Delphi Complete Works of the Brontes

by Bronte Sisters

From the brink of the moss-bedded fountain —

  From the side of the wintry brae.

  But lovelier than corn-fields all waving

  In emerald, and vermeil, and gold,

  Are the heights where the north-wind is raving,

  And the crags where I wandered of old.

  It was morning: the bright sun was beaming;

  How sweetly it brought back to me

  The time when nor labour nor dreaming

  Broke the sleep of the happy and free!

  But blithely we rose as the dawn-heaven

  Was melting to amber and blue,

  And swift were the wings to our feet given,

  As we traversed the meadows of dew.

  For the moors! For the moors, where the short grass

  Like velvet beneath us should lie!

  For the moors! For the moors, where each high pass

  Rose sunny against the clear sky!

  For the moors, where the linnet was trilling

  Its song on the old granite stone;

  Where the lark, the wild sky-lark, was filling

  Every breast with delight like its own!

  What language can utter the feeling

  Which rose, when in exile afar,

  On the brow of a lonely hill kneeling,

  I saw the brown heath growing there?

  It was scattered and stunted, and told me

  That soon even that would be gone:

  It whispered, “The grim walls enfold me,

  I have bloomed in my last summer’s sun.”

  But not the loved music, whose waking

  Makes the soul of the Swiss die away,

  Has a spell more adored and heartbreaking

  Than, for me, in that blighted heath lay.

  The spirit which bent ‘neath its power,

  How it longed — how it burned to be free!

  If I could have wept in that hour,

  Those tears had been heaven to me.

  Well — well; the sad minutes are moving,

  Though loaded with trouble and pain;

  And some time the loved and the loving

  Shall meet on the mountains again!

  The following little piece has no title; but in it the Genius of a solitary region seems to address his wandering and wayward votary, and to recall within his influence the proud mind which rebelled at times even against what it most loved.

  Shall earth no more inspire thee,

  Thou lonely dreamer now?

  Since passion may not fire thee,

  Shall nature cease to bow?

  Thy mind is ever moving,

  In regions dark to thee;

  Recall its useless roving,

  Come back, and dwell with me.

  I know my mountain breezes

  Enchant and soothe thee still,

  I know my sunshine pleases,

  Despite thy wayward will.

  When day with evening blending,

  Sinks from the summer sky,

  I’ve seen thy spirit bending

  In fond idolatry.

  I’ve watched thee every hour;

  I know my mighty sway:

  I know my magic power

  To drive thy griefs away.

  Few hearts to mortals given,

  On earth so wildly pine;

  Yet few would ask a heaven

  More like this earth than thine.

  Then let my winds caress thee

  Thy comrade let me be:

  Since nought beside can bless thee,

  Return — and dwell with me.

  Here again is the same mind in converse with a like abstraction. “The Night-Wind,” breathing through an open window, has visited an ear which discerned language in its whispers.

  THE NIGHT-WIND.

  In summer’s mellow midnight,

  A cloudless moon shone through

  Our open parlour window,

  And rose-trees wet with dew.

  I sat in silent musing;

  The soft wind waved my hair;

  It told me heaven was glorious,

  And sleeping earth was fair.

  I needed not its breathing

  To bring such thoughts to me;

  But still it whispered lowly,

  How dark the woods will be!

  “The thick leaves in my murmur

  Are rustling like a dream,

  And all their myriad voices

  Instinct with spirit seem.”

  I said, “Go, gentle singer,

  Thy wooing voice is kind:

  But do not think its music

  Has power to reach my mind.

  “Play with the scented flower,

  The young tree’s supple bough,

  And leave my human feelings

  In their own course to flow.”

  The wanderer would not heed me;

  Its kiss grew warmer still.

  “O come!” it sighed so sweetly;

  “I’ll win thee ‘gainst thy will.

  “Were we not friends from childhood?

  Have I not loved thee long?

  As long as thou, the solemn night,

  Whose silence wakes my song.

  “And when thy heart is resting

  Beneath the church-aisle stone,

  I shall have time for mourning,

  And THOU for being alone.”

  In these stanzas a louder gale has roused the sleeper on her pillow: the wakened soul struggles to blend with the storm by which it is swayed: —

  Ay — there it is! it wakes to-night

  Deep feelings I thought dead;

  Strong in the blast — quick gathering light —

  The heart’s flame kindles red.

  “Now I can tell by thine altered cheek,

  And by thine eyes’ full gaze,

  And by the words thou scarce dost speak,

  How wildly fancy plays.

