The poetical works of George MacDonald in two volumes - Volume 1, George MacDonald [universal ebook reader txt] 📗

Even the mocking purple truthful hung
On thy true shoulders, bleeding its folds among,
For thou wast king, art king for evermore!
I know the Father: he knows me the truth .
Truth-witness, therefore the one essential king,
With thee I die, with thee live worshipping!
O human God, O brother, eldest born,
Never but thee was there a man in sooth,
Never a true crown but thy crown of thorn!


A MEMORIAL OF AFRICA .


I.

Upon a rock I sat-a mountain-side,
Far, far forsaken of the old sea's lip;
A rock where ancient waters' rise and dip,
Recoil and plunge, eddy, and oscillant tide,
Had worn and worn, while races lived and died,
Involved channels. Where the sea-weed's drip
Followed the ebb, now crumbling lichens sip
Sparse dews of heaven that down with sunset slide.
I sat long-gazing southward. A dry flow
Of withering wind sucked up my drooping strength,
Itself weak from the desert's burning length.
Behind me piled, away and up did go
Great sweeps of savage mountains-up, away,
Where snow gleams ever, panthers roam, they say.


II.

This infant world has taken long to make,
Nor hast Thou done with it, but mak'st it yet,
And wilt be working on when death has set
A new mound in some churchyard for my sake.
On flow the centuries without a break;
Uprise the mountains, ages without let;
The lichens suck; the hard rock's breast they fret;
Years more than past, the young earth yet will take.
But in the dumbness of the rolling time,
No veil of silence shall encompass me-
Thou wilt not once forget and let me be;
Rather wouldst thou some old chaotic prime
Invade, and, moved by tenderness sublime,
Unfold a world, that I, thy child, might see.


A. M. D .


Methinks I see thee, lying straight and low,
Silent and darkling, in thy earthy bed,
The mighty strength in which I trusted, fled,
The long arms lying careless of kiss or blow;
On thy tall form I see the night-robe flow
Down from the pale, composed face-thy head
Crowned with its own dark curls: though thou wast dead,
They dressed thee as for sleep, and left thee so!
My heart, with cares and questionings oppressed,
Not oft since thou didst leave us turns to thee;
But wait, my brother, till I too am dead,
And thou shalt find that heart more true, more free,
More ready in thy love to take its rest,
Than when we lay together in one bed.


TO GARIBALDI-WITH A BOOK .


When at Philippi, he who would have freed
Great Rome from tyrants, for the season brief
That lay 'twixt him and battle, sought relief
From painful thoughts, he in a book did read,
That so the death of Portia might not breed
Unmanful thoughts, and cloud his mind with grief:
Brother of Brutus, of high hearts the chief,
When thou at length receiv'st thy heavenly meed,
And I have found my hoping not in vain,
Tell me my book has wiled away one pang
That out of some lone sacred memory sprang,
Or wrought an hour's forgetfulness of pain,
And I shall rise, my heart brimful of gain,
And thank my God amid the golden clang.


TO S. F. S .


They say that lonely sorrows do not chance:
More gently, I think, sorrows together go;
A new one joins the funeral gliding slow
With less of jar than when it breaks the dance.
Grief swages grief, and joy doth joy enhance;
Nature is generous to her children so.
And were they quick to spy the flowers that blow,
As quick to feel the sharp-edged stones that lance
The foot that must walk naked in life's way,-
Blest by the roadside lily, free from fear,
Oftener than hurt by dash of flinty spear,
They would walk upright, bold, and earnest-gay;
And when the soft night closed the weary day,
Would sleep like those that far-off music hear.


RUSSELL GURNEY .


In that high country whither thou art gone,
Right noble friend, thou walkest with thy peers,
The gathered great of many a hundred years!
Few are left like thee-few, I say, not none,
Else were thy England soon a Babylon,
A land of outcry, mockery, and tears!
Higher than law, a refuge from its fears,
Wast thou, in whom embodied Justice shone.
The smile that gracious broke on thy grand face
Was like the sunrise of a morn serene
Among the mountains, making sweet their awe.
Thou both the gentle and the strong didst draw;
Thee childhood loved, and on thy breast would lean,
As, whence thou cam'st, it knew the lofty place.


