Christina G. Rossetti

From the antique

It's a weary life, it is, she said:
Doubly blank in a woman's lot:
I wish and I wish I were a man:
Or, better then any being, were not:

Were nothing at all in all the world,
Not a body and not a soul:
Not so much as a grain of dust
Or a drop of water from pole to pole.

Still the world would wag on the same,
Still the seasons go and come:
Blossoms bloom as in days of old,
Cherries ripen and wild bees hum.

None would miss me in all the world,
How much less would care or weep:
I should be nothing, while all the rest
Would wake and weary and fall asleep.

Later life

Something this foggy day, a something which
Is neither of this fog nor of today,
Has set me dreaming of the winds that play
Past certain cliffs, along one certain beach,
And turn the topmost edge of waves to spray:
Ah pleasant pebbly strand so far away,
So out of reach while quite within my reach,
As out of reach as India or Cathay!
I am sick of where I am and where I am not,
I am sick of foresight and of memory,
I am sick of all I have and all I see,
I am sick of self, and there is nothing new;
Oh weary impatient patience of my lot!
Thus with myself: how fares it, Friends, with you?

Sleeping at last

Sleeping at last, the trouble and tumult over,
Sleeping at last, the struggle and horror past,
Cold and white, out of sight of friend and of lover,
Sleeping at last.

No more a tired heart downcast or overcast,
No more pangs that wring or shifting fears that hover,
Sleeping at last in a dreamless sleep locked fast.

Fast asleep. Singing birds in their leafy cover
Cannot wake her, nor shake her the gusty blast.
Under the purple thyme and the purple clover
Sleeping at last.

Twice

I took my heart in my hand
(O my love, O my love),
I said: Let me fall or stand,
Let me live or die,
But this once hear me speak-
(O my love, O my love)-
Yet a woman's words are weak;
You should speak, not I.

You took my heart in your hand
With a friendly smile,
With a critical eye you scanned,
Then set it down,
And said: It is still unripe,
Better wait a while;
Wait while the skylarks pipe,
Till the corn grows brown

As you set it down it broke-
Broke, but I did not wince;
I smiled at the speech you spoke,
At your judgment that I heard:
But I have not often smiled
Since then, nor questioned since,
Nor cared for corn-flowers wild,
Nor sung with the singing bird.

I take my heart in my hand,
O my God, O my God,
My broken heart in my hand:
Thou hast seen, judge Thou
My hope was written on sand,
O my God, O my God:
Now let Thy judgment stand-
Yea, judge me now

This contemned of a man,
This marred one heedless day,
This heart take Thou to scan
Both within and without:
Refine with fire its gold,
Purge Thou its dross away-
Yea, hold it in Thy hold,
Whence none can pluck it out.

I take my heart in my hand-
I shall not die, but live-
Before Thy face I stand;
I, for Thou callest such:
All that I have I bring,
All that I am I give,
Smile Thou and I shall sing,
But shall not question much.

Cousin Kate

I was a cottage maiden
      Hardened by sun and air
Contented with my cottage mates,
      Not mindful I was fair.
Why did a great lord find me out,
      And praise my flaxen hair?
Why did a great lord find me out,
      To fill my heart with care?

He lured me to his palace home -
      Woe's me for joy thereof-
To lead a shameless shameful life,
      His plaything and his love.
He wore me like a silken knot,
      He changed me like a glove;
So now I moan, an unclean thing,
      Who might have been a dove.

O Lady kate, my cousin Kate,
      You grew more fair than I:
He saw you at your father's gate,
      Chose you, and cast me by.
He watched your steps along the lane,
      Your work among the rye;
He lifted you from mean estate
      To sit with him on high.

Because you were so good and pure
      He bound you with his ring:
The neighbors call you good and pure,
      Call me an outcast thing.
Even so I sit and howl in dust,
      You sit in gold and sing:
Now which of us has tenderer heart?
      You had the stronger wing.

O cousin Kate, my love was true,
      Your love was writ in sand:
If he had fooled not me but you,
      If you stood where I stand,
He'd not have won me with his love
      Nor bought me with his land;
I would have spit into his face
      And not have taken his hand.

