The Blue Poetry Book

THE SUN UPON THE WEIRDLAW HILL

 
The sun upon the Weirdlaw Hill,
In Ettrick’s vale, is sinking sweet;
The westland wind is hush and still,
The lake lies sleeping at my feet.
Yet not the landscape to mine eye
Bears those bright hues that once it bore;
Though evening, with her richest dye,
Flames o’er the hills of Ettrick’s shore.
 
 
With listless look along the plain,
I see Tweed’s silver current glide,
And coldly mark the holy fane
Of Melrose rise in ruin’d pride.
The quiet lake, the balmy air,
The hill, the stream, the tower, the tree, —
Are they still such as once they were?
Or is the dreary change in me?
 
 
Alas, the warp’d and broken board,
How can it bear the painter’s dye!
The harp of strain’d and tuneless chord,
How to the minstrel’s skill reply!
To aching eyes each landscape lowers,
To feverish pulse each gale blows chill;
And Araby’s or Eden’s bowers
Were barren as this moorland hill.
 

Sir W. Scott.

THE WIFE OF USHER’S WELL

 
There lived a wife at Usher’s Well,
And a wealthy wife was she;
She had three stout and stalwart sons,
And sent them o’er the sea.
 
 
They hadna been a week from her,
A week but barely ane,
When word came to the carline wife,
That her three sons were gane.
 
 
They had not been a week from her,
A week but barely three,
When word came to the carline wife
That her sons she’d never see.
 
 
‘I wish the wind may never cease,
Nor fishes in the flood,
Till my three sons come hame to me,
In earthly flesh and blood!’
 
 
It fell about the Martinmas,
When nights are lang and mirk,
The carline wife’s three sons came hame
And their hats were o’ the birk.
 
 
It neither grew in syke nor ditch,
Nor yet in ony sheugh;
But at the gates o’ Paradise
That birk grew fair eneugh.
 
 
‘Blow up the fire, my maidens!
Bring water from the well!
For a’ my house shall feast this night,
Since my three sons are well!’
 
 
And she has made to them a bed,
She’s made it large and wide;
And she’s ta’en her mantle her about;
Sat down at the bed-side.
 
 
Up then crew the red red cock,
And up and crew the gray;
The eldest to the youngest said,
‘’Tis time we were away!’
 
 
The cock he hadna craw’d but once,
And clapp’d his wings at a’,
Whan the youngest to the eldest said,
‘Brother, we must awa’.
 
 
’The cock doth craw, the day doth daw,
The channerin’ worm doth chide:
If we be miss’d out o’ our place,
A sair pain we maun bide.
 
 
‘Fare ye well, my mother dear!
Farewell to barn and byre!
And fare ye weel, the bonny lass,
That kindles my mother’s fire!’
 

Unknown.

ALLEN-A-DALE

 
Allen-a-Dale has no fagot for burning,
Allen-a-Dale has no furrow for turning,
Allen-a-Dale has no fleece for the spinning,
Yet Allen-a-Dale has red gold for the winning.
Come, read me my riddle! come, hearken my tale!
And tell me the craft of bold Allen-a-Dale.
 
 
The Baron of Ravensworth prances in pride,
And he views his domains upon Arkindale side,
The mere for his net, and the land for his game,
The chase for the wild, and the park for the tame;
Yet the fish of the lake, and the deer of the vale,
Are less free to Lord Dacre than Allen-a-Dale!
 
 
Allen-a-Dale was ne’er belted a knight,
Though his spur be as sharp, and his blade be as bright:
Allen-a-Dale is no baron or lord,
Yet twenty tall yeomen will draw at his word;
And the best of our nobles his bonnet will vail,
Who at Rere-cross on Stanmore meets Allen-a-Dale.
 
 
Allen-a-Dale to his wooing is come;
The mother, she ask’d of his household and home:
‘Though the castle of Richmond stand fair on the hill,
My hall,’ quoth bold Allen, ‘shows gallanter still;
’Tis the blue vault of heaven, with its crescent so pale,
And with all its bright spangles!’ said Allen-a-Dale.
 
 
The father was steel, and the mother was stone;
They lifted the latch, and they bade him be gone;
But loud, on the morrow, their wail and their cry:
He had laugh’d on the lass with his bonny black eye.
And she fled to the forest to hear a love-tale,
And the youth it was told by was Allen-a-Dale!
 

Sir W. Scott.

THE BELEAGUERED CITY

 
I have read, in some old marvellous tale,
Some legend strange and vague,
That a midnight host of spectres pale
Beleaguered the walls of Prague.
 
