ROBERT WILLIAMS BUCHANAN (1841 - 1901)

POEMS FROM OTHER SOURCES - 8

THE BACHELOR DREAMS.

THE world is dreary, I am growing old,
     Wife nor bairn makes glad my chamber still,
The wintry season cometh with its cold,
     The hearth is dark, and the wind without is shrill;
Yea! twilight gloams around me—hope and power
Depart, like scent and colour from a flower—
     Yet, where I sit, sweet music floats to me:
’Tis the falling, falling, of a silver shower
     Around a forest tree!

Ah! can I hear the scented rain intone?
     Can I hear the leaves that stir and sigh
Or hear I but the movement and the moan
     Of busy folk that hurry darkly by?
Nay!—for a white hand lies in mine, sweet eyes
Shine on me, and a happy maiden cries!
     Nay! for my blood again flows fresh and free,—
To the falling, falling, of the shower that sighs
     Around the forest tree!

And can it be so many years ago,
     Since I clasp’d her, ’neath the leaves, that summer day?
And were there words of parting, words of woe?
     Sits she among her children far away?
Can she hear the sweet and melancholy sound?
Doth she see the shining dewdrops on the ground?
     Doth she flutter like the leaves and dream of me,—
To the falling, falling, of the rain around
     The murmurous forest tree?

The city closes round me, I am old,
     Yet ’tis melody from country lanes I hear;
The wintry season cometh with its cold,
     The hearth is dark, and the end of all is near;
Yet, love, the city fadeth with its pain!
The old bright dream is drowsy on my brain!
     And my life is flowing earthward fast and free,—
To the falling, falling, of the summer rain
     Around a forest tree!

                                                                         ROBERT BUCHANAN.

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‘The Bachelor Dreams’ was published in The Argosy (No. 6, May 1866).

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Hugo the Bastard.

BY ROBERT BUCHANAN.
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I.

I PICKED this quarrel, D’Avanne, with thee,
And I thank thee for giving that death-thrust sure.
Little, I swear, did it matter to me
Whether Blanche thy mistress was stained or pure;
All that I sought, when I picked this fight,
Was a knightly death by the hand of a knight.
Hold thy kerchief, De Loye, to my breast,
And stanch the red gap as well as you can—
Ugh! Jesu be praised, I shall soon be at rest—
A priest—no, by heaven! your hand, D’Avanne.
We’re friends, I trust? you forgive the lie?
Injure you, slander you, faith not I!
Thy Blanche is as pure as my sin is small;
I questioned her purity—only to die.
And I’ve proved she is pure with my blood, that’s all.
Ah, friend, all slander is most accurst,
But the slander of one’s own eyes is the worst.
Doubt not, doubt not, doubt not, D’Avanne,
By thy faith in thy mistress ever trust,
So walk erect the full height of a man,
When I am dust.

II.

De Loye, you knew her? my wife that is dead?
Nay, man, never tremble and hang your head!
I know what I’m talking about, and moreover
The scandalmongers of dull Navarre
Have cropped the whole tale up, spawn that they are,
Chew’d the cud, too, as cattle eat succulent clover.
Let them! who hinders! not I, I swear,
I who am going to join her up there!
Hush—lift me, De Loye, prop my head on your knee—
Your hands, but come closer—and listen to me.

III.

What was I but a sin in the night
Sprung up at last to a human height,
Hugo the Bastard, sans name, sans treasure,
The mortal scum of a monarch’s pleasure?
But I strode to the Court, with my sword on loin,
Rugged of feature, but scant of coin,
Till over his golden beard smiled Francis,
And gave me some little fighting to do;
So I rose in the world by the merest chances
And rose in my own opinion too.
But look at this head, like the head of an elf;
This beak of a nose, these eyeballs yellow;
I’ve looked in the mirror and hated myself—
I was ever the same—an ill-favoured fellow!
Base-born, moreover, of no degree!
God bless her, therefore, for smiling on me.

IV.

How they stared! Just as you, De Loye, stare now!
Even King Francis made a grimace!
None of the gad-flies could understand how
A lady so perfect of form and face
Should place her white little dove of a hand
In the great black palm of M’sieu Hugo—
She did it, though! and they tied the band
Snug enough in a town where few go.
From Paris we came to Navarre, and bade
Francis adieu and his gorgeous train—
How firm I felt on my legs! how glad!
The bright blood sparkled through every vein
With the beaded brilliance of bright champagne!
I was rich, pretty rich, as you guess, by this time—
I was never a man to waste money or miss time.
And here in Navarre, at Castle Blois—
A place to be proud of, though small, we led
Such a life! a summer dream of joy!
Till she lay in the darkness and bare me my boy,
Who caught but a glimpse of her beauty and fled.
Fled? Nay, I avow, De Loye, my friend,
His soul dwelt like light on her face till the end—
Just then came a line from the King: I must fain
Ride over the mountains and fight in Spain!
I have never forgot how she looked that night
When I showed her his Majesty’s mandate to leave—
While she rose on her pillow and strained me tight,
While her wild black hair in the dim lamp-light
Sparkled dark on a bosom too stony to grieve.
But she wept not, but gazed in a pale affright
With her great dark eyes. Ay, D’Avanne was right—
Women are nobler than men believe.