  “Yes — I could swear that glorious wind

  Has swept the world aside,

  Has dashed its memory from thy mind

  Like foam-bells from the tide:

  “And thou art now a spirit pouring

  Thy presence into all:

  The thunder of the tempest’s roaring,

  The whisper of its fall:

  “An universal influence,

  From thine own influence free;

  A principle of life — intense —

  Lost to mortality.

  “Thus truly, when that breast is cold,

  Thy prisoned soul shall rise;

  The dungeon mingle with the mould —

  The captive with the skies.

  Nature’s deep being, thine shall hold,

  Her spirit all thy spirit fold,

  Her breath absorb thy sighs.

  Mortal! though soon life’s tale is told;

  Who once lives, never dies!”

  LOVE AND FRIENDSHIP.

  Love is like the wild rose-briar;

  Friendship like the holly-tree.

  The holly is dark when the rose-briar blooms,

  But which will bloom most constantly?

  The wild rose-briar is sweet in spring,

  Its summer blossoms scent the air;

  Yet wait till winter comes again,

  And who will call the wild-briar fair?

  Then, scorn the silly rose-wreath now,

  And deck thee with the holly’s sheen,

  That, when December blights thy brow,

  He still may leave thy garland green.

  THE ELDER’S REBUKE.

  “Listen! When your hair, like mine,

  Takes a tint of silver gray;

  When your eyes, with dimmer shine,

  Watch life’s bubbles float away:

  When you, young man, have borne like me

  The weary weight of sixty-three,

  Then shall penance sore be paid

  For those hours so wildly squandered;

  And the words that now fall dead

  On you
r ear, be deeply pondered —

  Pondered and approved at last:

  But their virtue will be past!

  “Glorious is the prize of Duty,

  Though she be ‘a serious power’;

  Treacherous all the lures of Beauty,

  Thorny bud and poisonous flower!

  “Mirth is but a mad beguiling

  Of the golden-gifted time;

  Love — a demon-meteor, wiling

  Heedless feet to gulfs of crime.

  “Those who follow earthly pleasure,

  Heavenly knowledge will not lead;

  Wisdom hides from them her treasure,

  Virtue bids them evil-speed!

  “Vainly may their hearts repenting.

  Seek for aid in future years;

  Wisdom, scorned, knows no relenting;

  Virtue is not won by fears.”

  Thus spake the ice-blooded elder gray;

  The young man scoffed as he turned away,

  Turned to the call of a sweet lute’s measure,

  Waked by the lightsome touch of pleasure:

  Had he ne’er met a gentler teacher,

  Woe had been wrought by that pitiless preacher.

  THE WANDERER FROM THE FOLD.

  How few, of all the hearts that loved,

  Are grieving for thee now;

  And why should mine to-night be moved

  With such a sense of woe?

  Too often thus, when left alone,

  Where none my thoughts can see,

  Comes back a word, a passing tone

  From thy strange history.

  Sometimes I seem to see thee rise,

  A glorious child again;

  All virtues beaming from thine eyes

  That ever honoured men:

  Courage and truth, a generous breast

  Where sinless sunshine lay:

  A being whose very presence blest

  Like gladsome summer-day.

  O, fairly spread thy early sail,

  And fresh, and pure, and free,

  Was the first impulse of the gale

  Which urged life’s wave for thee!

  Why did the pilot, too confiding,

  Dream o’er that ocean’s foam,

  And trust in Pleasure’s careless guiding

  To bring his vessel home?

  For well he knew what dangers frowned,

  What mists would gather, dim;

  What rocks and shelves, and sands lay round

  Between his port and him.

  The very brightness of the sun

  The splendour of the main,

  The wind which bore him wildly on

  Should not have warned in vain.

  An anxious gazer from the shore —

  I marked the whitening wave,

  And wept above thy fate the more

  Because — I could not save.

  It recks not now, when all is over:

  But yet my heart will be

  A mourner still, though friend and lover

  Have both forgotten thee!

  WARNING AND REPLY.

  In the earth — the earth — thou shalt be laid,

  A grey stone standing over thee;

  Black mould beneath thee spread,

  And black mould to cover thee.

  “Well — there is rest there,

  So fast come thy prophecy;

  The time when my sunny hair

  Shall with grass roots entwined be.”

  But cold — cold is that resting-place,

  Shut out from joy and liberty,

  And all who loved thy living face

  Will shrink from it shudderingly,

  “Not so. HERE the world is chill,

  And sworn friends fall from me:

  But THERE — they will own me still,

  And prize my memory.”

