by Mortimer Collins.
Originally published in Temple Bar–A London Magazine for Town and Country Readers (Ward and Lock) vol.2 #7 (Jun 1861).
Summer.
Amy the beautiful leaned from the ledge
Of an oriel, snowy with clematis-bloom:
The south wind sighed through the river sedge.
Far off, the old sea's resonant boom
Rolled without cease under moon and stars—
Music weird of the midnight gloom.
The Giant of Night wore ruby Mars
As a gem on his finger. Hesper shone
Like a beacon over the mountain scaurs.
One amethyst gleam of the sunset gone
Touched the maiden's chesnut hair:
A coronal Summer had set thereon.
The wind's low whisper every where
Ran through the leaves with a rustle of life,
As I watched my Amy unaware;
As rose in my heart the deep love-strife
For that sweet girl-blossom in clematis-snow,
To woo her and win her, a darling wife.
She passed from my sight. To the sea below,
Where, under the stars, it coiled and curled
In endless ebb and tremulous flow,
The restless pulse of a sleeping world,
I went, in the clutch of a sweet unrest,
And watched the banners of Night unfurled,
And the nebule widen over the west.
With me went odour of clematis-musk,
And a vision of beauty Saxon-tressed
Haunted the depths of the mystic dusk;
And a soft shy glance of a lustrous eye
Dwelt in my heart, as a gem in the husk
Of worthless earth. O musical sigh
Of the summer south wind, breathe thou sweet
On Amy, wandering under the sky:
And strew fresh blossoms at Amy's feet,
When deep in the moss the wind flowers lie,
And afar in the woodland glades we meet.
Winter.
Ring merrily out the Sarum bells
O'er wild Wilts wolds o'erblown with snow,
Where the tyrant Spirit of Winter dwells.
But hotter than Summer my blood's free flow:
For the rich girl-blossom is plucked, is mine—
Mine through the valleys of earth to go.
Oh, now may I gaze in her deep gray eyne!
For Amy is mine, my own, my bride:
Her absolute beauty, her truth divine,—
Are they not mine? O moorlands wide,
Where the east wind, eddying fierce and swift,
Hurries the snow-storm's turbulent tide,
Piling it high in a perilous drift,—
Are ye not beautiful? Will there be aught
Sweeter when maidenly Spring shall lift
Her delicate foot in the woodlands, fraught
With colour and odour? Will there be
Sweeter musical cadence caught
By the wanderer's ear in the forest free,
When vernal rivulets ripple delight
By moss-grown boles of the old elm-tree
To the yellow star-clusters of primrose bright?
Oh, whence this magical golden haze,
This glamour that gladdens the snow-storm's flight,
This incense burning through wintry days
In my happy heart's strong altar-flame,
Sweeter than breath of a million Mays?
Only make answer with Amy's name—
Amy the beautiful. Verily this
Is the source whence the mystical glamour came—
A fairy fount in the clematis,
Whose icy waters, murmuring low,
None ever have known, none ever may kiss
But one—but I! whose amorous flow
On my long earth-travel I shall not miss
Till Death through the temple of Love shall go.