V.

Off I rode! Shall I own it, not so unwilling
To return to the business of wounding and killing?
I was happy, most happy, though pleasure seemed tame,
I had feared any change, yet was pleased when it came.
Ah, we men! we male weathercocks! what are we,
That women should love us so utterly?
Off I rode, sword on hip; and was soon far away,
Tickling the Spaniard’s yellow gizzards,
Fighting, tramping, ’neath sun and star, away,
Till these cheeks of mine were as brown as lizards.
Not a scratch got I! The sharp steel shaved me
Closely as razors, and hissed as it fell—
What might have happened I cannot tell,
But on two occasions angels saved me—

VI.

Angels! Ah, I forgot: a boy—
(How I bleed!—press the kerchief closer, De Loye)—
An Italian boy, with great black eyes,
Tanned cheeks and an elfin head,
And a drooping underlip, berry-red,
Where the senses lighted like butterflies.
He turned up, pale, in the midst of the strife,
And brought me a letter from madam my wife—
Blessings, injunctions, protestations,
Kisses, prayers, asseverations;
Then: “The boy who brings you this, my Hugo,
A poor Italian, Angelo,
Craves that in battle he may with you go,
And learn what grown men, warriors, know;
Thy page, thy henchman, let him be—
I knew his mother in Italy.”
More blessings, injunctions, protestations,
Kisses, prayers, asseverations;
I kissed the letter, then turned me round
To the boy, who stood with his eyes on the ground,
With cheeks blushing ruddy as junipers,
And I liked him—because he had eyes like hers.

VII.

I made him my henchman, as she bade—
A capital henchman, too, he made,
Though once or twice, in the thick of the fight,
I fancied I saw his cheeks turn white;
Yet he bit his lips and upheld his head,
Struggled among the living and dead,
And saved my life three times, as I said.
Tanned and yellow’d, but full of fun,
Home we rode when the war was done;
Some dozen leagues from Castle Blois
I parted from Angelo, the boy,
Who promised to join me, his master, anon,
At home at the Castle. I galloped on.
And the rest was a dream, for my soul was astir,
And my heart was bounding to look on her—
Till she stood at the gate with her arms outheld,
And I slipt from the saddle and clasped her to me,
While the servants shouted, the mastiff yelled,
And a bliss like quicksilver sparkled through me!

VIII.

The very next morning there came a billet
From Francis, compelling me, willy nilly,
On urgent affairs to the Court to repair straight;
Grumbling a little, I jumped on my mare straight;
Rode, entered Paris, saw Gold Beard again,
Who held out his hand with an air that delighted me—
Who praised me galore for my doings in Spain,
And, drawing his sword, with that grace of his, knighted me.
How glorious I felt when I mounted to ride
To Marie, in the pride of my honour new-gained!
How the hedges and fields whistled by, as I strained
Every nerve of the brute, hasting on to her side;
But lo! a tried servitor met me midway—
(Tried, mark you, and true—be he damned with my hate!)
Who whispered—(now mark how De Loye turns away—
You know what he whispered, De Loye—ay, but wait!)
That the dark-eyed Italian, Angelo,
The stripling whose face I had fancied so,
Had been watched one night as he quietly crept
Into the room where my lady slept.
I listened, dumb, then white as death,
Struck the grey fiend on the mouth, and he fell,
But followed, with all the devils of hell,
As I galloped onward, and scarce drew breath
Till I came to Castle Blois by night,
When the moon was up and the fields wore a light
Like the gleam of a lamp on a face that is dead.

IX.

(Higher—and grasp me under the shoulder;
There’s a hammering, clamouring, here in my head!
I’m growing weaker—I’m growing colder!)

X.

Swiftly I sprang to my lady’s room,
The grey slave followed, and bore a lamp—
We rushed upstairs with a hasty tramp—
And, crouching back in the scatter’d gloom,
Without the door of her chamber, ho!—
His bright eyes sparkling, Angelo.
’Twas enough—by the throat I gripped him tight;
He could not speak—but his eyes were bright
With a beautiful horror, strange to see—
I hissed to the knave, “A death by steel
Were too sweet an end for such as he;
Help me to grip him neck and heel,
And place him in the great oaken chest
That lies in my chamber—for there he shall rest
Till he rot!” The grey knave, who was used to such work—
He had camped with the Arab, and smoked with the Turk—
Lent a hand, and ’twas done; and along the gloom,
The boy was borne to his living tomb:
And can I ever forget, De Loye,
That last despairing look of the boy,
Who strove in vain to utter a cry,
As we tomb’d him in silence, and left him to die?

