Читать книгу The Rainbow and the Rose - Эдит Несбит - Страница 2

  LAID close to Death, these many thousand years,

  In this small seed Life hid herself and smiled;

  So well she hid, Death was at least beguiled,

  Set free the grain—and lo! the sevenfold ears!

  Warmed by the sun, wooed by the wind's soft word,

  Under blue canopy they hold their state:

  For this, ah, was it not worth while to wait

  Through all the centuries of hope deferred?

  What could they know who laid the seed with Death

  Of this Divine fruition fixed and planned?

  Love—since Life parts us—lend my hand your hand

  And look with me into the eyes of faith.

  For here between your hand and mine there lies

  A little seed we trust to Death to keep

  Through unimagined centuries of sleep

  Until the day when Life shall bid it rise.

  Our harvest waits us. Who knows where or how,

  What worlds away, wrapped in what coil of pain?

  But Life shall bid us pluck gold sevenfold grain

  Grown from the love she bids us bury now.

  MY beautiful beech, your smooth grey coat is trimmed

  With letters. Once, each stood for all things dear

  To foolish lovers, dead this many a year,

  Whose lamp of lighted love so soon was dimmed.

  You have seen them come and go,

  And heard their kisses and vows

  Under your boughs,

  The pitiful vows they swore,

  Have seen their poor tears flow,

  Have seen them part; to meet, and to return, no more!

  And in old winters, through your branches bare,

  The north wind drove the blue home-scented smoke

  That on the glowing Christmas hearth awoke

  Where the old logs, with eager flicker and flare,

  Sang their low crackling song

  Of peace and of good will.

  The old song is still,

  The old voices have died away,

  The hearth has been cold so long,

  And the bright faces dimmed and covered up with clay.

  And summer after summer wakes to glow

  The ordered pleasance with the clipped box-hedge,

  The drooping lilac by the old moat's edge,

  The roses, that throw you kisses from below,

  The orchard pink and white,

  The sedge's whispered words,

  The nesting birds,

  All these return to revel round your feet.

  And in the untroubled night

  The nightingale still sings, the jasmine still is sweet.

  My beautiful beech, I carve upon you here

  The master-letter which begins her name

  Through whom, to me, the royal summer came,

  And nightingale and rose, and all things dear.

  And, in some far-off time,

  I shall come here, weary and old,

  When the hearth in my heart is cold

  And the birds that nest there flown;

  I will remember this summer in all its prime

  And say, "There was a day—

  Thank God, the Giver, an unforgotten day,

  When I walked here, not alone,

  —O God of pity and sorrow, not alone!"

  WAKE, do you wake in the dark in the strange far place,

  Window and door not set like the ones we knew,

  Leaning your face through the dark for another face,

  Stretching your arms to the arms that are far from you,

  Even as I, through the depth of this darkness, do?

  Sleep, do you sleep in the house in the lonely land?

  In the lonely room do you hear no steps draw near?

  Do you miss in the darkness the hand that implores your hand,

  See through the darkness your last dream disappear,

  And weep, as I weep, in the outer darkness here?

  Dream, do you dream? Nay, never a dream will stay,

  Never a phantom is fond, or a vision kind.

  Your dreams elude you and fly through the dark my way,

  My dreams fly forth to you whom they may not find;

  And we in the darkness weep, we weep and are left behind.

  So silent is the world to-night

  The lamp gives silence out like light,

  The latticed windows open wide

  Show silence, like the night, outside:

  The nightingale's faint song draws near

  Like musical silence to mine ear.

  The empty house calls not to me,

  "Here, but for fate, were thou and she—"

  Its gibe for once is checked. To-night

  Silence is queen in grief's despite,

  And even the longing of my soul

  Is silent 'neath this hour's control.

  O WEARY night, O weary day,

  When heart's delight is far away!

  What is the day? A frame of blue

  The vacant-glaring sun grins through.

