Oh long ago I told you so, I tell you so to-day : Go you your way, and let me go Just my own free way.' The sea swept in with moan and foam, Quickening the stretch of sand; They stood almost in sight of home ; He strove to take her hand. 'Oh can't you take your answer then, And won't you understand? For me you're not the man of men, I've other plans are planned. You're good for Madge, or good for Cis, Or good for Kate, may be: But what's to me the good of this While you're not good for me? ' They stood together on the beach, They two alone, And louder waxed his urgent speech, His patience almost gone: 'Oh, say but one kind word to me, Jessie, Jessie Cameron.' And by her hut far down the lane Some say they would not pass at night, Lest they should hear an unked strain Or see an unked sight. Alas for Jessie Cameron! The sea crept moaning, moaning nigher; She should have hastened to begone, The sea swept higher, breaking by her : She should have hastened to her home While yet the west was flushed with fire, But now her feet are in the foam, The sea-foam sweeping higher. O mother, linger at your door, And light your lamp to make it plain; But Jessie she comes home no more, No more again. They stood together on the strand, They only each by each ; 'I'd be too proud to beg,' quoth she, Home, her home, was close at hand, And pride was in her tone. And pride was in her lifted head, And in her angry eye, And in her foot, which might have fled But would not fly. Some say that he had gipsy blood, That in his heart was guile : Yet he had gone through fire and flood Only to win her smile. Some say his grandam was a witch, A black witch from beyond the Nile, Who kept an image in a niche And talked with it the while. Utterly out of reach. Her mother in the chimney nook Heard a startled sea-gull screech, But never turned her head to look Towards the darkening beach : Neighbours here and neighbours there Heard one scream, as if a bird Jessie she comes home no more, Her lover's step sounds at his door And boats may search upon the sea And search along the river, ་ But none know where the bodies be; Sea-winds that shiver, Keep the secret first and last Of their dwelling. Whether the tide so hemmed them round With its pitiless flow That when they would have gone they found No way to go; Whether she scorned him to the last With words flung to and fro, Whether he helped or hindered her, Only watchers by the dying Have thought they heard one pray And watchers by the dead have A windy swell from miles away, With sobs and screams, but not a word Distinct for them to say: Come and gone as quick as thought, I Which might be hand or hair. GROWN AND FLOWN But now that leaves are withering For hunger, cold, love, everything. I loved my love on sunny days Until late Summer's wane; I loved my love--alas to see That this should be, alas! I thought that this could scarcely Yet has it come to pass : EVE 'WHILE I sit at the door, 'How have Eden bowers grown LOVED my love from green of Most lofty tree that flowers, Spring Until sere Autumn's fall; Most deeply rooted: I chose the Tree of Death. So they two went together in glowing August weather, A silly sheep benighted from the fold, The honey-breathing heather lay A sluggard with a thorn-choked to their left and right; And dear she was to doat on, her swift feet seemed to float on The air like soft twin pigeons too sportive to alight. 'Oh what is that in heaven where grey cloud-flakes are seven, Where blackest clouds hang riven just at the rainy skirt?' 'Oh that's a meteor sent us, a message dumb, portentous, An undeciphered solemn signal of help or hurt.' 'Oh what is that glides quickly where velvet flowers grow thickly, Their scent comes rich and sickly?' 'A scaled and hooded worm.' 'Oh what's that in the hollow, so pale I quake to follow?' 'Oh that's a thin dead body which waits the eternal term.' Turn again, O my sweetest,-turn again, false and fleetest : This beaten way thou beatest, I fear, is hell's own track.' Nay, too steep for hill mounting; nay, too late for cost counting: This downhill path is easy, but there's no turning back.' 21 February 1863. FROM SUNSET TO RISE STAR garden plot. Take counsel, sever from my lot your lot, Dwell in your pleasant places, hoard your gold; Lest you with me should shiver on the wold, Athirst and hungering on a barren spot. For I have hedged me with a thorny hedge, I live alone, I look to die alone. Yet sometimes when a wind sighs through the sedge Ghosts of my buried years and friends come back, My heart goes sighing after swallows flown On sometime summer's unreturning track. 22 February 1865. MAGGIE A LADY You must not call me Maggie, you must not call me Dear, For I'm Lady of the Manor now stately to see; And if there comes a babe, as there may some happy year, "Twill be little lord or lady at my knee. Oh but what ails you, my sailor cousin Phil, That you shake and turn white like a cockcrow ghost? Go from me, summer friends, and You're as white as I turned once tarry not: I am no summer friend, but wintry cold; down by the mill, When one told me you and ship and crew were lost. Philip my playfellow, when we were His mother said fie, and his sisters boy and girl It was the Miller's Nancy told it to me), cried shame, His highborn ladies cried shame from their place: Philip with the merry life in lip and They said fie when they only heard curl, Philip my playfellow drowned in the sea! my name, But fell silent when they saw my face. I thought I should have fainted, but Am I so fair, Philip? I stood stunned at the moment, you think Philip, did I was so fair when we played boy and girl Till I raised my wail of desolate Where blue forget-me-nots bloomed complaint For you, my cousin, brother, all I had. on the brink Of our stream which the millwheel sent awhirl? They said I looked so pale-some If I was fair then, sure I'm fairer |