Yet I've a gift you have not got,
      And seem not like to get:
For all your clothes and wedding-ring
      I've little doubt you fret.
My fair-haired son, my shame, my pride,
      Cling closer, closer yet:
Your father would give his lands for one
      To wear his coronet.

Sappho

I sigh at day-dawn, and I sigh
When the dull day is passing by.
I sigh at evening, and again
I sigh when night brings sleep to men.
Oh! it were far better to die
Than thus forever mourn and sigh,
And in death's dreamless sleep to be
Unconscious that none weep for me;
Eased from my weight of heaviness,
Forgetful of forgetfulness,
Resting from care and pain and sorrow
Thro' the long night that knows no morrow;
Living unloved, to die unknown,
Unwept, untended, and alone.

A Pause

They made the chamber sweet with flowers and leaves,
      And the bed sweet with flowers on which I lay;
      While my soul, love-bound, loitered on its way.
I did not hear the birds about the eaves,
Nor hear the reapers talk among the sheaves:
      Only my soul kept watch from day to day,
My thirsty soul kept watch for one away:--
Perhaps he loves, I thought, remembers, grieves.
At length there came the step upon the stair,
      Upon the lock the old familiar hand:
Then first my spirit seemed to scent the air
      Of Paradise; then first the tardy sand
Of time ran golden; and I felt my hair
      Put on a glory,and my soul expand.

A Study (A Soul)

She stands as pale as Parian statues stand;
      Like Cleopatra when she turned at bay,
      And felt her strength above the Roman sway,
And felt the aspic writhing in her hand.
Her face is steadfast toward the shadowy land,
      For dim beyond it looms the light of day;
      Her feet are steadfast; all the arduous way
That foot-track hath not wavered on the sand.
She stands there like a beacon thro' the night,
      A pale clear beacon where the storm-drift is;
She stands alone, a wonder deathly white;
She stands there patient, nerved with inner might,
      Indomitable in her feebleness,
Her face and will athirst against the light.

Cobwebs

It is a land with neither night nor day,
      Nor heat nor cold, nor any wind, nor rain,
      Nor hills nor valleys; but one even plain
Stretches thro' long unbroken miles away:
While thro' the sluggish air a twilight grey
      Broodeth; no moons or seasons wax and wane,
      No ebb and flow are there among the main,
No bud-time no leaf-falling there for aye,
No ripple on the sea, no shifting sand,
      No beat of wings to stir the stagnant space,
And loveless sea: no trace of days before,
      No guarded home, no time-worn restingplace
No future hope no fear forevermore.

In an Artist's Studio

One face looks out from all his canvasses,
      One selfsame figure sits or walks or leans;
      We found her hidden just behind those screens,
That mirror gave back all her loveliness.
A queenin opal or in ruby dress,
      A nameless girl in freshest summer greens,
      A saint, an angel;--every canvass means
The same one meaning, neither more nor less.
He feeds upon her face by day and night,
      And she with true kind eyes looks back on him
Fair as the moon and joyfull as the light;
      Not wan with waiting, not with sorrow dim;
Not as she is, but was when hope shone bright;
      Not as she is, but as she fills his dream.

Winter: My Secret

I tell my secret? No indeed, not I:
Perhaps some day, who knows?
But not today; it froze, and blows and snows,
And you're too curious: fie!
You want to hear it? well:
Only, my secret's mine, and I won't tell.

Or, after all, perhaps there's none:
Suppose there is no secret after all,
But only just my fun.
Today's a nipping day, a biting day;
In which one wants a shawl,
A veil, a cloak, and other wraps:
I cannot ope to everyone who taps,
And let the draughts come whistling thro' my hall;
Come bounding and surrounding me,
Come buffeting, astounding me,
Nipping and clipping thro' my wraps and all.
I wear my mask for warmth: who ever shows
His nose to Russian snows
To be pecked at by every wind that blows?
You would not peck? I thank you for good will,
Believe, but leave the truth untested still.

Spring's an expansive time: yet I don't trust
March with its peck of dust,
Nor April with its rainbow-crowned brief showers,
Nor even May, whose flowers
One frost may wither thro' the sunless hours.

Perhaps some languid summer day,
WHen drowsy birds sing less and less,
And golden fruit is ripening to excess,
If there's not too much sun nor too much cloud,
And the warm wind is neither still nor loud,
Perhaps my secret I may say,
Or you may guess.