IX

Cease, clouds of autumn, cease to roll;

Your thunders slay a poor girl’s soul.

Love of my heart, in distant lands thou roamest.

      The musical rich sound of rain

      But touching me, ah, turns to pain.

Love of my heart, in distant lands thou roamest.

The pleasant daylight brings delay

      Of added infelicity

Because of one face far away,

      Grief of heart where joy should be.

Love of my heart, in distant lands thou roamest.

The glorious lightning as it burns

      Goes shuddering through my body faint

And my sad eyes remembrance turns

      Into moist fountains of complaint.

Love of my heart, in distant lands thou roamest.

Cease, clouds of autumn, cease to roll;

      Your thunders slay a poor girl’s soul.

Love of my heart, in distant lands thou roamest. 

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 X

The spring is here, sweet friend, the spring is here

And all his captains brings to make me moan.

How many dreadful armed things appear

                              One by one.

The cuckoo of his black bands captain is,

The full moon marshals his white companies.

The nectared moon grows poisonous as a snake,

      A venomed arrow is the murmuring bee.

The cuckoo’s cunning note my heart doth break

                              Utterly. 

XI

Ere I had taken half my will of joy,

      Why hast thou, Night, with cruel swiftness ceased?

To slay a woman’s heart with sad annoy,

      0 ruddy Dawn, thou openest in the east.

The whispering world begins in dawn’s red shining,

Nor will Night stay one hour for lovers’ pining.

      Ere love is done, must Dawn our love discover ?

Ah why should lover’s blissful meeting

      Mix so soon with parting’s sorrow?

      On happy night come heavy morrow ?

Night will not stay for love’s entreating.

      Ere love was done, ah me! the night Was over. 

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 XII

Nay, though thy absence was a tardy fire,

      Yet in such meeting is a worse derision;

For never yet the passionate eyes’ desire

      Drew comfort from such momentary vision.

Who ever heard of great heats soon expended,

Huge fire with a little burning ended ? 

XIII

I said in anger, “When next time he prays,

      I will be sullen and repulse his charms.”

Ah me! but when I saw my lover’s face,

      I quite forgot and rushed into his arms.

Mine eyes said, “We will joy in him no longer;

      Vainly let him entreat nor pardon crave.”

He came, nor pardon asked; my bonds grew stronger,

      I am become more utterly¹ his slave. 

XIV

Ah sweet, thou hast not understood my love, —

      This is my grief, thou hast not understood.

Else would my heart’s pain thy compassion move,

      Who in my heart persistest like heart’s blood.

When I am dead, then wilt thou pity prove

      And with thy sorrow on deaf ears intrude ?

      This is my grief thou hast not understood. 

¹ hopelessly 

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 XV

How much thou didst entreat! with what sweet wooing

      Thou hast bewitched my soul to love thee!

Now when I’ve loved thee to my own undoing,

0 marvel! all my piteous tears and suing

      To bless me with thy presence cannot move thee.

Would I, if I had known ere all was over,

      Have given my heart for thy sole pleasure?

So sweet thy words, I fell in love with loving

And gave my heart, the very roots removing.

      How could I know that thy love had a measure ? 

XVI

How could I know that he was waiting only

      For an excuse to leave me ?

I was so sure he loved me, not one lonely

      Suspicion came to grieve me.

But now a small offence his pretext making

      He has buried Love and left me;

Blithely has gone, his whole will of me taking,

      Having of bliss bereft me.

Too well he knows my grief of heart, not caring

      Tho’ it break through his disdain.

I sit forsaken, all my beauty wearing

      But as a crown of pain. 

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 XVII

Into the hollow of whose hand my heart

      I gave once, surely thinking him my lover,

How shall I now forget him? by what art

      My captive soul recover?

I took Love’s graver up and slow portrayed

      His beauty on my soul with lingering care.

How shall the picture¹ from its back-ground fade,

      Burnt in so deeply there.

“He has forgotten thee, forget him thou;”

      All say to me, “a vain thing is regret.”

Ah yes, that day when death is on my brow,

      I shall indeed forget. 

XVIII

Hast thou remembered me at last, my own

      And therefore come after so many days ?

When man has once drained love and elsewhere flown,

      Does he return to the forgotten face ?

Therefore I think by error thou hast come,

Or else a passing pity led thee home.

¹ etching 

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  XIX

I did not dream, 0 love, that I

      Would ever have thee back again.

The sunflower drooping hopelessly

      Expects no sun to end her pain.

I did not dream my lord would show

      Favour to his poor slave-girl more,

That I should mix my eyes as now

      With the dear eyes I panted for.

I did not dream my huge desire

      Would be filled full and grief be over,

But burning in love’s bitter fire

      With hopeless longing for my lover,

One thought alone possessed thy slave,

      “Lord of my life, where art thou gone?

Wilt thou not come this life to save ?”

      Dumbly this thought and this alone. 

                             XX

In true sweet love what more than utter bliss is,

      He only knows who is himself true lover.

As moonbird seeks the moon, she seeks his kisses,

      Liberal of nectar he yearns down above her. 

Page– 275