The Complete Poems of Robert Browning - 22 Poetry Collections in One Edition. Robert Browning
Of visions, each a part of the dim whole.
And a star left his peers and came with peace
Upon a storm, and all eyes pined for him,
And one isle harboured a sea-beaten ship,
And the crew wandered in its bowers, and plucked
Its fruits, and gave up all their hopes for home.
And one dream came to a pale poet’s sleep,
And he said, “I am singled out by God,
“No sin must touch me.” I am very weak,
But what I would express is, — Leave me not,
Still sit by me — with beating breast, and hair
Loosened — watching earnest by my side,
Turning my books, or kissing me when I
Look up — like summer wind. Be still to me
A key to music’s mystery, when mind fails,
A reason, a solution and a clue,
You see I have thrown off my prescribed rules:
I hope in myself — and hope, and pant, and love —
You’ll find me better — know me more than when
You loved me as I was. Smile not; I have
Much yet to gladden you — to dawn on you.
No more of the past — I’ll look within no more —
I have too trusted to my own wild wants —
Too trusted to myself — to intuition.
Draining the wine alone in the still night,
And seeing how — as gathering films arose,
As by an inspiration life seemed bare
And grinning in its vanity, and ends
Hard to be dreamed of, stared at me as fixed,
And others suddenly became all foul,
As a fair witch turned an old hag at night.
No more of this — we will go hand in hand,
I will go with thee, even as a child,
Looking no further than thy sweet commands.
And thou hast chosen where this life shall be —
The land which gave me thee shall be our home,
Where nature lies all wild amid her lakes
And snow-swathed mountains, and vast pines all girt
With ropes of snow — where nature lies all bare,
Suffering none to view her but a race
Most stinted and deformed — like the mute dwarfs
Which wait upon a naked Indian queen.
And there (the time being when the heavens are thick
With storms) I’ll sit with thee while thou dost sing
Thy native songs, gay as a desert bird
Who crieth as he flies for perfect joy,
Or telling me old stories of dead knights,
Or I will read old lays to thee — how she,
The fair pale sister, went to her chill grave
With power to love, and to be loved, and live.
Or will go together, like twin gods
Of the infernal world, with scented lamp
Over the dead — to call and to awake —
Over the unshaped images which lie
Within my mind’s cave — only leaving all
That tells of the past doubts. So when spring comes,
And sunshine comes again like an old smile,
And the fresh waters, and awakened birds,
And budding woods await us — I shall be
Prepared, and we will go and think again,
And all old loves shall come to us — but changed
As some sweet thought which harsh words veiled before;
Feeling God loves us, and that all that errs,
Is a strange dream which death will dissipate;
And then when I am firm we’ll seek again
My own land, and again I will approach
My old designs, and calmly look on all
The works of my past weakness, as one views
Some scene where danger met him long before
Ah! that such pleasant life should be but dreamed!
But whate’er come of it — and tho’ it fade,
And tho’ ere the cold morning all be gone
As it will be; — tho’ music wait for me,
And fair eyes and bright wine, laughing like sin,
Which steals back softly on a soul half saved;
And I be first to deny all, and despise
This verse, and these intents which seem so fair;
Still this is all my own, this moment’s pride,
No less I make an end in perfect joy.
E’en in my brightest time, a lurking fear
Possessed me. I well knew my weak resolves,
I felt the witchery that makes mind sleep
Over its treasures — as one half afraid
To make his riches definite — but now
These feelings shall not utterly be lost,
I shall not know again that nameless care,
Lest leaving all undone in youth, some new
And undreamed end reveal itself too late:
For this song shall remain to tell for ever,
That when I lost all hope of such a change
Suddenly Beauty rose on me again.
No less I make an end in perfect joy,
For I, having thus again been visited,
Shall doubt not many another bliss awaits,
And tho’ this weak soul sink, and darkness come,
Some little word shall light it up again,
And I shall see all clearer and love better;
I shall again go o’er the tracts of thought,
As one who has a right; and I shall live
With poets — calmer — purer still each time,
And beauteous shapes will come to me again,
And unknown secrets will be trusted me,
Which were not mine when wavering — but now
I shall be priest and lover, as of old.
Sun-treader, I believe in God, and truth,
And love; and as one just escaped from death
Would bind himself in bands of friends to feel
He lives indeed — so, I would lean on thee;
Thou must be ever with me — most in gloom
When such shall come — but chiefly when I die,
For I seem dying, as one going in the dark
To fight a giant — and live thou for ever,
And be to all what thou hast been to me —
All in whom this wakes pleasant