  Farewell, then, all that love,

  All that deep sympathy:

  Sleep on: Heaven laughs above,

  Earth never misses thee.

  Turf-sod and tombstone drear

  Part human company;

  One heart breaks only — here,

  But that heart was worthy thee!

  LAST WORDS.

  I knew not ‘twas so dire a crime

  To say the word, “Adieu;”

  But this shall be the only time

  My lips or heart shall sue.

  That wild hill-side, the winter morn,

  The gnarled and ancient tree,

  If in your breast they waken scorn,

  Shall wake the same in me.

  I can forget black eyes and brows,

  And lips of falsest charm,

  If you forget the sacred vows

  Those faithless lips could form.

  If hard commands can tame your love,

  Or strongest walls can hold,

  I would not wish to grieve above

  A thing so false and cold.

  And there are bosoms bound to mine

  With links both tried and strong:

  And there are eyes whose lightning shine

  Has warmed and blest me long:

  Those eyes shall make my only day,

  Shall set my spirit free,

  And chase the foolish thoughts away

  That mourn your memory.

  THE LADY TO HER GUITAR.

  For him who struck thy foreign string,

  I ween this heart has ceased to care;

  Then why dost thou such feelings bring

  To my sad spirit — old Guitar?

  It is as if the warm sunlight

  In some deep glen should lingering stay,

  When clouds of storm, or shades of night,

  Have wrapt the parent orb away.

  It is as if the glassy brook

  Should image still its willows fair,

  Though years ago the woodman’s stroke

  Laid low in dust their Dryad-hair.

  Even so, Guitar, thy magic tone

  Hath moved the tear and waked the sigh:

  Hath bid the ancient torrent moan,

  Although its very source is dry.

  THE TWO CHILDREN.

  Heavy hangs the rain-drop

  From the burdened spray;

  Heavy broods the damp mist

  On uplands far away.

  Heavy looms the dull sky,

  Heavy rolls the sea;

  And heavy throbs the young heart

  Beneath that lonely tree.

  Never has a blue streak

  Cleft the clouds since morn;

  Never has his grim fate

  Smiled since he was born.

  Frowning on the infant,

  Shadowing childhood’s joy

  Guardian-angel knows not

  That melancholy boy.

  Day is passing swiftly

  Its sad and sombre prime;

  Boyhood sad is merging

  In sadder manhood’s time:

  All the flowers are praying

  For sun, before they close,

  And he prays too — unconscious —

  That sunless human rose.

  Blossom — that the west-wind

  Has never wooed to blow,

  Scentless are thy petals,

  Thy dew is cold as snow!

  Soul — where kindred kindness,

  No early promise woke,

  Barren is thy beauty,

  As weed upon a rock.

  Wither — soul and blossom!

  You both were vainly given;

  Earth reserves no blessing

  For the unblest of heaven!

  Child of delight, with sun-bright hair,

  And sea-blue, sea-deep eyes!

  Spirit of bliss! What brings thee here

  Beneath these sullen skies?

  Thou shouldst live in eternal spring,

  Where endless day is never dim;

  Why, Seraph, has thine erring wing

  Wafted thee down to weep with him?

  “Ah! not f
rom heaven am I descended,

  Nor do I come to mingle tears;

  But sweet is day, though with shadows blended;

  And, though clouded, sweet are youthful years.

  “I — the image of light and gladness —

  Saw and pitied that mournful boy,

  And I vowed — if need were — to share his sadness,

  And give to him my sunny joy.

  “Heavy and dark the night is closing;

  Heavy and dark may its biding be:

  Better for all from grief reposing,

  And better for all who watch like me —

  “Watch in love by a fevered pillow,

  Cooling the fever with pity’s balm

  Safe as the petrel on tossing billow,

  Safe in mine own soul’s golden calm!

  “Guardian-angel he lacks no longer;

  Evil fortune he need not fear:

  Fate is strong, but love is stronger;

  And MY love is truer than angel-care.”

  THE VISIONARY.

  Silent is the house: all are laid asleep:

  One alone looks out o’er the snow-wreaths deep,

  Watching every cloud, dreading every breeze

  That whirls the wildering drift, and bends the groaning trees.

  Cheerful is the hearth, soft the matted floor;

  Not one shivering gust creeps through pane or door;

  The little lamp burns straight, its rays shoot strong and far:

  I trim it well, to be the wanderer’s guiding-star.

  Frown, my haughty sire! chide, my angry dame!

  Set your slaves to spy; threaten me with shame: