The poetical works of George MacDonald in two volumes - Volume 2, George MacDonald [8 ebook reader TXT] 📗

I have drunk like wine
The life of thy swiftening race.

Wilt miss me, mother sweet,
A life in thy milky veins? Wilt miss the sound of my feet
In the tramp that shakes thy plains

When the jaws of darkness rend,
And the vapours fold away, And the sounds of life ascend
Like dust in the blinding day?

I would know thy silver strain
In the shouts of the starry crowd When the souls of thy changing men
Rise up like an incense cloud.

I would know thy brightening lobes
And the lap of thy watery bars Though space were choked with globes
And the night were blind with stars!

From the folds of my unknown place,
When my soul is glad and free, I will slide by my God's sweet grace
And hang like a cloud on thee.

When the pale moon sits at night
By the brink of her shining well, Laving the rings of her widening light
On the slopes of the weltering swell,

I will fall like a wind from the west
On the locks of thy prancing streams, And sow the fields of thy rest
With handfuls of sweet young dreams.

When the sound of thy children's cry
Hath stricken thy gladness dumb, I will kindle thine upward eye
With a laugh from the years that come.

Far above where the loud wind raves,
On a wing as still as snow I will watch the grind of the curly waves
As they bite the coasts below;

When the shining ranks of the frost
Draw down on the glistening wold In the mail of a fairy host,
And the earth is mossed with cold,

Till the plates that shine about
Close up with a filmy din, Till the air is frozen out,
And the stars are frozen in.

I will often stoop to range
On the fields where my youth was spent, And my feet shall smite the cliffs of change
With the rush of a steep descent;

And my glowing soul shall burn
With a love that knows no pall, And my eye of worship turn
Upon him that fashioned all-

When the sounding waves of strife
Have died on the Godhead's sea, And thy life is a purer life
That nurses a life in me.


THY HEART .

Make not of thy heart a casket, Opening seldom, quick to close; But of bread a wide-mouthed basket, Or a cup that overflows.


0 LORD, HOW HAPPY!

From the German of Dessler.

O Lord, how happy is the time
When in thy love I rest! When from my weariness I climb
Even to thy tender breast! The night of sorrow endeth there-
Thou art brighter than the sun; And in thy pardon and thy care
The heaven of heaven is won.

Let the world call herself my foe,
Or let the world allure- I care not for the world; I go
To this dear friend and sure. And when life's fiercest storms are sent
Upon life's wildest sea, My little bark is confident
Because it holds by thee.

When the law threatens endless death
Upon the dreadful hill, Straightway from her consuming breath
My soul goeth higher still- Goeth to Jesus, wounded, slain,
And maketh him her home, Whence she will not go out again,
And where death cannot come.

I do not fear the wilderness
Where thou hast been before; Nay rather will I daily press
After thee, near thee, more! Thou art my food; on thee I lean,
Thou makest my heart sing; And to thy heavenly pastures green
All thy dear flock dost bring.

And if the gate that opens there
Be dark to other men, It is not dark to those who share
The heart of Jesus then: That is not losing much of life
Which is not losing thee, Who art as present in the strife
As in the victory.

Therefore how happy is the time
When in thy love I rest! When from my weariness I climb
Even to thy tender breast! The night of sorrow endeth there-
Thou art brighter than the sun! And in thy pardon and thy care
The heaven of heaven is won!


NO SIGN .

O Lord, if on the wind, at cool of day,
I heard one whispered word of mighty grace; If through the darkness, as in bed I lay,
But once had come a hand upon my face;

If but one sign that might not be mistook
Had ever been, since first thy face I sought, I should not now be doubting o'er a book,
But serving thee with burning heart and thought.

So dreams that heart. But to my heart I say,
Turning my face to front the dark and wind: Such signs had only barred anew his way
Into thee, longing heart, thee, wildered mind.

They asked the very Way, where lies the way?
The very Son, where is the Father's face? How he could show himself, if not in clay,
Who was the lord of spirit, form, and space!

My being, Lord, will nevermore be whole
Until thou come behind mine ears and eyes, Enter and fill the temple of my soul
With perfect contact-such a sweet surprise,

Such presence as, before it met the view,
The prophet-fancy could not once foresee, Though every corner of the temple knew
By very emptiness its need of thee.