 
Beside the Moldau’s rushing stream,
With the wan moon overhead,
There stood, as in an awful dream,
The army of the dead.
 
 
White as a sea-fog, landward bound,
The spectral camp was seen,
And, with a sorrowful, deep sound,
The river flowed between.
 
 
No other voice nor sound was there,
No drum, nor sentry’s pace;
The mist-like banners clasped the air,
As clouds with clouds embrace.
 
 
But, when the old cathedral bell
Proclaimed the morning prayer,
The white pavilions rose and fell
On the alarmèd air.
 
 
Down the broad valley, fast and far
The troubled army fled;
Up rose the glorious morning star,
The ghastly host was dead.
 
 
I have read, in the marvellous heart of man,
That strange and mystic scroll,
That an army of phantoms vast and wan
Beleaguer the human soul.
 
 
Encamped beside Life’s rushing stream,
In Fancy’s misty light,
Gigantic shapes and shadows gleam
Portentous through the night.
 
 
Upon its midnight battle ground
The spectral camp is seen,
And, with a sorrowful, deep sound,
Flows the River of Life between.
 
 
No other voice, nor sound is there,
In the army of the grave;
No other challenge breaks the air,
But the rushing of Life’s wave.
 
 
And, when the solemn and deep church bell
Entreats the soul to pray,
The midnight phantoms feel the spell,
The shadows sweep away.
 
 
Down the broad Vale of Tears afar
The spectral camp is fled;
Faith shineth as a morning star,
Our ghastly fears are dead.
 

H. W. Longfellow.

ALEXANDER’S FEAST OR, THE POWER OF MUSIC

 
’Twas at the royal feast for Persia won
By Philip’s warlike son —
Aloft in awful state
The godlike hero sate
On his imperial throne;
His valiant peers were placed around,
Their brows with roses and with myrtles bound
(So should desert in arms be crown’d);
The lovely Thais by his side
Sate like a blooming eastern bride
In flower of youth and beauty’s pride: —
Happy, happy, happy pair!
None but the brave
None but the brave
None but the brave deserves the fair!
 
 
Timotheus placed on high
Amid the tuneful quire
With flying fingers touch’d the lyre:
The trembling notes ascend the sky
And heavenly joys inspire.
The song began from Jove
Who left his blissful seats above —
Such is the power of mighty love!
A dragon’s fiery form belied the god;
Sublime on radiant spires he rode
When he to fair Olympia prest,
And while he sought her snowy breast;
Then round her slender waist he curl’d,
And stamp’d an image of himself, a sovereign of the world.
– The listening crowd admire the lofty sound!
A present deity! they shout around:
A present deity! the vaulted roofs rebound!
With ravish’d ears
The monarch hears,
Assumes the god,
Affects to nod
And seems to shake the spheres.
 
 
The praise of Bacchus then the sweet musician sung —
Of Bacchus ever fair and ever young:
The jolly god in triumph comes!
Sound the trumpets, beat the drums!
Flush’d with a purple grace
He shows his honest face:
Now give the hautboys breath; he comes, he comes!
Bacchus, ever fair and young,
Drinking joys did first ordain;
Bacchus’ blessings are a treasure,
Drinking is the soldier’s pleasure:
Sweet the pleasure,
Sweet is pleasure after pain.
 
 
Soothed with the sound, the king grew vain;
Fought all his battles o’er again,
And thrice he routed all his foes, and thrice he slew the slain!
The master saw the madness rise,
His glowing cheeks, his ardent eyes;
And while he Heaven and Earth defied
Changed his hand and check’d his pride.
He chose a mournful Muse
Soft pity to infuse:
He sung Darius great and good,
By too severe a fate
Fallen, fallen, fallen, fallen,
Fallen from his high estate,
And weltering in his blood;
Deserted, at his utmost need,
By those his former bounty fed;
On the bare earth exposed he lies
With not a friend to close his eyes.
– With downcast looks the joyless victor sate,
Revolving in his alter’d soul
The various turns of Chance below;
And now and then a sigh he stole,
And tears began to flow.
 
 
The mighty master smiled to see
That love was in the next degree;
’Twas but a kindred sound to move,
For pity melts the mind to love.
Softly sweet, in Lydian measures
Soon he soothed his soul to pleasures.
War, he sung, is toil and trouble,
Honour but an empty bubble,
Never ending, still beginning;
Fighting still, and still destroying;
If the world be worth thy winning,
Think, O think, it worth enjoying:
Lovely Thais sits beside thee,
Take the good the gods provide thee!
– The many rend the skies with loud applause;
So Love was crown’d, but Music won the cause.
The prince, unable to conceal his pain,
Gazed on the fair
Who caused his care,
And sigh’d and look’d, sigh’d and look’d,
Sigh’d and look’d, and sigh’d again:
At length with love and wine at once opprest
The vanquish’d victor sunk upon her breast.
 