XI.

Then strode I back, with a fiend in my soul,
These yellow eyes glaring, my face white as snow,
Firmly gripping the sword, free to settle the whole
Black account with the woman, my mistress. But no!
Her chamber was empty, the bird had fled,
I sat me down on the side of the bed,
Thought, trembled, and muttered “Let her go!”
[Raise me higher—prop my head!”
You know what the scandalmonger said.]

XII.

I kept my secret,—till now (I die!
De Loye, De Loye, bend down and hark!)
I fought, I swaggered, but by and by,
I rose one night, and groped in the dark,
Lit a lamp, and lifted the lid of the chest,
And saw HER . . . in her stripling’s raiment drest;
Her face shrivelled up, with her horror, dead eyes
Blankly staring on me—
Fair limbs twisted up in their agonies,
And . . . Marie!—Marie!

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‘Hugo the Bastard’ was published in Temple Bar (October, 1866). Apparently Buchanan wished it to appear anonymously according to this item in The Patriot (1 November, 1866):

“Then it is said Mr. Robert Buchanan is going to try what the law will do for him. His last volume of poems he dedicated to Mr. Hepworth Dixon, of the Athenæum; whereupon a critic in the Westminster Review, reviewing the volume, and who, being a poet himself, has, perhaps, a right to devote himself to ‘the choking of singing birds,’ chose to fall foul of this dedication, and to attribute ‘sycophancy’ to the poet, whereat the great wrath and the threatened lawsuit. The same plaintiff will appear in another action against Mr. Bentley, the proprietor of Temple Bar, for publishing his name as that of the author of a poem called ‘Hugo the Bastard.’ Mr. Buchanan does not deny his paternity, but as the piece is not a favourable specimen of his style he thinks that he had a right to maintain his anonymity if he chose.”

Buchanan also wrote a letter to The Athenæum on 10th November, 1866 on the same matter.

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THE SKEIN.

Slip, yes, slip your skein, my Kitty,
     O’er my hands, and wind, and wind,
All the while, with little pity,
     Tangling, tangling, heart and mind:
Kitty! eyes upon the wool!
Not on me, my beautiful!

Now you droop your eyes completely,
     Winding, winding, dreamilie;
Wherefore, wherefore smile so sweetly
     On a thing that cannot see?
If you must smile, smile this way!
I will bear it as I may!

Ah! the rosebud fingers flitting
     Swift about the colored ball!
How my heart beats time, while sitting;
     Still, I try to bear it all:
Kitty, do you know or care
’Tis my heart you’re winding there?

Kitty, I am in a vision!
     All the world to mist doth die;
Only, in an air Elysian,
     Little fairy fingers fly:
Surely, if they flit too near,
I shall catch and kiss them, dear!

Tangled! pout not, frown not, Kitty!
     Though I gladly bear the pain;
For your anger is so pretty,
     It may make me sin again.
There! ’tis well! Now, wind, and wind,
Tangling further heart and mind!

Now, ’tis done! the last thread lingers
     Sadly from me, slow to part;
Can’st thou see that in my fingers
     I am holding up my heart?
Wind and wind! I do not care!
Smile or frown! and I will bear!

Ah! so fast and quick you wind it,
     I no more can keep it mine;
Do you wonder that you find it
     Throbbing now, close, close to thine:
Tangled, tangled are the twain;
Kiss, kiss, kiss them free again!

‘The Skein’ was published in the Broadway Magazine (No. 4, December 1867). It was reprinted in The New York Times, December 8th, 1867.

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LONDON LYRICS.

No. III.—A Fashionable Love Affair.

AND so we love our cousin James?
     Trust the old woman for a seer!
Why, how the little lily flames,
     The blue eyes open, and each ear
     Hath turn’d into a rosebud, dear!
Ah! bless thee, Blanche, though I am old,
     I guessed thy secret from the first,—
Though I am ugly, patch’d, and cold,
     I’ve seen the world, its best and worst;
And ah! the world is cruel, bad, and rough;
     Not that it calls me names—it is not that!
Life after twenty-five is sad enough,
     At sixty-five, how dull and stale and flat!
Ah, child! though year on year in shame and woe
     These feet have wander’d on through weary ways,
     I never loved but once in all my days,—
Not wisely, ah! not wisely—but I know,
     When all the light of all the world has passed,
     That love will lift me up to God at last!

Blanche, little Blanche! how shall I phrase to thee
     The truth—the shame—of him I cherished so?—
A wild gallant, such as there used to be
     When I was young—’tis fifty years ago.
A ne’er-do-well, degraded, worn, and wild,
     A knight, yet fallen from his knightly state,
Brought down by wine and wicked women, child;
     But these were things I only knew too late;
And we, we Osbornes, were a race of fire—
     No lily ladies sighing over fashions—
The blood of soldiers filled me, and my sire
     Gave me quick humours and eternal passions!
And when I loved that man of evil fame—
     Ere I knew all, love grew without control—
Child, I was his for ever—pride nor shame
Could come between our spirits—he became
     A fearful part of my immortal soul.

