Poems

Part 1

Transcribed from the 1903 John Lane edition by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk

Poems by Alice Meynell

Contents:

SONNET--MY HEART SHALL BE THY GARDEN SONNET--THOUGHTS IN SEPARATION TO A POET SONG OF THE SPRING TO THE SUMMER TO THE BELOVED MEDITATION TO THE BELOVED DEAD--A LAMENT SONNET IN AUTUMN A LETTER FROM A GIRL TO HER OWN OLD AGE SONG BUILDERS OF RUINS SONNET SONG OF THE DAY TO THE NIGHT 'SOEUR MONIQUE' IN EARLY SPRING PARTED REGRETS SONG SONNET--IN FEBRUARY SAN LORENZO GIUSTINIANI'S MOTHER SONNET--THE LOVE OF NARCISSUS TO A LOST MELODY SONNET--THE POET TO NATURE THE POET TO HIS CHILDHOOD SONNET AN UNMARKED FESTIVAL SONNET--THE NEOPHYTE SONNET--SPRING ON THE ALBAN HILLS SONG OF THE NIGHT AT DAYBREAK SONNET--TO A DAISY SONNET--TO ONE POEM IN A SILENT TIME FUTURE POETRY THE POET SINGS TO HER POET A POET'S SONNET THE MODERN POET AFTER A PARTING RENOUNCEMENT VENI CREATOR

DEDICATION

TO W. M.

Most of these verses were written in the author's early youth, and were published in a volume called 'Preludes,' now out of print. Other poems, representing the same transitory and early thoughts, which appeared in that volume, are now omitted as cruder than the rest; and their place is taken by the few verses written in maturer years.

SONNET--MY HEART SHALL BE THY GARDEN

My heart shall be thy garden. Come, my own, Into thy garden; thine be happy hours Among my fairest thoughts, my tallest flowers, From root to crowning petal, thine alone.

Thine is the place from where the seeds are sown Up to the sky enclosed, with all its showers. But ah, the birds, the birds! Who shall build bowers To keep these thine? O friend, the birds have flown.

For as these come and go, and quit our pine To follow the sweet season, or, new-comers, Sing one song only from our alder-trees.

My heart has thoughts, which, though thine eyes hold mine, Flit to the silent world and other summers, With wings that dip beyond the silver seas.

SONNET--THOUGHTS IN SEPARATION

We never meet; yet we meet day by day Upon those hills of life, dim and immense: The good we love, and sleep--our innocence. O hills of life, high hills! And higher than they,

Our guardian spirits meet at prayer and play. Beyond pain, joy, and hope, and long suspense, Above the summits of our souls, far hence, An angel meets an angel on the way.

Beyond all good I ever believed of thee Or thou of me, these always love and live. And though I fail of thy ideal of me,

My angel falls not short. They greet each other. Who knows, they may exchange the kiss we give, Thou to thy crucifix, I to my mother.

TO A POET

Thou who singest through the earth, All the earth's wild creatures fly thee, Everywhere thou marrest mirth. Dumbly they defy thee. There is something they deny thee.

Pines thy fallen nature ever For the unfallen Nature sweet. But she shuns thy long endeavour, Though her flowers and wheat Throng and press thy pausing feet.

Though thou tame a bird to love thee, Press thy face to grass and flowers, All these things reserve above thee Secrets in the bowers, Secrets in the sun and showers.

Sing thy sorrow, sing thy gladness. In thy songs must wind and tree Bear the fictions of thy sadness, Thy humanity. For their truth is not for thee.

Wait, and many a secret nest, Many a hoarded winter-store Will be hidden on thy breast. Things thou longest for Will not fear or shun thee more.

Thou shalt intimately lie In the roots of flowers that thrust Upwards from thee to the sky, With no more distrust, When they blossom from thy dust.

Silent labours of the rain Shall be near thee, reconciled; Little lives of leaves and grain, All things shy and wild Tell thee secrets, quiet child.

Earth, set free from thy fair fancies And the art thou shalt resign, Will bring forth her rue and pansies Unto more divine Thoughts than any thoughts of thine.

Nought will fear thee, humbled creature. There will lie thy mortal burden Pressed unto the heart of Nature, Songless in a garden, With a long embrace of pardon.

Then the truth all creatures tell, And His will whom thou entreatest, Shall absorb thee; there shall dwell Silence, the completest Of thy poems, last, and sweetest.

Part 2

SONG OF THE SPRING TO THE SUMMER

THE POET SINGS TO HER POET

O poet of the time to be, My conqueror, I began for thee. Enter into thy poet's pain, And take the riches of the rain, And make the perfect year for me.

Thou unto whom my lyre shall fall, Whene'er thou comest, hear my call. O, keep the promise of my lays, Take the sweet parable of my days; I trust thee with the aim of all.

And if thy thoughts unfold from me, Know that I too have hints of thee, Dim hopes that come across my mind In the rare days of warmer wind, And tones of summer in the sea.

And I have set thy paths, I guide Thy blossoms on the wild hillside. And I, thy bygone poet, share The flowers that throng thy feet where I led thy feet before I died.

TO THE BELOVED

Oh, not more subtly silence strays Amongst the winds, between the voices, Mingling alike with pensive lays, And with the music that rejoices, Than thou art present in my days.

My silence, life returns to thee In all the pauses of her breath. Hush back to rest the melody That out of thee awakeneth; And thou, wake ever, wake for me.

Full, full is life in hidden places, For thou art silence unto me. Full, full is thought in endless spaces. Full is my life. A silent sea Lies round all shores with long embraces.

Thou art like silence all unvexed Though wild words part my soul from thee. Thou art like silence unperplexed, A secret and a mystery Between one footfall and the next.

Most dear pause in a mellow lay! Thou art inwoven with every air. With thee the wildest tempests play, And snatches of thee everywhere Make little heavens throughout a day.

Darkness and solitude shine, for me. For life's fair outward part are rife The silver noises; let them be. It is the very soul of life Listens for thee, listens for thee.

O pause between the sobs of cares! O thought within all thought that is; Trance between laughters unawares! Thou art the form of melodies, And thou the ecstasy of prayers.

MEDITATION

Rorate Coeli desuper, et nubes pluant Justum. Aperiatur Terra, et germinet Salvatorem.

No sudden thing of glory and fear Was the Lord's coming; but the dear Slow Nature's days followed each other To form the Saviour from his Mother --One of the children of the year.

The earth, the rain, received the trust, --The sun and dews, to frame the Just. He drew his daily life from these, According to his own decrees Who makes man from the fertile dust.

Sweet summer and the winter wild, These brought him forth, the Undefiled. The happy Springs renewed again His daily bread, the growing grain, The food and raiment of the Child.

TO THE BELOVED DEAD--A LAMENT

Beloved, thou art like a tune that idle fingers Play on a window-pane. The time is there, the form of music lingers; But O thou sweetest strain, Where is thy soul? Thou liest i' the wind and rain.

Even as to him who plays that idle air, It seems a melody, For his own soul is full of it, so, my Fair, Dead, thou dost live in me, And all this lonely soul is full of thee.

Thou song of songs!--not music as before Unto the outward ear; My spirit sings thee inly evermore, Thy falls with tear on tear. I fail for thee, thou art too sweet, too dear.

Thou silent song, thou ever voiceless rhyme, Is there no pulse to move thee, At windy dawn, with a wild heart beating time, And falling tears above thee, O music stifled from the ears that love thee?

Oh, for a strain of thee from outer air! Soul wearies soul, I find. Of thee, thee, thee, I am mournfully aware, --Contained in one poor mind, Who wert in tune and time to every wind.

Poor grave, poor lost beloved! but I burn For some more vast To be. As he that played that secret tune may turn And strike it on a lyre triumphantly, I wait some future, all a lyre for thee.

SONNET

Your own fair youth, you care so little for it, Smiling towards Heaven, you would not stay the advances Of time and change upon your happiest fancies. I keep your golden hour, and will restore it.

Part 3

If ever, in time to come, you would explore it-- Your old self whose thoughts went like last year's pansies, Look unto me; no mirror keeps its glances; In my unfailing praises now I store it.

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