 
Now strike the golden lyre again:
A louder yet, and yet a louder strain!
Break his bands of sleep asunder
And rouse him like a rattling peal of thunder.
Hark, hark! the horrid sound
Has raised up his head:
As awaked from the dead
And amazed he stares around.
Revenge, revenge, Timotheus cries,
See the Furies arise!
See the snakes that they rear
How they hiss in their hair,
And the sparkles that flash from their eyes!
Behold a ghastly band
Each a torch in his hand!
Those are Grecian ghosts, that in battle were slain
And unburied remain
Inglorious on the plain:
Give the vengeance due
To the valiant crew!
Behold how they toss their torches on high,
How they point to the Persian abodes
And glittering temples of their hostile gods.
– The princes applaud with a furious joy:
And the King seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy;
Thais led the way
To light him to his prey,
And like another Helen, fired another Troy!
 
 
– Thus, long ago,
Ere heaving bellows learn’d to blow,
While organs yet were mute,
Timotheus, to his breathing flute
And sounding lyre
Could swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire.
At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame;
The sweet enthusiast from her sacred store
Enlarged the former narrow bounds,
And added length to solemn sounds,
With Nature’s mother-wit, and arts unknown before.
– Let old Timotheus yield the prize
Or both divide the crown;
He raised a mortal to the skies;
She drew an angel down!
 

J. Dryden.

THE PASSIONATE SHEPHERD TO HIS LOVE

 
Come live with me and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and vallies, dales and fields,
And woods or steepy mountain yields.
 
 
And we will sit upon the rocks,
Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks
By shallow rivers to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.
 
 
And I will make thee beds of roses
And a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroider’d all with leaves of myrtle.
 
 
A gown made of the finest wool,
Which from our pretty lambs we pull,
Fair-linèd slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold.
 
 
A belt of straw and ivy-buds
With coral clasps and amber studs,
An’ if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me, and be my love.
 
 
Thy silver dishes for thy meat
As precious as the gods do eat,
Shall on an ivory table be
Prepar’d each day for thee and me.
 
 
The shepherd-swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May-morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me, and be my love.
 

C. Marlowe.

THE FLOWERS O’ THE FOREST

 
I’ve heard them lilting, at the ewe-milking,
Lasses a’ lilting, before dawn o’ day;
But now they are moaning, on ilka green loaning;
The Flowers o’ the Forest are a’ wede awae.
 
 
At bughts, in the morning, nae blythe lads are scorning;
Lasses are lonely, and dowie, and wae;
Nae daffing, nae gabbing, but sighing and sabbing;
Ilk ane lifts her leglin, and hies her awae.
 
 
In har’st, at the shearing, nae youths now are jeering,
Bandsters are lyart, and runkled, and gray;
At fair, or at preaching, nae wooing, nae fleeching;
The Flowers o’ the Forest are a’ wede awae.
 
 
At e’en, in the gloaming, nae younkers are roaming
‘Bout stacks, wi’ the lasses at bogles to play;
But ilk maid sits dreary, lamenting her dearie —
The Flowers o’ the Forest are weded awae.
 
 
Dool and wae for the order, sent our lads to the Border!
The English, for ance, by guile wan the day;
The Flowers o’ the Forest, that fought aye the foremost,
The prime of our land, are cauld in the clay.
 
 
We’ll hear nae mair lilting, at the ewe-milking;
Women and bairns are heartless and wae:
Sighing and moaning, on ilka green loaning —
The Flowers o’ the Forest are a’ wede awae.
 

E. Elliott.

ULALUME

I

 
The skies they were ashen and sober;
The leaves they were crispèd and sere, —
The leaves they were withering and sere;
It was night in the lonesome October
Of my most immemorial year;
It was hard by the dim lake of Auber,
In the misty mid region of Weir, —
It was down by the dank tarn of Auber,
In the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.
 

II

 
Here once, through an alley Titanic
Of cypress, I roamed with my Soul, —
Of cypress, with Psyche, my Soul.
These were days when my heart was volcanic
As the scoriac rivers that roll, —
As the lavas that restlessly roll
Their sulphurous currents down Yaanek
In the ultimate climes of the pole, —
That groan as they roll down Mount Yaanek
In the realms of the boreal pole.
 