They put stone walls between us—it was just!
     But money opens doors—we met alone—
And I besought him, on my knees, to thrust
     His evil fiend behind him, and atone!
Atone! atone! O the wild vows he swore!
     I listen’d and believed; yet he sinned on—
Then, on the threshold of my father’s door,
One moonless night, I cried, ‘I love no more!
     Thy shame has come between us—get thee gone!’
And fled into the sleeping house, and crept
     Up the dark stairs, and felt along the gloom,
     And found my mother waiting in my room,
And fell on that hard woman’s heart, and wept;
And ere I knew the terror, little one,
     Ere I awoke from that dark, vague distress,
The world had grown all dark, the wrong was done,
     And I was withering in a bridal dress.

Then came my folly—sin—it matters naught
What name they give to their unhallow’d thought!
One night—I was alone in my cold dwelling—
     My lord was heaven knows where—at rout or ball—
There came the cackle of a gossip, telling
     That he—that man—had fallen in a brawl—
         Hurt unto death—and in a lodging lay
         A street or two away.
Blanche, little Blanche! ere I could understand,
I sat by his bedside, and held his hand!

Ah! pity, pity me! All, all, was lost;
     The world had gone and all the world can gain,
All, all, save him and his sick agony,
     And those wild eyes that rolled in fever’d pain!
     O God, forgive me! for I prayed and cried:
     ‘My place is here—here, here,—by this bedside!
Nothing is left me in the world but this—
     This life that flutters o’er its opening grave—
These eyes that see not, lips that cannot kiss—
     And this is all I crave!’

But he—that man I name not—raving lay,
     Knowing me not, but dreaming of his crimes—
     And—ah, the horror!—shrieking loud at times,
In blasphemies to make the hair turn gray—
Words, Blanche, to wither up the heart and chill
     The weary love that listens on the ground;
     But mine was love more piteous, more profound,
And ’mid the red-hot shame I loved him still—
     Loved on with awfuller, intenser fire,
Loved on with Horror for my only friend,
     Loved blindly on as mighty men aspire!
And, Blanche, there came reward before the end.

It was a sombre sunset; at his side
     I kept my vigil, breathing soft and deep,
Watching his slumber, while the eventide
     Scatter’d its dusky silver on his sleep.
And, Blanche, just then he woke, and look’d at me!
     A wild, long look, bitter, without a breath!
And knew me, knew me, sinking wearily
     As if to close his eyes in angry death;
Then look’d again, and moan’d upon his bed,
     And that soft silver soften’d o’er his face;
And when, snow-pale, I bent above his head,
     The lines of shame, and sorrow, and disgrace
Faded away, and left his features wan
     As placid as a little one’s at prayer:
The great, pure soul that hides in every man
     Came up into his eyes and trembled there;
And while as gently as a mother might,
I answered that sweet light,
And moved his head upon my arm, he smiled
And kissed me, like a child;
And fainter, fainter, grew his human heart,
     And colder, colder, grew the tired bad clay,
While his diviner part
     Sweeten’d and slipt away.

And thou art pale—so pale.
Kiss me, and pardon the old woman’s tale.
There was a separation, as you’ve heard—
     My lord hush’d up the truth he never knew:
We parted quietly, without a word—
     And here I am alive at sixty-two.
What the world said, who knows? this heart of mine
     Broke not, but grew a little harder, colder,—
I lived, played cards, made gossip over wine;
I did not grieve—the loss was too divine—
     I grieve still less, my dear, now I am older.
For now I see the past with clearer eyes,
     Though people think me bad, and think aright:
The world is much amiss, but love is wise,
And what is pure one moment, I surmise,
     Is pure for ever, in the world’s despite.

                                                                         ROBERT BUCHANAN.

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‘A Fashionable Love Affair’ was published in London Society (March, 1868).

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LONDON LYRICS.

A Drawing-Room Ballad.

IN the dawn of a golden morrow
     May Marguerite went away;
Nought of sin or sorrow
     Had touched that perfumed clay.

Each morning sweeter and whiter,
     In the city dark she grew;
Here, as in places brighter,
     The clouds rain down such dew.

The splendour and power of Nature
     Rank’d little in her sight;
She was a city creature,
     Smiling by candlelight.

The nooks where Love might meet her,
     Fashion from sunshine shrouds;
Yet her hue than roses was sweeter,
     Her motion was like a cloud’s.

Wherever the gas glared brightly,
     May Marguerite tript and flew,
O’er the flower’d carpet as lightly
     As if it blossom’d and blew.

Under her gentle seeing,
     In her delicate little hand,
They placed the Book of Being,
     To read and understand.

