Yet here is peace for ever new!
30 When I who watch them am away,
Still all things in this glade go through
The changes of their quiet day.

Then to their happy rest they pass! The flowers upclose, the birds are fed, 35 The night comes down upon the grass, The child sleeps warmly in his bed.

Calm soul of all things! make it mine
To feel, amid the city's jar,

That there abides a peace of thine 40 Man did not make, and cannot mar.

The will to neither strive nor cry,
The power to feel with others give!
Calm, calm me more! nor let me die
Before I have begun to live.

SELF-DEPENDENCE

(From the same)

Weary of myself, and sick of asking
What I am, and what I ought to be,
At this vessel's prow I stand, which bears me
Forwards, forwards, o'er the starlit sea.

5 And a look of passionate desire

O'er the sea and to the stars I send:

"Ye who from my childhood up have calm'd me, Calm me, ah, compose me to the end!

66 Ah, once more," I cried, "ye stars, ye waters, 10 On my heart your mighty charm renew; Still, still let me, as I gaze upon you,

Feel my soul becoming vast like you!”

From the intense, clear, star-sown vault of heaven,
Over the lit sea's unquiet way,

15 In the rustling night-air came the answer:
"Wouldst thou be as these are? Live as they.

"Unaffrighted by the silence round them,
Undistracted by the sights they see,

These demand not that the things without them 20 Yield them love, amusement, sympathy.

"And with joy the stars perform their shining,
And the sea its long moon-silver'd roll;
For self-poised they live, nor pine with noting
All the fever of some differing soul.

25 "Bounded by themselves, and unregardful
In what state God's other works may be,
In their own tasks all their powers pouring,
These attain the mighty life you see."

O air-born voice! long since, severely clear, 30 A cry like thine in mine own heart I hear: "Resolve to be thyself; and know, that he Who finds himself, loses his misery!"

SHAKSPEARE

(From The Strayed Reveller and Other Poems, 1849)
Others abide our question. Thou art free.
We ask and ask-Thou smilest and art still,
Out-topping knowledge. For the loftiest hill,
Who to the stars uncrowns his majesty,

5 Planting his steadfast footsteps in the sea,
Making the heaven of heavens his dwelling-place,
Spares but the cloudy border of his base
To the foil'd searching of mortality;

And thou, who didst the stars and sunbeams

know,

10 Self-school'd, self-scann'd, self-honour'd, self

secure,

Didst tread on earth unguess'd at.-Better so!

All pains the immortal spirit must endure,
All weakness which impairs, all griefs which bow,
Find their sole speech in that victorious brow.

Gabriel Charles Dante Rossetti

1828-1882

THE BLESSED DAMOZEL

(Third Version, from Poems, 1870)

The blessed damozel leaned out
From the gold bar of Heaven;
Her eyes were deeper than the depth
Of waters stilled at even;

5 She had three lilies in her hand.

10

And the stars in her hair were seven.

Her robe ungirt from clasp to hem,
No wrought flowers did adorn,

But a white rose of Mary's gift,
For service meetly worn;

Her hair that lay along her back
Was yellow like ripe corn.

Herseemed she scarce had been a day
One of God's choristers;

15 The wonder was not yet quite gone
From that still look of hers;

Albeit, to them she left, her day
Had counted as ten years.

20

(To one, it is ten years of years.
Yet now, and in this place,

Surely she leaned o'er me-her hair
Fell all about my face. . .
Nothing: the autumn fall of leaves.
The whole year sets apace.)

25 It was the rampart of God's house
That she was standing on;

30

By God built over the sheer depth
The which is Space begun;

So high, that looking downward thence
She scarce could see the sun.

It lies in Heaven, across the flood
Of ether, as a bridge.

Beneath, the tides of day and night
With flame and darkness ridge

35 The void, as low as where this earth
Spins like a fretful midge.

40

Around her, lovers, newly met
'Mid deathless love's acclaims,
Spoke evermore among themselves
Their heart-remembered names;
And the souls mounting up to God
Went by her like thin flames.

And still she bowed herself and stooped
Out of the circling charm;

45 Until her bosom must have made
The bar she leaned on warm,

50

And the lilies lay as if asleep
Along her bended arm.

From the fixed place of Heaven she saw
Time like a pulse shake fierce

Through all the world. Her gaze still strove

Within the gulf to pierce

Its path; and now she spoke as when
The stars sang in their spheres.

55 The sun was gone now; the curled moon Was like a little feather

60

Fluttering far down the gulf; and now
She spoke through the still weather.
Her voice was like the voice the stars
Had when they sang together.

(Ah sweet! Even now, in that bird's song,
Strove not her accents there,

Fain to be harkened? When those bells
Possessed the mid-day air,

65 Strove not her steps to reach my side
Down all the echoing stair?)

70

'I wish that he were come to me,
For he will come,' she said.

'Have I not prayed in Heaven?-on earth,
Lord, Lord, has he not pray'd?

Are not two prayers a perfect strength?
And shall I feel afraid?

'When round his head the aureole clings,
And he is clothed in white,

75 I'll take his hand and go with him
To the deep wells of light;

As unto a stream we will step down,
And bathe there in God's sight.

'We two will stand beside that shrine, 80 Occult, withheld, untrod,