Ionica Part 17

Miscreant brides! for their grooms they slew.

One out of many is not attainted, One alone blest and for ever sainted, False to her father, to wedlock true.

Praise her! she gave her young husband the warning.

Praise her for ever! She cried, "Arise!

Flee from the slumber that deadens the eyes; Flee from the night that hath never a morning.

Baffle your host who contrived our espousing, Baffle my sisters, the forty and nine, Raging like lions that mangle the kink, Each on the blood of a quarry carousing.

I am more gentle, I strike not thee, I will not hold thee in dungeon tower.

Though the king chain me, I will not cower, Though my sire banish me over the sea.

Freely run, freely sail, good luck attend thee; Go with the favour of Venus and Night.

On thy tomb somewhere and some day bid write Record of her who hath dared to befriend thee."

BARINE

Lady, if you ever paid Forfeit for a heart betrayed, If for broken pledge you were By one tooth, one nail less fair,

I would trust. But when a vow Slips from off your faithless brow, Forth you flash with purer l.u.s.tre, And a fonder troop you muster.

You with vantage mock the shade Of a mother lowly laid, Silent stars and depths of sky, And high saints that cannot die.

Laughs the Queen of love, I say, Laughs at this each silly fay, Laughs the rogue who's ever whetting Darts of fire on flint of fretting.

Ay, the crop of youth is yours, Fresh enlistments throng your doors, Veterans swear you serve them ill, Threaten flight, and linger still.

Dames and thrifty greybeards dread Lest you turn a stripling's head; Poor young brides are in dismay Lest you sigh their lords away.

TO BRITOMART MUSING

Cla.s.sic throat and wrist and ear Tempt a gallant to draw near; Must romantic lip and eye Make him falter, bid him fly?

If Camilla's upright lance By the contrast did enhance Charms of curving neck and waist, Yet she never was embraced.

She was girt to take the field, And her aventayle concealed Half the grace that might have won Homage from Evander's son.

Countess Montfort, clad in steel, Showed she could both dare and feel; Smiled to greet the champion s.h.i.+ps, Touched Sir Walter with the lips.

She could charm, although in dress Like the sainted shepherdess, Jeanne, a leader void of guile, Jeanne, a woman all the while.

Damsel with the mind of man, Lay not softness under ban; For the glory of thy s.e.x Twine with myrtle manly necks.

HERSILIA

I see her stand with arms a-kimbo, A blue and blonde s_ub aureo nimbo_; She scans her literary limbo, The reliques of her teens;

Things like the chips of broken stilts, Or tatters of embroidered quilts, Or nosegays tossed away by jilts, Notes, ballads, tales, and scenes.

Soon will she gambol like a lamb, Fenced, but not tethered, near the Cam.

Maybe she'll swim where Byron swam, And chat beneath the limes,

Where Arthur, Alfred, Fitz, and Brooks Lit thought by one another's looks, Embraced their jests and kicked their books, In England's happier times;

Ere magic poets felt the gout, Ere Darwin whelmed the Church in doubt Ere Apologia had found out The round world must be right;

When Gladstone, bluest of the blue, Read all Augustine's folios through; When France was tame, and no one knew We and the Czar would fight.

"Sixty years since" (said dear old Scott; We're bound, you know, to quote Sir Wat) This isle had not a sweeter spot Than Neville's Court by Granta;

No Newnham then, no kirtled scribes, No Clelia to harangue the tribes, No race for girls, no apple bribes To tempt an Atalanta.

We males talked fast, we meant to be World-betterers all at twenty-three, But somehow failed to level thee, Oh battered fort of Edom!

Into the breach our daughters press, Brave patriots in unwarlike dress, Adepts at thought-in-idleness, Sweet devotees of freedom.

And now it is your turn, fair soul, To see the fervent car-wheels roll, Your rivals clas.h.i.+ng past the goal, Some sly Milanion leading.

Ah! with them may your Genius bring Some Celia, some Miss Mannering; For youthful friends.h.i.+p is a thing More precious than succeeding.

SAPPHO'S CURSING

Woman dead, lie there; No record of thee Shall there ever be, Since thou dost not share Roses in Pieria grown.

In the deathful cave, With the feeble troop Of the folk that droop, Lurk and flit and crave, Woman severed and far-flown.

A SERVING MAN'S EPITAPH

A slave--oh yes, a slave!

But in a freeman's grave.

By thee, when work was done, Timanthes, foster-son, By thee whom I obeyed, My master, I was laid.

Live long, from trouble free; But if thou com'st to me, Paying to age thy debt, Thine am I, master, yet.