The Book was mighty and olden,
     Yea, worn and eaten with age;
Though the letters looked great and golden,
     She could not read a page.

The letters flutter’d before her,
     And all look’d sweetly wild:
Death saw her, and bent o’er her,
     As she pouted her lips and smiled.

And weary a little with tracing
     The Book, she look’d aside,
And lightly smiling, and placing
     A flower in its leaves, she died.

She died—but her sweetness fled not,
     As fly the things of power,—
For the Book wherein she read not
     Is the sweeter for the flower.

                                                               ROBERT BUCHANAN.

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‘A Drawing-Room Ballad’ was published in London Society (July, 1868). The last five verses were published in the 1874 King edition of the Poetical Works as ‘On A Young Poetess’s Grave’.

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LONDON LYRICS.

The Faces.

A TERROR is in the city,
     By night and by day,
And whenever that terror passes
     I tremble and pray,
And the eye of my soul closes swiftly
     To shut it away.

Not the sneer of the worldling,
     The smirk of the saint,
Not the poor lost women
     With their smile of paint,
But faces, and ever faces,
     With a warning faint.

Faces, and ever faces,
     They pass on the stream,—
Piteous human faces,
     Like things in a dream;
Morning and night, and most awful
     In the gaslight gleam.

Faces, terrible faces,
     With a tale unsaid,
Fixed human faces
     Whence the light has fled,
Faces, and ever faces,
     Where the soul is dead.

Faces, lost pale faces,
     Of the rich or the poor,
Faces of hearts where meanness
     Hath eat to the core,
Faces—the signs of spirits
     That muse no more.

The sadness of these faces
     Is sad beyond belief,
Meaner than the shrill sorrow
     Of the harlot or the thief;
The gladness of these faces
     Is sadder than their grief.

Oh, there seems hope for evil,
     Though bloodiest crime befall,—
But life that hath neither beauty
     Nor foulness—it is so small!
Alas, for the frozen spirits
     That do not stir at all!

They gather the gold and raiment,
     They buy and they pay;
But, ah! at the glimpse of their faces
     I tremble and pray,
And the eye of my soul closes quickly
     To shut them away.

                                                               ROBERT BUCHANAN.

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‘The Faces’ was published in London Society (October, 1868).

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SUSPIRIA DE PROFUNDIS

BY ROBERT BUCHANAN.

(ILLUSTRATED BY J. D. WATSON.)

FIRST VOICE.

TO-NIGHT there is no moon—
     How dark and still the sky looks overhead!
I think that we shall have a snow-fall soon,
     Walk quicker? Nelly Blair’s your name, you said?
         Have you been long in London?

SECOND VOICE.

                                       Thirteen days.
     I hate it! hate the town, and all its ways!

FIRST VOICE.

And I! An ugly place! all bad, all bad!
     Hardhearted as a flint, and dull and dark!
Drink is the only comfort to be had;
     But drink gets me in trouble always. Hark!
That’s twelve o’clock. Let’s stop a minute, do!
     Here, down this quiet street—there’s no one nigh—
Sit on my shawl—I live in Lambeth too,—
     We can go home together by-and-by.
How bad your cough is! It will kill you quite
This being out at night.

SECOND VOICE.

Kill me? It’s Death who doesn’t hear me call—
’Tis killing my ownself I fear to do!
If I’d the heart I’d leap off Waterloo
This night, and end it all.

FIRST VOICE.

Ah, how you cough! You’d best go home to bed!
Are you in pain? Rise up, and let us go!

SECOND VOICE.

O Lord! O Lord! I wish that I was dead!
Look how the air is whitening. It’s the Snow.
How white it looks, how still!

FIRST VOICE.

Lean on my arm a little. You are ill!

SECOND VOICE.

Come on, come on. How white the streets are growing!
I used to like the fields when it was snowing.
This minds me of old days, and all the fun—
         That’s over now, and done—
I’ve seen my brightest days, and now I’m old—
Hark! There’s Saint Clement’s striking ‘one’—
         It’s cold! it’s cold!

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‘Suspiria de Profundis’ was published in the Christmas edition of London Society (December, 1868).

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DAME MARTHA’S WELL.

(After Christian Winther.)

Dame Martha bode in Sonderland,
     A good and gentle dame;
When the winter was long and the rich man hard,
     To her the poor folk came.

The hungry ate out of her hand,
     The sickly took her bed;
And to the sinful wrong-doer
     Sweet words of peace she said.

She was not rich in gold nor gear,
     But all might share her best:
Silver nor gold she could not give,
     But the crust she gave was blest.

There came fierce foemen from afar,
     Over the salt sea-tide:
With fire and sword they laid full low
     The hamlets far and wide.

From east to west in Sonderland
     A fire ran bloody red:
Dame Martha’s house was burnt full low,
     And its gentle lady fled.

She fled unto a lonely tower,
     To the sad kirkyard nigh,
Only the owl from his dark lair
     Looked down with round bright eye.