TO ONE THREATENED WITH BLINDNESS .


I.

Lawrence, what though the world be growing dark,
And twilight cool thy potent day inclose!
The sun, beneath the round earth sunk, still glows
All the night through, sleepless and young and stark.
Oh, be thy spirit faithful as the lark,
More daring: in the midnight of thy woes,
Dart through them, higher than earth's shadow goes,
Into the Light of which thou art a spark!
Be willing to be blind-that, in thy night,
The Lord may bring his Father to thy door,
And enter in, and feast thy soul with light.
Then shall thou dream of darksome ways no more,
Forget the gloom that round thy windows lies,
And shine, God's house, all radiant in our eyes.


II.

Say thou, his will be done who is the good!
His will be borne who knoweth how to bear!
Who also in the night had need of prayer,
Both when awoke divinely longing mood,
And when the power of darkness him withstood.
For what is coming take no jot of care:
Behind, before, around thee as the air,
He o'er thee like thy mother's heart will brood.
And when thou hast wearied thy wings of prayer,
Then fold them, and drop gently to thy nest,
Which is thy faith; and make thy people blest
With what thou bring'st from that ethereal height,
Which whoso looks on thee will straightway share:
He needs no eyes who is a shining light!


TO AUBREY DE VERE .


Ray of the Dawn of Truth, Aubrey de Vere,
Forgive my play fantastic with thy name,
Distilling its true essence by the flame
Which Love 'neath Fancy's limbeck lighteth clear.
I know not what thy semblance, what thy cheer;
If, as thy spirit, hale thy bodily frame,
Or furthering by failure each high aim;
If green thy leaf, or, like mine, growing sear;
But this I think, that thou wilt, by and by-
Two journeys stoutly, therefore safely trod-
We laying down the staff, and He the rod-
So look on me I shall not need to cry-
"We must be brothers, Aubrey, thou and I:
We mean the same thing-will the will of God!"


GENERAL GORDON .


I.

Victorious through failure! faithful Lord,
Who for twelve angel legions wouldst not pray
From thine own country of eternal day,
To shield thee from the lanterned traitor horde,
Making thy one rash servant sheathe his sword!-
Our long retarded legions, on their way,
Toiling through sands, and shouldering Nile's down-sway,
To reach thy soldier, keeping at thy word,
Thou sawest foiled-but glorifiedst him,
Over ten cities giving him thy rule!
We will not mourn a star that grew not dim,
A soldier-child of God gone home from school!
A dregless cup, with life brimmed, he did quaff,
And quaffs it now with Christ's imperial staff!


II.

Another to the witnesses' roll-call
Hath answered, "Here I am!" and so stept out-
With willingness crowned everywhere about,
Not the head only, but the body all,
In one great nimbus of obedient fall,
His heart's blood dashing in the face of doubt-
Love's last victorious stand amid the rout!
-Silence is left, and the untasted gall.
No chariot with ramping steeds of fire
The Father sent to fetch his man-child home;
His brother only called, "My Gordon, come!"
And like a dove to heaven he did aspire,
His one wing Death, his other, Heart's-desire.
-Farewell a while! we climb where thou hast clomb!


THE CHRYSALIS .


Methought I floated sightless, nor did know
That I had ears until I heard the cry
As of a mighty man in agony:
"How long, Lord, shall I lie thus foul and slow?
The arrows of thy lightning through me go,
And sting and torture me-yet here I lie
A shapeless mass that scarce can mould a sigh!"
The darkness thinned; I saw a thing below
Like sheeted corpse, a knot at head and feet.
Slow clomb the sun the mountains of the dead,
And looked upon the world: the silence broke!
A blinding struggle! then the thunderous beat
Of great exulting pinions stroke on stroke!
And from that world a mighty angel fled.


THE SWEEPER OF THE FLOOR .


Methought that in a solemn church I stood.
Its marble acres, worn with knees and feet,
Lay spread from door to door, from street to street.
Midway the form hung high upon the rood
Of him who gave his life to be our good;
Beyond, priests flitted, bowed, and murmured meet,
Among the candles shining still and sweet.
Men came and went, and worshipped as they could-
And still their dust a woman with