III

 
Our talk had been serious and sober,
But our thoughts they were palsied and sere, —
Our memories were treacherous and sere;
For we knew not the month was October,
And we marked not the night of the year
(Ah, night of all nights in the year!)
We noted not the dim lake of Auber —
(Though once we had journeyed down here),
Remembered not the dank tarn of Auber,
Nor the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.
 

IV

 
And now, as the night was senescent,
And star-dials pointed to morn, —
As the sun-dials hinted of morn,
At the end of our path a liquescent
And nebulous lustre was born,
Out of which a miraculous crescent
Arose with a duplicate horn, —
Astartè’s bediamonded crescent
Distinct with its duplicate horn.
 

V

 
And I said, ‘She is warmer than Dian:
She rolls through an ether of sighs, —
She revels in a region of sighs:
She has seen that the tears are not dry on
These cheeks, where the worm never dies,
And has come past the stars of the Lion:
To point us the path to the skies —
To the Lethean peace of the skies;
Come up in despite of the Lion,
To shine on us with her bright eyes;
Come up through the lair of the Lion,
With love in her luminous eyes.’
 

VI

 
But Psyche, uplifting her finger,
Said – ‘Sadly, this star I mistrust —
Her pallor I strangely mistrust —
Oh, hasten! – oh, let us not linger!
Oh, fly! – let us fly! – for we must.’
In terror she spoke, letting sink her
Wings until they trailed in the dust —
In agony sobbed, letting sink her
Plumes till they trailed in the dust —
Till they sorrowfully trailed in the dust.
 

VII

 
I replied ‘This is nothing but dreaming:
Let us on by this tremulous light;
Let us bathe in this crystalline light:
Its sibyllic splendour is beaming
With hope and in beauty to-night: —
See! – it flickers up the sky through the night!
Ah, we safely may trust to its gleaming,
And be sure it will lead us aright —
We safely may trust to a gleaming
That cannot but guide us aright,
Since it flickers up to Heaven through the night.’
 

VIII

 
Thus I pacified Psyche and kissed her,
And tempted her out of her gloom —
And conquered her scruples and gloom;
And we passed to the end of a vista,
But were stopped by the door of a tomb —
By the door of a legended tomb;
And I said, ‘What is written, sweet sister,
On the door of this legended tomb?’
She replied: – ‘Ulalume – Ulalume —
’Tis the vault of thy lost Ulalume!’
 

IX

 
Then my heart it grew ashen and sober
As the leaves that were crisped and sere,
As the leaves that were withering and sere;
And I cried – ‘It was surely October
On this very night of last year,
That I journeyed – I journeyed down here —
That I brought a dread burden down here!
On this night of all nights in the year;
Ah, what demon has tempted me here?
Well I know, now, this dim lake of Auber —
This misty mid region of Weir —
Well I know, now, this dank tarn of Auber, —
This ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.’
 

E. A. Poe.

KUBLA KHAN

A VISION IN A DREAM

 
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills
Where blossom’d many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.
 
 
But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted
As e’er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover!
And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething
As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,
A mighty fountain momently was forced:
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher’s flail;
And ’mid these dancing rocks at once and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,
Then reach’d the caverns measureless to man,
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:
And ’mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war!
The shadow of the dome of pleasure
Floated midway on the waves;
Where was heard the mingled measure
From the fountain and the caves.
It was a miracle of rare device,
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!
 
 
A damsel with a dulcimer
In a vision once I saw:
It was an Abyssinian maid,
And on her dulcimer she played,
Singing of Mount Abora.
Could I revive within me
Her symphony and song,
To such a deep delight ’twould win me
That with music loud and long,
I would build that dome in air,
That sunny dome! Those caves of ice!
And all who heard should see them there
And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of Paradise.
 

S. T. COLERIDGE.

L’ALLEGRO

 
Hence, loathèd Melancholy,
Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born
In Stygian cave forlorn
’Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights unholy!
Find out some uncouth cell
Where brooding Darkness spreads his jealous wings
And the night-raven sings;
There under ebon shades, and low-brow’d rocks
As ragged as thy locks,
In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell.
 