Hungry and thirsty she abode
     Unseen, apart from men,
Not a drop of all that she had given
     Was given to her again.

But when the dark and bloody band
     Again forsook that shore,
Dame Martha found her ruined house,
     And built it up once more.

The hungry ate out of her hand,
     The sickly took her bed,
And to the sinful wrong-doer
     Sweet words of peace she said.

For many a day unto her door
     They came from far and wide;
But many a human wanderer wept
     The day Dame Martha died.

The kirk bell sounded sad and low,
     Man, child, and woman wept;
Wearily to the sad kirkyard
     They bare her as she slept.

And when they passed the lonely tower
     Where she in need had fled,
The bearers set the black bier down,
     And prayed, and blessed the dead.

And when they prayed with tearful eyes,
     There sprang beneath the bier,
Out of the ground, a little well
     Of water, crystal clear.

And still in rocky Sonderland,
     The village gossips tell,
The sick may drink and straight be healed,
     Out of Dame Martha’s well.

God’s blessing on the gentle soul,
     Not rich in gold and gear,
That in the midst of evil days
     Gleams up like water clear.

Like crystal clear, the gentle soul
     Doth from the cold ground burst;—
God bless the little wayside well,
     Refreshing all that thirst!

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First published (anonymously) in All The Year Round (13 November, 1869) and reprinted in Good Words (October, 1870) and the Glasgow Herald (4 October, 1870) ‘Dame Martha’s Well’ is a translation of a poem by the Danish writer, Bernhard Severin Ingemann (1789-1862). An earlier English version, ‘Dame Martha’s Fountain’, was published in the article, ‘Danish and Norwegian Literature’ in The Foreign Quarterly Review (Vol. VI No. XI, 1830 - p. 83) and was reprinted in Longfellow’s anthology, Poems of Places   (1876). Buchanan mistakenly attributes the original to the Danish lyric poet, Christian Winther (1796-1876).

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A BLIND MAN’S LOVE.

BY ROBERT BUCHANAN.

I HEARD the humming of the streets for ever,
As in a sleep—the people came and went
Around my seat unseen, like shapes that pass
Unseen, but heard, in haunted lands; and oft
Light laughter and a motion close around me,
And gentle speech, disturb’d me. What to me
Was beauteous interchange of day and night—
The coming and the going of the sun,
Gathering grayness, and the rising moon—
And what to me was light of sun or stars,
Since light and darkness came and went around,
Unmark’d by weary eyes that could not see,
That had not seen the day for seven years;
Only, when sunlight daily went away,
My world grew stiller, colder—that was all.

And I was hard and dull at twenty-three,
Dull with my grief, hard to the core from dwelling,
Sleeping or waking, in the dark so long;
One, and one pleasure only had the power to stir
And trouble all my soul, until it felt
A sunshine of its own. A light foot-fall,
A tender greeting, fluttering of a dress,
A touch as soft as is a rose’s leaf,
That flutters to the grass and makes no sound.
These were the intimations of a world
Beyond my sorrow, the admonishings
Which sweeten’d that dull gloom wherein I dwelt.
O, sweeter far than any beauteous thing
The eye could look upon, one little name,
One little soft sweet name, I murmur’d o’er,
Softly, to keep my heart still: ah! the name,
The little living name I murmur’d o’er,
And saw in golden letters in the dark!
May! May! May! May!—it brought me back the time
When I could see the roses and the leaves,
The silver splash of water, the blue hills
Netted in sunny weather! May! May! May!
I murmur’d it for ever to my heart,
For joy, for joy of it! . . . Sweeter than all
To sit within my shadow-land, and hear
That one voice singing, while a little hand
I could not see, swept o’er the trembling keys,
And all the air around me seem’d to melt
Into a vapour, in whose midst there sat
One sweet girl-shape before an instrument,
Her bright curls shining, and her eyes of blue
Looking on me! Then the sweet sound would cease,
The vision made of music died away,
And I was wearying in the dark again.

