Written by
Charles Kingsley |
I GO down from the hills half in gladness, and half with a pain I depart,
Where the Mother with gentlest breathing made music on lip and in heart;
For I know that my childhood is over: a call comes out of the vast,
And the love that I had in the old time, like beauty in twilight, is past.
I am fired by a Danaan whisper of battles afar in the world,
And my thought is no longer of peace, for the banners in dream are unfurled,
And I pass from the council of stars and of hills to a life that is new:
And I bid to you stars and you mountains a tremulous long adieu.
I will come once again as a master, who played here as child in my dawn
I will enter the heart of the hills where the gods of the old world are gone.
And will war like the bright Hound of Ulla with princes of earth and of sky.
For my dream is to conquer the heavens and battle for kingship on high.
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Written by
Charles Kingsley |
With all my will, but much against my heart,
We two now part.
My Very Dear,
Our solace is, the sad road lies so clear.
It needs no art,
With faint, averted feet
And many a tear,
In our opposèd paths to persevere.
Go thou to East, I West.
We will not say
There 's any hope, it is so far away.
But, O, my Best,
When the one darling of our widowhead,
The nursling Grief,
Is dead,
And no dews blur our eyes
To see the peach-bloom come in evening skies,
Perchance we may,
Where now this night is day,
And even through faith of still averted feet,
Making full circle of our banishment,
Amazèd meet;
The bitter journey to the bourne so sweet
Seasoning the termless feast of our content
With tears of recognition never dry.
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Written by
Charles Kingsley |
Flow down, cold rivulet, to the sea,
Thy tribute wave deliver:
No more by thee my steps shall be,
For ever and for ever.
Flow, softly flow, by lawn and lea,
A rivulet then a river:
Nowhere by thee my steps shall be
For ever and for ever.
But here will sigh thine alder tree
And here thine aspen shiver;
And here by thee will hum the bee,
For ever and for ever.
A thousand suns will stream on thee,
A thousand moons will quiver;
But not by thee my steps shall be,
For ever and for ever.
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Written by
Charles Kingsley |
“ARE you ready for your steeplechase, Lorraine, Lorraine, Lorree?
Barum, Barum, Barum, Barum, Barum, Barum, Baree.
You’re booked to ride your capping race to-day at Coulterlee,
You’re booked to ride Vindictive, for all the world to see,
To keep him straight, and keep him first, and win the run for me.
”
Barum, Barum, Barum, Barum, Barum, Barum, Baree.
She clasp’d her newborn baby, poor Lorraine, Lorraine, Lorrèe,
Barum, Barum, Barum, Barum, Barum, Barum, Baree.
“I cannot ride Vindictive, as any man might see,
And I will not ride Vindictive, with this baby on my knee;
He ’s kill’d a boy, he ’s kill’d a man, and why must he kill me?”
“Unless you ride Vindictive, Lorraine, Lorraine, Lorree,
Unless you ride Vindictive to-day at Coulterlee,
And land him safe across the brook, and win the blank for me,
It ’s you may keep your baby, for you ’ll get no keep from me.
”
“That husbands could be cruel,” said Lorraine, Lorraine, Lorrèe,
“That husbands could be cruel, I have known for seasons three;
But oh, to ride Vindictive while a baby cries for me,
And be kill’d across a fence at last for all the world to see!”
She master’d young Vindictive—O, the gallant lass was she!
And kept him straight and won the race as near as near could be;
But he kill’d her at the brook against a pollard willow tree;
Oh! he kill’d her at the brook, the brute, for all the world to see,
And no one but the baby cried for poor Lorraine, Lorree.
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Written by
Charles Kingsley |
Welcome, wild Northeaster!
Shame it is to see
Odes to every zephyr;
Ne'er a verse to thee.
Welcome, black Northeaster!
O'er the German foam;
O'er the Danish moorlands,
From thy frozen home.
Tired are we of summer,
Tired of gaudy glare,
Showers soft and steaming,
Hot and breathless air.
Tired of listless dreaming,
Through the lazy day--
Jovial wind of winter
Turn us out to play!
Sweep the golden reed-beds;
Crisp the lazy dike;
Hunger into madness
Every plunging pike.
Fill the lake with wild fowl;
Fill the marsh with snipe;
While on dreary moorlands
Lonely curlew pipe.
Through the black fir-forest
Thunder harsh and dry,
Shattering down the snowflakes
Off the curdled sky.
Hark! The brave Northeaster!
Breast-high lies the scent,
On by holt and headland,
Over heath and bent.
Chime, ye dappled darlings,
Through the sleet and snow.
Who can override you?
Let the horses go!
Chime, ye dappled darlings,
Down the roaring blast;
You shall see a fox die
Ere an hour be past.
Go! and rest tomorrow,
Hunting in your dreams,
While our skates are ringing
O'er the frozen streams.
Let the luscious Southwind
Breathe in lovers' sighs,
While the lazy gallants
Bask in ladies' eyes.
What does he but soften
Heart alike and pen?
'Tis the hard gray weather
Breeds hard English men.
What's the soft Southwester?
