Volume Ii Part 37 (1/2)

Alfred Tennyson [1809-1892]

RONSARD TO HIS MISTRESS

”Quand vous serez bien vieille, le soir a la chandelle a.s.sise aupres du feu devisant et filant, Direz, chantant mes vers en vous esmerveillant, Ronsard m'a celebre du temps que j'etois belle.”

Some winter night, shut snugly in Beside the f.a.got in the hall, I think I see you sit and spin, Surrounded by your maidens all.

Old tales are told, old songs are sung, Old days come back to memory; You say, ”When I was fair and young, A poet sang of me!”

There's not a maiden in your hall, Though tired and sleepy ever so, But wakes, as you my name recall, And longs the history to know.

And, as the piteous tale is said, Of lady cold and lover true, Each, musing, carries it to bed, And sighs and envies you!

”Our lady's old and feeble now,”

They'll say: ”she once was fresh and fair, And yet she spurned her lover's vow, And heartless left him to despair.

The lover lies in silent earth, No kindly mate the lady cheers; She sits beside a lonely hearth, With threescore and ten years!”

Ah! dreary thoughts and dreams are those, But wherefore yield me to despair, While yet the poet's bosom glows, While yet the dame is peerless fair!

Sweet lady mine! while yet 'tis time Requite my pa.s.sion and my truth, And gather in their blus.h.i.+ng prime The roses of your youth!

William Makepeace Thackeray [1811-1863]

”WHEN YOU ARE OLD”

After Pierre de Ronsard

When you are old and gray and full of sleep, And nodding by the fire, take down this book, And slowly read and dream of the soft look Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;

How many loved your moments of glad grace, And loved your beauty with love false or true; But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you, And loved the sorrows of your changing face.

And bending down beside the glowing bars Murmur, a little sadly, how love fled And paced upon the mountains overhead And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.

William Butler Yeats [1865-

SONG From ”Pippa Pa.s.ses”

You'll love me yet--and I can tarry Your love's protracted growing: June reared that bunch of flowers you carry, From seeds of April's sowing.

I plant a heartfull now: some seed At least is sure to strike, And yield--what you'll not pluck indeed, Not love, but, may be, like.

You'll look at least on love's remains, A grave's one violet: Your look?--that pays a thousand pains.

What's death? You'll love me yet!

Robert Browning [1812-1889]

LOVE IN A LIFE

Room after room, I hunt the house through We inhabit together.