At seventeen, a fever struck me down,
And I arose, and found the world was gone,
And nothing but a shadow world remain’d.
Six weary years we dwelt in London town,
My mother seeking for her stricken son
Such help and skill as only could be found
In that great cloud of sound; for such it was,
And nothing more, to me. But nought avail’d!
All skill fell powerless—still those weary eyes
Beheld not—still I wearied and grew hard—
Still moan’d and pray’d to God that I might die,
Till that new friend, a neighbour’s child, came near,
Made light of music, gave my soul within
Eyes to perceive and passion to create,
And haunted me with touch, and scent, and sound,
Such as made darkness more divine at times
Than seeing and the sunshine.
                                                 Then at last,
Strange as a trumpet wakening the dead
To wonder and white robes, came blessed light;
Light, light,—a revelation; and I saw.
Yet, for a time, the motion of the world
Look’d dim and ghostly—shapes like phantoms came—
Strange as those wondrous flashes on the ball
Of darkness, and my spirit was oppress’d
With the unaccustom’d burthen of the sense.
Slow, as a lily opens, leaf by leaf,
Light deepen’d—brightening, brightening—till at last,
Full-orb’d, great, golden as a lily’s heart,
Unclosed God’s perfect day.
                                                 Then, as I sat,
Breathless with the new bliss of the bright world,
Soft motion and the flutter of a dress
Disturb’d me. Turning, radiant as a rose,
I saw a face I knew not;—strange and meek,
Not beauteous—eyes not luminous, looks not light,
Like those which I had pictured in my dream;
Yet the face smiled upon me eagerly,
And lighten’d as it smiled,—while, darkening,
I flush’d and murmur’d inarticulate words,
And, trembling like a leaf, she cried aloud
In the same voice that I had loved so long
In darkness—in the same beloved voice
That I had fondled in my shadow-land.
“Do you not know me? I am May!” whereon
I shiver’d and felt cold.
                                       For all the world
Seem’d bitter and a cheat. The face I dream’d,
The light young delicate face with eyes of blue,
Had faded in the golden light of day;
And in its place a pensive twilight cheek,
A common creature of the clay, with eyes
Not luminous like the eyes I made it dream,
Linger’d and smiled. The world seem’d suddenly
Stale and unprofitable—all the bliss of light
Was bitter—all the fragrant sense of love
Seem’d like a wither’d feast-day posy found
At daybreak, when the revellers are gone,
In the stale-smelling ball-room of the feast.
Then I beheld her, like a frighten’d hind,
With widening eyeballs shrink, and feeling shamed
To look so coldly on my little friend,
I squeezed a feeble smile into my cheeks,
And took her hand: she, fluttering from my touch,
Stood musing; and I saw her as she lived—
A pensive woman, delicate-limb’d and small,
With brown hair braided o’er Madonna brows,
And dark eyes suffering from the gentle light
They shed on others: on her brow the light
Falling subdued and gentle. This my May!
This golden-hair, the spirit of my dream!
Nay, then, the world was bitter and a cheat!

     Ah, love, my love! come nearer. Let me kiss
The broad, pure brow; and, kissing, may I kiss
Away all sorrow. Sweeter this soft hair,
Silver’d with the miraculous snows of time,
Than all the luminous looks that e’er beguiled
Rash sailors to the shallows! Yet, at first,
This perfect face repell’d me—it arose
Coldly, like something strange, to which the voice
I knew so well seem’d alien; and I loathed
The light for changing thee!

                                 Then, for long days
The face withdrew, and left me to my thoughts.
And the streets murmur’d, and the world look’d bright,
And shadow-land had died into a dream.
Ne’er had I felt so utterly alone!
Yea, darkness had been blest society;
But now the light was solitude indeed.

Now shall I tell by what slow witchery,
Dear love, I grew to earn for those soft eyes
And that pale, asking face. How, in the light
That was as darkness, unaware, again
I hearken’d for thy foot; and how I wept,
When from a distant chamber came to mine
The trouble of thy singing. Then I cried
Thy name out loudly, like a fever’d man,
And gently up before me rose again
The twilight of thy face; and all at once
I felt I loved it—not as young men love—
Not with the fever’d humour of the flesh—
Not as I loved that wondrous face in dream—
But strangely, clingingly, and helplessly,
As weary men ask rest, as fever’d lips
Crave coolness, as in the parch’d Syrian sands,
Under the sun’s insufferable blaze,
Men seek the shadow of the locust tree.

Yea, how I love thee! Dearest, draw the blind,
And do not light the lamp, but let me sit
In darkness as of old; and play to me
The tune I loved so in my shadow-land,
When I conceived thee other than thou wert,
Yet never purer, dearer! . . . So, O Soul,
What pictures come and fade before thy sight!
All life is hush’d—the world, the daylight, fades
To twilight and a silvery star of sound!

‘A Blind Man’s Love’ was published in Routledge’s Christmas Annual (December, 1869).

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EARTH’S SHADOWS.

O PERISHABLE brother, let us pause,
Here on the bald crown of the crag, and mark,
With tight-held breath and passionate deep eyes,
The many-coloured picture. Far beneath
Sleepeth the silent water like a sheet
Of liquid mother-o’-pearl; and on its rim
A ship sleeps, and the shadow of the ship.
Astern the red sharks basking, tiny specks
Upon the brine: oh, hark! how softly sings
A wild weird ditty, to a watery tune,
The fisher among his nets upon the shore!
And yonder, far away, his shouting bairns
Are running, dwarf’d by distance small as mice,
Along the yellow sands. Behind us, see
The immeasurable mountains, rising silent
From bourne to bourne, from heathery thymy slopes,
To the grey slopes of granite; from the slopes
Of granite to the dim and ashen heights,
Where, with a silver glimmer, silently
The white cloud, pausing, sheds miraculous snow
On the heights untravell’d, whither we are bound.