'Tis the ladies' breeze,
Bringing home their trueloves
Out of all the seas.
But the black Northeaster,
Through the snowstorm hurled,
Drives our English hearts of oak
Seaward round the world.
Come, as came our fathers,
Heralded by thee,
Conquering from the eastward,
Lords by land and sea.
Come; and strong, within us
Stir the Vikings' blood;
Bracing brain and sinew;
Blow, thou wind of God!
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Written by
Charles Kingsley |
OH, England is a pleasant place for them that ’s rich and high;
But England is a cruel place for such poor folks as I;
And such a port for mariners I ne’er shall see again,
As the pleasant Isle of Avès, beside the Spanish main.
There were forty craft in Avès that were both swift and stout,
All furnish’d well with small arms and cannons round about;
And a thousand men in Avès made laws so fair and free
To choose their valiant captains and obey them loyally.
Thence we sail’d against the Spaniard with his hoards of plate and gold,
Which he wrung by cruel tortures from the Indian folk of old;
Likewise the merchant captains, with hearts as hard as stone,
Which flog men and keelhaul them and starve them to the bone.
Oh, the palms grew high in Avès and fruits that shone like gold,
And the colibris and parrots they were gorgeous to behold;
And the ***** maids to Avès from bondage fast did flee,
To welcome gallant sailors a sweeping in from sea.
Oh, sweet it was in Avès to hear the landward breeze
A-swing with good tobacco in a net between the trees,
With a ***** lass to fan you while you listen’d to the roar
Of the breakers on the reef outside that never touched the shore.
But Scripture saith, an ending to all fine things must be,
So the King’s ships sail’d on Avès and quite put down were we.
All day we fought like bulldogs, but they burst the booms at night;
And I fled in a piragua sore wounded from the fight.
Nine days I floated starving, and a ***** lass beside,
Till for all I tried to cheer her, the poor young thing she died;
But as I lay a gasping a Bristol sail came by,
And brought me home to England here to beg until I die.
And now I ’m old and going I ’m sure I can’t tell where;
One comfort is, this world’s so hard I can’t be worse off there:
If I might but be a sea-dove I ’d fly across the main,
To the pleasant Isle of Avès, to look at it once again.
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Written by
Charles Kingsley |
1 "O Mary, go and call the cattle home,
2 And call the cattle home,
3 And call the cattle home
4 Across the sands of Dee";
5 The western wind was wild and dank with foam,
6 And all alone went she.
7 The western tide crept up along the sand,
8 And o'er and o'er the sand,
9 And round and round the sand,
10 As far as eye could see.
11 The rolling mist came down and hid the land:
12 And never home came she.
13 "Oh! is it weed, or fish, or floating hair--
14 A tress of golden hair,
15 A drownèd maiden's hair
16 Above the nets at sea?
17 Was never salmon yet that shone so fair
18 Among the stakes on Dee.
"
19 They rowed her in across the rolling foam,
20 The cruel crawling foam,
21 The cruel hungry foam,
22 To her grave beside the sea:
23 But still the boatmen hear her call the cattle home
24 Across the sands of Dee.
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Written by
Charles Kingsley |
1 When all the world is young, lad,
2 And all the trees are green;
3 And every goose a swan, lad,
4 And every lass a queen;
5 Then hey for boot and horse, lad,
6 And round the world away!
7 Young blood must have its course, lad,
8 And every dog his day.
9 When all the world is old, lad,
10 And all the trees are brown;
11 And all the sport is stale, lad,
12 And all the wheels run down;
13 Creep home, and take your place there,
14 The spent and maimed among;
15 God grant you find one face there,
16 You loved when all was young.
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Written by
Charles Kingsley |
1 Three fishers went sailing away to the west,
2 Away to the west as the sun went down;
3 Each thought on the woman who loved him the best,
4 And the children stood watching them out of the town;
5 For men must work, and women must weep,
6 And there's little to earn, and many to keep,
7 Though the harbour bar be moaning.
8 Three wives sat up in the lighthouse tower,
9 And they trimmed the lamps as the sun went down;
10 They looked at the squall, and they looked at the shower,
11 And the night-rack came rolling up ragged and brown.
12 But men must work, and women must weep,
13 Though storms be sudden, and waters deep,
14 And the harbour bar be moaning.
15 Three corpses lay out on the shining sands
16 In the morning gleam as the tide went down,
17 And the women are weeping and wringing their hands
18 For those who will never come home to the town;
19 For men must work, and women must weep,
20 And the sooner it's over, the sooner to sleep;
21 And good-bye to the bar and its moaning.
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Written by
Charles Kingsley |
ONLY in my deep heart I love you, sweetest heart.
Many another vesture hath the soul, I pray
Call me not forth from this.
If from the light I part
Only with clay I cling unto the clay.
And ah! my bright companion, you and I must go
Our ways, unfolding lonely glories, not out own,
Nor from each other gathered, but an inward glow
Breathed by the Lone One on the seeker lone.
If for the heart’s own sake we break the heart, we may
When the last ruby drop dissolves in diamond light
Meet in a deeper vesture in another day.
Until that dawn, dear heart, good-night, good-night.
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