see, One after one: and then the great ridge drew, Lessening to the lessening music, back, And past into the belt and swell'd again Slowly to music ever when it broke The statues, king or saint, or founder fell; Then from the gaps and chasms of ruin left Came men and women in dark clusters round, Some crying,Set them up! they shall not fall!' And others Let them lie, for they have fall'n.' And still they strove and wrangled; and she grieved In her strange dream, she knew not why, to find Their wildest wailings never out of tune With that sweet note; and ever as their shrieks Ran highest up the gamut, that great wave Yours came but from the breaking of glass, And mine but from the crying of a child." "Child? No!" said he, "but this tide's roar, and his, Our Boanerges with his threats of doom, And loud-lung'd Antibabylonianisms (Altho' I grant but little music there) Went both to make your dream but if there were A music harmonizing our wild cries, Sphere-music such as that you dream'd about, Why, that would make our passions far too like The discords dear to the musician. NoOne shriek of hate would jar all the hymns of heaven: True Devils with no ear, they howl in tune With nothing but the Devil!” "True' indeed! One of our town, but later by an hour Here than ourselves, spoke with me on the shore; While you were running down the sands, and made The dimpled flounce of the sea-furbelow flap, Good man, to please the child. She brought strange news. Why were you silent when I spoke tonight? I had set my heart on your forgiving him Before you know. We must forgive the dead." "Dead! who is dead?" "The man your eye pursued. A little after you had parted with him, He suddenly dropt dead of heartdisease." "Dead? he? of heart-disease? what heart had he To die of? dead!" Willy, my beauty, my eldest-born, the flower of the flock; could fling him; for "Here's a leg for a babe of a week!" says doctor; and he would b bound, There was not his like that year in twenty parishes round." Strong of his hands, and strong on his legs, but still of his tongue! I ought to have gone before him: I wonder he went so young. I cannot cry for him, Annie: I have not long to stay; Perhaps I shall see him the sooner, for he lived far away. Why do you look at me, Annie? you think I am hard and cold; But all my children have gone before me, I am so old: I cannot weep for Willy, nor can I weep for the rest; Only at your age, Annie, I could have wept with the best. And cried myself wellnigh blind, and all of an evening late Larn'd a ma' beä. I reckons I 'anno sa mooch to larn. But a cast oop, thot a did, 'boot Bessy Marris's bairn. Thaw a knaws I hallus voäted wi Squoire an' choorch an staäte, An' i' the woost o' toimes I wur niver agin the raäte. An' I hallus coomed to's choorch afoor moy Sally wur dead, An' 'eerd un a bummin' awaäy loike a buzzard-clock ower my eäd, An' I niver knaw'd whot a meän'd bu I thowt a 'ad summut to saäy, An' I thowt a said whot owt to'a a said an' I coom'd awaäy. |