Part 12 (1/2)

”My son, look up, if you would see The Promise on your way, And turn a trustful face to me.”

I whispered--”Yea.”

Geraldine

My head is filled with olden rhymes beside this moaning sea, But many and many a day has gone since I was dear to thee!

I know my pa.s.sion fades away, and therefore oft regret That some who love indeed can part and in the years forget.

Ah! through the twilights when we stood the wattle trees between, We did not dream of such a time as this, fair Geraldine.

I do not say that all has gone of pa.s.sion and of pain; I yearn for many happy thoughts I shall not think again!

And often when the wind is up, and wailing round the eaves, You sigh for withered Purpose shred and scattered like the leaves, The Purpose blooming when we met each other on the green; The sunset heavy in your curls, my golden Geraldine.

I think we lived a loftier life through hours of Long Ago, For in the largened evening earth our spirits seemed to grow.

Well, that has pa.s.sed, and here I stand, upon a lonely place, While Night is stealing round the land, like Time across my face; But I can calmly recollect our shadowy parting scene, And swooning thoughts that had no voice--no utterance, Geraldine.

Achan

(From ”Jephthah”.)

Hath he not followed a star through the darkness, Ye people who sit at the table of Jephthah?

Oh! turn with the face to a light in the mountains, Behold it is further from Achan than ever!

”I know how it is with my brothers in Mizpeh,”

Said Achan, the swift-footed runner of Zorah, ”They look at the wood they have hewn for the altar; And think of a shadow in sackcloth and ashes.

”I know how it is with the daughter of Jephthah, (O Ada, my love, and the fairest of women!) She wails in the time when her heart is so zealous For G.o.d who hath stricken the children of Ammon.

”I said I would bring her the odours of Edom, And armfuls of spices to set at the banquet!

Behold I have fronted the chieftain her father; And strong men have wept for the leader of thousands!

”My love is a rose of the roses of Sharon, All lonely and bright as the Moon in the myrtles!

Her lips, like to honeycombs, fill with the sweetness That Achan the thirsty is hindered from drinking.