEP

...

Leaves whirled below, aloft; the sky

Sagged like a sodden shroud;

215.A SILENT MOUTH

O little green leaf on the bough, you hear the lark in morn,

You hear the grey feet of the wind stor in the shimmering corn,

You hear, low down in the grass,

The Singing Sidhe as they pass,

Do you ever hear, o little green flame,

My lived one calling, whispering my name?

...

A mouth in its silence is sweet

But my heart cries loud when we meet,

And I turn my head with a better sigh

When the boy who has stolen my love, unheeding, goes by.

I have made my heart as the stones in the street for his tread,

I have made my love as the shadow that falls from his dear gold head...

So must I go silent and lonely and loveless for evermore.

219.THE SNOW MAN--Wallace Stevens

One must have a mind of winter

To regard the frost and the boughs

Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;

And have been cold a long time

To behold the junipers shagged with ice,

The spruces rough in the distant glitter

Of the January sun; and not to think

Of any misery in the sound of the wind,

In the sound of a few leaves,

Which is the sound of the land

Full of the same wind

That is blowing the same bare place

For the listener, who listens in the snow,

And, nothing himself, beholds

Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

231. Sonnet

She loves me! From her own bliss-breathing lips

The live confession came, like rich perfume

From crimson petals bursting into bloom! ...

In life's diurnal round wears in its mien...

233.SPRING NIGHT--Sara Teasdale

The park is filled with night and fog,

The veils are drawn about the world,

The drowsy lights along the paths

Are dim and pearled.

Gold and gleaming the empty streets,

Gold and gleaming the misty lake,

The mirrored lights like sunken swords,

Glimmer and shake.

Oh, is it not enough to be 

Here with this beauty over me?

My throat should ache with praise, and I

Should kneel in joy beneath the sky.

O beauty, are you not enough?

Why am I crying after love,

With youth, a singing voice, and eyes

To take earth's wonder with surprise.

Why have I put off my pride,

Why am I unsatisfied ,--

I, for whom the pensive night

Binds her cloudy hair with light,--

I, for whom all beauty burns

Like incense in a million urns?

O beauty, are you not enough?

Why am I crying after love?

235. STAY, O SWEET--John Donne

Stay, O sweet, and do not rise!

The light that shines comes from thine eyes;

The day breaks not: it is my heart,

Because that you and I must part.

Stay! or else my joys will die,

And perish in their infancy...

241. SUMMER NIGHT--Elizabeth Stoddard

I feel the breath of the summer night,

Aromatic fire:

The trees, the vines, the flowers are astir

With tender desire.

The white months flutter about the lamp,

Enamoured with light

And a thousand creatures softly sing

A song to the night!

But I am alone, and how can I sing

Praises to thee?

Come, Night! unveil the beautiful soul

That waiteth for me.

242.THE SUN HAS LONG BEEN SET---William Wordsworth

The sun has long been set,

The stars are out by twos and threes,

The little birds are piping yet

Among the bushes and trees;

There's a cuckoo, and one or two thrushes,

And a far-off wind that rushes,

And a sound of water that gushes,

And the cuckoo's sovereign cry

Fills all the hollow of the sky.

Who would "go parading"

In London, "and masquerading,"

On such a night of June

With that beautiful soft half-moon,

And all these innocent blisses?

On such a night as this is!