When I keep all thy words, no favoured some,
Heedless of worldly winds or judgment's tide, Then, Jesus, thou wilt with thy father come-
Oh, ended prayers!-and in my soul abide.

Ah, long delay! ah, cunning, creeping sin!
I shall but fail, and cease at length to try: O Jesus, though thou wilt not yet come in,
Knock at my window as thou passest by!


NOVEMBER, 1851 .

What dost thou here, O soul, Beyond thy own control, Under the strange wild sky? 0 stars, reach down your hands, And clasp me in your silver bands, I tremble with this mystery!- Flung hither by a chance Of restless circumstance, Thou art but here, and wast not sent; Yet once more mayest thou draw By thy own mystic law To the centre of thy wonderment.

Why wilt thou stop and start? Draw nearer, oh my heart, And I will question thee most wistfully; Gather thy last clear resolution To look upon thy dissolution.

The great God's life throbs far and free, And thou art but a spark Known only in thy dark, Or a foam-fleck upon the awful ocean, Thyself thy slender dignity, Thy own thy vexing mystery, In the vast change that is not change but motion.

'Tis not so hard as it would seem; Thy life is but a dream- And yet thou hast some thoughts about the past; Let go, let go thy memories, They are not things but wandering cries- Wave them each one a long farewell at last: I hear thee say-"Take them, O tide, And I will turn aside, Gazing with heedlessness, nay, even with laughter! Bind me, ye winds and storms, Among the things that once had forms, And carry me clean out of sight thereafter!"

Thou hast lived long enough To know thy own weak stuff, Laughing thy fondest joys to utter scorn; Give up the idle strife- It is but mockery of life; The fates had need of thee and thou wast born! They are, in sooth, but thou shalt die. O wandering spark! O homeless cry! O empty will, still lacking self-intent! Look up among the autumn trees: The ripened fruits fall through the breeze, And they will shake thee even like these Into the lap of an Accomplishment!

Thou hadst a faith, and voices said:- "Doubt not that truth, but bend thy head Unto the God who drew thee from the night:" Thou liftedst up thy eyes-and, lo! A host of voices answered-"No; A thousand things as good have seen the light!" Look how the swarms arise From every clod before thy eyes! Are thine the only hopes that fade and fall When to the centre of its action One purpose draws each separate fraction, And nothing but effects are left at all? Aha, thy faith! what is thy faith? The sleep that waits on coming death- A blind delirious swoon that follows pain. "True to thy nature!"-well! right well! But what that nature is thou canst not tell- It has a thousand voices in thy brain. Danced all the leaflets to and fro? -Thy feet have trod them long ago! Sprung the glad music up the blue? -The hawk hath cut the song in two. All the mountains crumble, All the forests fall, All thy brethren stumble, And rise no more at all! In the dim woods there is a sound When the winds begin to moan; It is not of joy or yet of mirth, But the mournful cry of our mother Earth, As she calleth back her own. Through the rosy air to-night The living creatures play Up and down through the rich faint light- None so happy as they! But the blast is here, and noises fall Like the sound of steps in a ruined hall, An icy touch is upon them all, And they sicken and fade away.

The child awoke with an eye of gladness, With a light on his head and a matchless grace, And laughed at the passing shades of sadness That chased the smiles on his mother's face; And life with its lightsome load of youth Swam like a boat on a shining lake- Freighted with hopes enough, in sooth, But he lived to trample on joy and truth, And change his crown for a murder-stake!

Oh, a ruddy light went through the room, Till the dark ran out to his mother Night! And that little chamber showed through the gloom Like a Noah's ark with its nest of light! Right glad was the maiden there, I wis, With the youth that held her hand in his! Oh, sweet were the words that went and came Through the light and shade of the leaping flame That glowed on the cheerful faces! So human the speech, so sunny and kind, That the darkness danced on the wall behind, And even the wail of the winter wind Sang sweet through the window-cases!

But a mournful wail crept round and round, And a voice cried:-"Come!" with a dreary sound, And the circle wider grew; The light flame sank, and sorrow fell On the faces of those that loved so well; Darker and wilder grew the tone; Fainter and fainter the faces shone; The wild night clasped them, and they were gone- And thou art passing too!

Lo, the morning slowly springs Like