THE WINDOW; OR, THE SONG OF THE WRENS. FOUR years ago Mr. Sullivan requested me to write a little song-cycle, German fashion, for him to exercise his art upon. He had been very successful in setting such old songs as Orpheus with his lute,' and I drest up for him, partly in the old style, a puppet, whose almost only merit is, perhaps, that it can dance to Mr. Sullivan's instrument. I am sorry that my four-year-old puppet should have to dance at all in the dark shadow of these days; but the music is now completed, and I am bound by my promise. December, 1870. A. TENNYSON. THE WINDOW. ON THE HILL. THE lights and shadows fly! Yonder brightens and darkens down on the plain. A jewel, a jewel dear to a lover's eye! Oh is it the brook, or a pool, or her window-pane, When the winds are up in the morning? Clouds that are racing above, And winds and lights and shadows that cannot be still, All running on one way to the home of my love, You are all running on, and I stand on the slope of the hill, And the winds are up in the morning! Follow, follow the chase! And my thoughts are as quick and as quick, ever on, on, on. O lights, are you flying over her sweet little face? And my heart is there before you are come, and gone, When the winds are up in the Bite, frost, bite! You roll up away from the light The blue wood-louse, and the plump dormouse, And the bees are still'd, and the flies are kill'd, And you bite far into the heart of the house, But not into mine. Bite, frost, bite! The woods are all the searer, The fuel is all the dearer, My spring is all the nearer, You have bitten into the heart of the earth, But not into mine. SPRING. Birds' love and birds' song Passing with the weather, To love once and for ever. Men's love and birds' love, And women's love and men's! And you my wren with a crown of gold, You my queen of the wrens! You the queen of the wrens We'll be birds of a feather, I'll be King of the Queen of the wrens, And all in a nest together. THE LETTER. Where is another sweet as my sweet, Fine of the fine, and shy of the shy? Fine little hands, fine little feet Dewy blue eye. Shall I write to her? shall I go? Ask her to marry me by and by? Somebody said that she'd say no; Somebody knows that she'll say ay! Ay or no, if ask'd to her face? Ay or no, from shy of the shy? Go, little letter, apace, apace, Fly; The mist and the rain, the mist and the rain! Is it ay or no? is it ay or no? Ay is the song of the wedded spheres, No will push me down to the worm, And when I am there and dead and gone, The wet west wind and the world will go on. The wind and the wet, the wind and the wet! Wet west wind how you blow, you blow! And never a line from my lady yet! Is it ay or no? is it ay or no? Blow then, blow, and when I am gone, The wet west wind and the world may go on. NO ANSWER. Winds are loud and you are dumb, Take my love, for love will come, Love will come but once a life. Winds are loud and winds will pass! Spring is here with leaf and grass: Take my love and be my wife. After-loves of maids and men Are but dainties drest again : Love me now, you'll love me then: Love can love but once a life. THE ANSWER. Two little hands that meet, |