 
But come, thou Goddess fair and free,
In heaven yclept Euphrosynè,
And by men, heart-easing Mirth,
Whom lovely Venus at a birth
With two sister Graces more
To ivy-crownèd Bacchus bore:
Or whether (as some sager sing)
The frolic wind that breathes the spring
Zephyr, with Aurora playing,
As he met her once a-Maying —
There on beds of violets blue
And fresh-blown roses wash’d in dew
Fill’d her with thee, a daughter fair,
So buxom, blithe, and debonair.
Haste thee, Nymph, and bring with thee
Jest, and youthful jollity,
Quips, and cranks, and wanton wiles,
Nods, and becks, and wreathèd smiles
Such as hang on Hebe’s cheek,
And love to live in dimple sleek;
Sport that wrinkled Care derides,
And Laughter holding both his sides: —
Come, and trip it as you go
On the light fantastic toe;
And in thy right hand lead with thee
The mountain nymph, sweet Liberty;
And if I give thee honour due,
Mirth, admit me of thy crew,
To live with her, and live with thee
In unreprovèd pleasures free;
To hear the lark begin his flight
And singing startle the dull night
From his watch-tower in the skies,
Till the dappled dawn doth rise;
Then to come, in spite of sorrow,
And at my window bid good-morrow
Through the sweetbriar, or the vine,
Or the twisted eglantine:
While the cock with lively din
Scatters the rear of darkness thin,
And to the stack, or the barn-door,
Stoutly struts his dames before:
Oft listening how the hounds and horn
Cheerly rouse the slumbering morn:
From the side of some hoar hill,
Through the high wood echoing shrill.
Sometime walking, not unseen,
By hedge-row elms, on hillocks green,
Right against the eastern gate
Where the great Sun begins his state
Robed in flames and amber light;
The clouds in thousand liveries dight;
While the ploughman, near at hand,
Whistles o’er the furrow’d land,
And the milkmaid singeth blithe,
And the mower whets his scythe,
And every shepherd tells his tale
Under the hawthorn in the dale.
Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures
Whilst the landscape round it measures;
Russet lawns, and fallows gray,
Where the nibbling flocks do stray;
Mountains, on whose barren breast
The labouring clouds do often rest;
Meadows trim with daisies pied,
Shallow brooks, and rivers wide;
Towers and battlements it sees
Bosom’d high in tufted trees,
Where perhaps some Beauty lies,
The Cynosure of neighbouring eyes.
Hard by, a cottage chimney smokes
From betwixt two agèd oaks,
Where Corydon and Thyrsis, met,
Are at their savoury dinner set
Of herbs, and other country messes
Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses;
And then in haste her bower she leaves
With Thestylis to bind the sheaves;
Or, if the earlier season lead,
To the tann’d haycock in the mead.
Sometimes with secure delight
The upland hamlets will invite,
When the merry bells ring round,
And the jocund rebecks sound
To many a youth and many a maid,
Dancing in the chequer’d shade;
And young and old come forth to play
On a sunshine holy-day,
Till the live-long daylight fail:
Then to the spicy nut-brown ale,
With stories told of many a feat,
How faery Mab the junkets eat;
She was pinch’d, and pull’d, she said;
And he, by friar’s lantern led;
Tells how the drudging Goblin sweat
To earn his cream-bowl duly set,
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn,
His shadowy flail hath thresh’d the corn
That ten day-labourers could not end;
Then lies him down the lubber fiend,
And, stretch’d out all the chimney’s length,
Basks at the fire his hairy strength;
And crop-full out of doors he flings,
Ere the first cock his matin rings.
Thus done the tales, to bed they creep.
By whispering winds soon lulled asleep.
Tower’d cities please us then
And the busy hum of men,
Where throngs of knights and barons bold,
In weeds of peace high triumphs hold,
With store of ladies, whose bright eyes
Rain influence, and judge the prize
Of wit or arms, while both contend
To win her grace, whom all commend.
There let Hymen oft appear
In saffron robe, with taper clear,
And pomp, and feast, and revelry,
With mask, and antique pageantry:
Such sights as youthful poets dream
On summer eves by haunted stream.
Then to the well-trod stage anon,
If Jonson’s learned sock be on,
Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy’s child.
Warble his native wood-notes wild.
And ever against eating cares
Lap me in soft Lydian airs
Married to immortal verse,
Such as the meeting soul may pierce
In notes, with many a winding bout
Of linkèd sweetness long drawn out;
With wanton heed and giddy cunning,
The melting voice through mazes running,
Untwisting all the chains that tie
The hidden soul of harmony;
That Orpheus’ self may heave his head
From golden slumber, on a bed
Of heap’d Elysian flowers, and hear
Such strains as would have won the ear
Of Pluto, to have quite set free
His half-regain’d Eurydicè.
These delights if thou canst give,
Mirth, with thee I mean to live.
 

J. Milton