  What is the night? A sable veil

  Through which the moon peers tired and pale.

  O weary day! O weary night!

  How far away is heart's delight!

  Love hung the sun in his high place

  To give me light to see her face,

  And love spread out the veil of night

  To hide us two from all men's sight.

  O kindly night, O pleasant day,

  Your use is gone—why should ye stay?

  My heart's delight is far away,

  O weary night, O weary day.

  If I could make a pillow for your head,

  Soft, pleasant, filled with every pretty thought;

  If I could lay a carpet where you tread

  Of all my life's most radiant fancies wrought,

  And spread my love as canopy above you,

  Your sleep, your steps should know how much I love you.

  But—as life goes, to the old sorry tune—

  I stand apart, I see thorns wound your feet,

  Your sleeping eyes resenting sun and moon,

  Your head lie restless on a breast unmeet—

  And say no word, and suffer without moan,

  Lest you should guess how much you are alone.

  I PLUCKED the blossoms of delight

  In many a wood and many a field,

  I made a garland fair and bright

  As any gardens yield.

  But when I sought the living tree

  To make new earth and Heaven new,

  I found—alas for you and me—

  Its roots were set in you.

  Oh, dear my garden, where the fruit

  Of lovely knowledge sweetly springs,

  How jealously you guard the root

  Of all enlightening things!

  AND you could leave me now—

  After the first remembered whispered vow

  Which sings for ever and ever in my ears—

  The vow which God among His Angels hears—

  After the long-drawn years,

  The slow hard tears,

  Could break new ground, and wake

  A new strange garden to blossom for your sake,

  And leave me here alone,

  In the old garden that was once our own?

  How should I learn to bear

  Our garden's pleasant ways and pleasant air,

  Her flowers, her fruits, her lily, her rose and thorn,

  When only in a picture these appear—

  These, once alive, and always over-dear?

  Ah—think again: the rose you used to wear

  Must still be more than other roses be

  The flower of flowers. Ah, pity, pity me!

  For in my acres is no plot of ground

  Whereon could any garden site be found,

  I have but little skill

  To water weed and till

  And make the desert blossom like the rose;

  Yet our old garden knows

  If I have loved its ways and walks and kept

  The garden watered, and the pleasance swept.

  Yet—if you must—go now:

  Go, with my blessing filling both your hands,

  And, mid the desert sands

  Which life drifts deep round every garden wall,

  Make your new festival

  Of bud and blossom—red rose and green leaf.

  No blight born of my grief

  Shall touch your garden, love; but my heart's prayer

  Shall draw down blessings on you from the air,

  And all we learned of leaf and plant and tree

  Shall serve you when you walk no more with me

  In garden ways; and when with her you tread

  The pleasant ways with blossoms overhead

  And when she asks, "How did you come to know

  The secrets of the ways these green things grow?"

  Then you will answer—and I, please God, hear,

  "I had another garden once, my dear".

  I HEAR the waves to-night

  Piteously calling, calling

  Though the light

  Of the kind moon is falling,

  Like kisses, on the sea

  That calls for sunshine, dear, as my soul calls for thee.

  I see the sea lie gray

  Wrinkling her brows in sorrow,

  Hear her say:—

  "Bright love of yesterday, return to-morrow,

  Sun, I am thine, am thine!"

  Oh sea, thy love will come again, but what of mine?

  ROSE of the desert of my heart,

  Moon of the night that is my soul,

  Thou can'st not know how sweet thou art,

  Nor what wild tides thy beams control.

  For all thy heart a garden is,

  Thy soul is like a dawn of May.

  And garden and dawn might both be his,

  Who from them both must turn away.

  Oh, garden of the Spring's delight!

  Oh, dewy dawn of perfect noon!

  I will not pluck thy roses white

  Or warm thy May-time into June.

  I can but bless thee, moon and rose,

  And journey far and very far

  To where the night no moonbeam shows,

  To where no happy roses are!