O perishable brother, what a world!
How wondrous and how beauteous! Look! and think
What magic mixed the tints of yonder heaven,
Wherein, upon a cushion soft as moss,
A heaven pink-tinted like a maiden’s flesh,
The dim Star of the gloaming lieth cool
In palpitating silver, while beneath
Her image, putting luminous feelers forth,
Streams liquid, like a living thing o’ the sea!
What magic? What magician? O, my brother,
What grand magician, mixing up those tints,
Pouring the water down, and sending forth
The crystal air like breath—snowing the heavens
With luminous jewels of the day and night,
Look’d down and saw thee lie, a lifeless clod,
And lifted thee, and moulded thee to shape!
Colour’d thee with the sunlight till thy blood
Ran ruby, pour’d the chemic tints o’ the air
Thro’ eyes that kindled into azure, stole
The flesh-tints of the lily and the rose
To make thee wondrous fair unto thyself,
Knitted thy limbs with ruby bands, and blew
Into thy hollow heart until it stirred;
Then, to the inmost chamber of his heaven
Withdrawing, left, in midst of such a world,
The living apparition of a Man,
A mystery amid the mysteries,
A lonely semblance, with a wild appeal
To which no thing that lives, however dear,
Hath given a tearless answer; a shapen Soul,
Projecting ever as it ages on,
A Shade—which is a silence and a sleep!

Yet not companionless, within this waste
Of splendour, dwellest thou; here by thy side
I linger, girdled for the road like thee,
With pilgrim’s staff and scrip, and thro’ the vales
Below, the race of people like to us
Moves on together like a single cloud,
Uttering a common moan, and to our eyes
Casting a common shadow; yet each soul
Therein now moveth, with a want like thine,
Westward unto the bourne. Nor those alone,
Thy perishable brethren, share thy want,
And wander, haunted, thro’ the world; but beasts,
With that dumb hunger in their eye projects,
Their darkness; by the yeanling lambkin’s side
Its shadow plays, and the lithe lizard hath
Its image on the flat stone in the sun.
And these, the greater and the less like we,
Shall perish in their season. In the mere
The slender water-lily sees her shade,
And sheddeth sweetly on the summer air
Her farewell breathing; and the forest tree
That standeth for a hundred years, fulfils
Its daily sunset prophecy at last,
And falleth, falleth! Art thou comforted?
Nay, then, behold the shadows of the Hills,
Attesting they are perishable too,
And cry no more thou art companionless.

_____

‘Earth’s Shadows’ was published in All The Year Round (8 January, 1870). A reworked version also appears in ‘The Man and the Shadow’, the second part of The Book of Orm.

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SUMMER SONG IN THE CITY.

THIS is the time of fresh winds blowing,
     And cuckoo-calls, and heather-bells;
This is the time when streams are flowing
     Down the green mist of dreamy dells:
         Poesy, O Poesy,
         Stay in London lanes with me.

In the deep valley spring-winds hover,
     Shaking the dew from their wild hair;
Beyond the cool shade of the lover,
     The mower sweats with sleepy stare:
         Colour and sweet melody
         Fill the forest greenery.

The mavis sings, “Young lover, lover,
     Be quick, be quick—kiss sweet, kiss sweet!”
The young love breathes as sweet as clover;
     The old love hangs like ripen’d wheat—
         Misery, O Misery!
         Dost thou listen? canst thou see?

The scent of summer floateth hither,
     Into the dull streets’ whitening blaze;
The white clouds part, and eyes look thither,
     From thirsty lanes and weary ways:
         Charity, O Charity!
         Scatter thy bright seed fearlessly.

Nor shady bowers, nor summer gold,
     Pleasure the souls who lie so deep:
Only the beggar is less cold,
     And feels a drowsier thirst for sleep:
         Poesy, O Poesy!
         Whisper sweet to such as he.

When with the grain all England quivers,
     When nuts grow milky, wheat-ears burst—
When clearly sparkle all the rivers,
     Ah, to be hungry and athirst!
         Water and bread, O Charity,
         Bring to poor humanity!

Dark is the poor one’s hearth and lonely,
     He would not learn, he would not know;
He craves the blessed wheat-bread only,
     Not the sweet light that makes it grow.
         Fruit of the forbidden tree
         Were but sour to misery!

Now all the days are rich with beauty,
     And other angels roam elsewhere,
O Poesy! here lies thy duty,
     In darker days and fouler air—
         Poesy, O Poesy!
         Fold thy wings and do not flee.

While all the plains are heavy-laden,
     And richer grows the ripening ear,
Pause in thy place, O heavenly Maiden!
     Gather thy harvest with no fear,—
         Let other angels wander free,
         Say thou Amen to Charity!

                                                                   ROBERT BUCHANAN.

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‘Summer Song in the City’ was published in Good Words (April, 1871 - p.308).

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