Alice Meynell

A Letter from a Girl to Her Own Old Age

Listen, and when thy hand this paper presses,
O time-worn woman, think of her who blesses
What thy thin fingers touch, with her caresses.

O mother, for the weight of years that break thee!
O daughter, for slow time must yet awake thee,
And from the changes of my heart must make thee!

O fainting traveller, morn is gray in heaven.
Dost thou remember how the clouds were driven?
And are they calm about the fall of even?

Pause near the ending of thy long migration;
For this one sudden hour of desolation
Appeals to one hour of thy meditation.

Suffer, O silent one, that I remind thee
Of the great hills that stormed the sky behind thee,
Of the wild winds of power that have resigned thee.

Know that the mournful plain where thou must wander
Is but a gray and silent world, but ponder
The misty mountains of the morning yonder.

Listen:-the mountain winds with rain were fretting,
And sudden gleams the mountain-tops besetting.
I cannot let thee fade to death, forgetting.

What part of this wild heart of mine I know not
Will follow with thee where the great winds blow not,
And where the young flowers of the mountain grow not.

Yet let my letter with thy lost thoughts in it
Tell what the way was when thou didst begin it,
And win with thee the goal when thou shalt win it.

I have not writ this letter of divining
To make a glory of thy silent pining,
A triumph of thy mute and strange declining.

Only one youth, and the bright life was shrouded;
Only one morning, and the day was clouded;
And one old age with all regrets is crowded.

O hush, O hush! Thy tears my words are steeping.
O hush, hush, hush! So full, the fount of weeping?
Poor eyes, so quickly moved, so near to sleeping?

Pardon the girl; such strange desires beset her.
Poor woman, lay aside the mournful letter
That breaks thy heart; the one who wrote, forget her:

The one who now thy faded features guesses,
With filial fingers thy gray hair caresses,
With morning tears thy mournful twilight blesses.

A Poet of One Mood

A poet of one mood in all my lays,
     Ranging all life to sing one only love,
      Like a west wind across the world I move,
Sweeping my harp of floods mine own wild ways.
The countries change, but not the west-wind days
     Which are my songs. My soft skies shine above,
     And on all seas the colours of a dove,
And on all fields a flash of silver greys.
I made the whole world answer to my art
     And sweet monotonous meanings. In your ears
I change not ever, bearing, for my part,
     One thought that is the treasure of my years-
A small cloud full of rain upon my heart
      And in mine arms, clapsed, like a child in tears.

The Shepherdess

She walks-the lady of my delight-
     A shepherdess of sheep.
Her flocks are thoughts. She keeps them white;
     She keeps them from the steep;
She feeds them on the fragrant height,
     And folds them in for sleep.

She roams maternal hills and bright,
     Dark valleys safe and deep.
Into that tender breast at night
     The chastest stars may peep.
She walks-the lady of my delight-
     A shepherdess of sheep.

She holds her little thoughts in sight,
     Though gay they run and leap.
She is so circumspect and right;
     She has her soul to keep.
She walks-the lady of my delight-
     A shepherdess of sheep.

Renouncement

I must not think of thee; and, tired yet strong,
I shun the thought that lurks in all delight --
The thought of thee -- and in the blue heaven's height,
And in the sweetest passage of a song.
Oh, just beyond the fairest thoughts that throng
This breast, the thought of thee awaits, hidden yet bright;
But it must never, never come in sight;
I must stop short of thee the whole day long.
But when sleep comes to close each difficult day,
When night gives pause to the long watch I keep,
And all my bonds I needs must loose apart,
Must doff my will as raiment laid away --
With the first dream that comes with the first sleep
I run, I run, I am gathered to thy heart.