The Poems of Alice Meynell

								



Most dear pause in a mellow lay!

    Thou art inwoven with every air.
With thee the wildest tempests play,

    And snatches of thee everywhere
Make little heavens throughout a day.


Darkness and solitude shine, for me.

    For life's fair outward part are rife
The silver noises; let them be.

    It is the very soul of life
Listens for thee, listens for thee.


O pause between the sobs of cares;

    O thought within all thought that is;
Trance between laughters unawares:

    Thou art the shape of melodies,
And thou the ecstasy of prayers!

  AN UNMARKED FESTIVAL


There's a feast undated, yet

    Both our true lives hold it fast,--
Even the day when first we met.

    What a great day came and passed,

    --Unknown then, but known at last.


And we met: You knew not me,

    Mistress of your joys and fears;
Held my hand that held the key

    Of the treasure of your years,

    Of the fountain of your tears.


For you knew not it was I,

    And I knew not it was you.
We have learnt, as days went by.

    But a flower struck root and grew

    Underground, and no one knew.


Day of days!  Unmarked it rose,

    In whose hours we were to meet;
And forgotten passed.  Who knows,

    Was earth cold or sunny, Sweet,

    At the coming of your feet?


One mere day, we thought; the measure

    Of such days the year fulfils.
Now, how dearly would we treasure

    Something from its fields, its rills,

    And its memorable hills.

  IN AUTUMN


The leaves are many under my feet,

    And drift one way.
Their scent of death is weary and sweet.

    A flight of them is in the grey
Where sky and forest meet.


The low winds moan for dead sweet years;

    The birds sing all for pain,
Of a common thing, to weary ears,--

    Only a summer's fate of rain,
And a woman's fate of tears.


I walk to love and life alone

    Over these mournful places,
Across the summer overthrown,

    The dead joys of these silent faces,
To claim my own.


I know his heart has beat to bright

    Sweet loves gone by;
I know the leaves that die to-night

    Once budded to the sky;
And I shall die from his delight.


O leaves, so quietly ending now,

    You heard the cuckoos sing.
And I will grow upon my bough

    If only for a Spring,
And fall when the rain is on my brow.


O tell me, tell me ere you die,

    Is it worth the pain?
You bloomed so fair, you waved so high;

    Now that the sad days wane,
Are you repenting where you lie?


I lie amongst you, and I kiss

    Your fragrance mouldering.
O dead delights, is it such bliss,

    That tuneful Spring?
Is love so sweet, that comes to this?


Kiss me again as I kiss you;

    Kiss me again,
For all your tuneful nights of dew,

    In this your time of rain,
For all your kisses when Spring was new.


You will not, broken hearts; let be.

    I pass across your death