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Those of my own life, who by turns had flung A shadow across me. Straightway I was 'ware, 10 So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move

Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair;
And a voice said in mastery, while I strove,—
"Guess now who holds thee?"-" Death," I said.
But, there,

The silver answer rang,-" Not Death, but Love."

VI.

Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand
Henceforward in thy shadow. Nevermore
Alone upon the threshold of my door

Of individual life, I shall command
5 The uses of my soul, nor lift my hand
Serenely in the sunshine as before,

Without the sense of that which I forboreThy touch upon the palm. The widest land Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine 10 With pulses that beat double. What I do And what I dream include thee, as the wine Must taste of its own grapes. And when I sue God for myself, He hears that name of thine, And sees within my eyes the tears of two.

XXXV.

If I leave all for thee, wilt thou exchange And be all to me? Shall I never miss Home-talk and blessing and the common kiss That comes to each in turn, nor count it strange, 5 When I look up, to drop on a new range

Of walls and floors, another home than this? Nay, wilt thou fill that place by me which is Filled by dead eyes too tender to know change? That's hardest. If to conquer love, has tried, 10 To conquer grief, tries more, as all things prove;

For grief indeed is love and grief beside.
Alas, I have grieved so I am hard to love..
Yet love me-wilt thou? Open thine heart wide,
And fold within the wet wings of thy dove.

XLIII.

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being, and ideal Grace.
5 I love thee to the level of everyday's

Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use

10 In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith. I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints,-I love thee with the breath, Smiles, tears, of all my life!-and, if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death.

Charles kingsley

1819-1875

SONG

(From The Saint's Tragedy, 1848)

Oh! that we two were Maying

Down the stream of the soft spring breeze;
Like children with violets playing

In the shade of the whispering trees.

5 Oh! that we two sat dreaming

On the sward of some sheep-trimmed down
Watching the white mist steaming

Over river and mead and town.

Oh! that we two lay sleeping

10 In our nest in the churchyard sod,

With our limbs at rest on the quiet earth's breast,
And our souls at home with God.

5

THE THREE FISHERS

(1851)

Three fishers went sailing away to the West,
Away to the West as the sun went down;

Each thought on the woman who loved him the
best,

And the children stood watching them out of

the town,

For men must work, and women must weep,
And there's little to earn, and many to keep,
Though the harbour bar be moaning.

Three wives sat up in the lighthouse tower,
And they trimmed the lamps as the sun went
down;

10 They looked at the squall, and they looked at the

shower,

And the night-rack came rolling up ragged and

brown.

But men must work, and women must weep,
Though storms be sudden, and waters deep,
And the harbour bar be moaning.

15 Three corpses lay out on the shining sands

In the morning gleam as the tide went down, And the women are weeping and wringing their hands

For those who will never come home to the town;

20

For men must work, and women must weep,
And the sooner it's over, the sooner to sleep;
And good-bye to the bar and its moaning.

THE SANDS OF DEE

(From Alton Locke, 1849)

"O Mary, go and call the cattle home

And call the cattle home,

And call the cattle home
Across the sands of Dee;"

5 The western wind was wild and dank with foam And all alone went she.

10

15

20

The western tide crept up along the sand,

And o'er and o'er the sand,

And round and round the sand,

As far as eye could see.

The rolling mist came down and hid the land:
And never home came she.

"Oh! is it weed, or fish, or floating hair-
A tress of golden hair,

A drownèd maiden's hair

Above the nets at sea?

Was never salmon yet that shone so fair
Among the stakes on Dee."

They rowed her in across the rolling foam,

The cruel crawling foam,

The cruel hungry foam,

To her grave beside the sea:

But still the boatmen hear her call the cattle

home

Across the sands of Dee.

CLEAR AND COOL

(Song from The Water Babies, 1863)

Clear and cool, clear and cool,
By laughing shallow, and dreaming pool;
Cool and clear, cool and clear,

By shining shingle, and foaming wear;
5 Under the crag where the ouzel sings,
And the ivied wall where the church-bell rings,
Undefiled, for the undefiled;

Play by me, bathe in me, mother and child.

Dank and foul, dank and foul,

10 By the smoky town in its murky cowl; Foul and dank, foul and dank,

15

By wharf and sewer and slimy bank;
Darker and darker the further I go,
Baser and baser the richer I grow;

Who dare sport with the sin-defiled?
Shrink from me, turn from me, mother and child.

Strong and free, strong and free;
The floodgates are open, away to the sea.
Free and strong, free and strong,

20 Cleansing my streams as I hurry along
To the golden sands, and the leaping bar,
And the taintless tide that awaits me afar,
As I lose myself in the infinite main,

25

Like a soul that has sinned and is pardoned again.

Undefiled, for the undefiled;

Play by me, bathe in me, mother and child.

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