Henry Alford Poems >>
The School Of The Heart. Lesson The First

The spring is coming round--the buds have burst,
 And on the coppice--path, and in the bower,
 The leaping spray of sunlight leaf--inwrought
 Sports to the gentle bidding of the breeze:
 And far away into the inner grove,
 Bright green, the mosses cluster on the stems,
 Till where the thickest arbour doth embower
 Sweet solitary flowers of meekest eye,
 That dwell for ever with the silent dews.
 Sweet partner of my hopes, who through the young
 And sunny years of life hast been to me
 An opening bud most delicately nursed,
 Methinks this day hath risen upon us two
 As on the joyous earth and teeming wood--
 To summon into life the folded flowers,
 And bid our plant of love spring boldly up,
 Fearing no check from frost, or blighting dew.
 No one is present with us; none is here
 But thou and I; so I may tell my thoughts,
 Now thou hast picked thine apron full of flowers;
For I have much to tell. Along the east
 The clear pale light of the morn is brooding still;
 And down our favourite path, on either side,
 The little leaves are glittering in the sun;
 So we will talk away the morning--tide
 Under the soft bright April. Let us sit
 Together on that slope, where cluster thick
 The full--blown primroses, and playfully
 The tender drooping wood--anemones
 Toss to the breeze in turn their silver bells.

 'Tis long since we were free to while away
 So many hours in converse: and I feel
 Strange yearnings to pour out my inner soul,
 To open forth unto thee all the stores
 Whereby my spirit hath been furnished
For the great war with evil. Few have lived
 As we have lived, unsevered; our young life
 Was but a summer's frolic: we have been
 Like two babes passing hand in hand along
 A sunny bank on flowers. The busy world
 Goes on around us, and its multitudes
 Pass by me, and I look them in the face,
 But cannot read such meaning as I read
 In this of thine; and thou too dost but move
 Among them for a season, but returnest
 With a light step and smiles to our old seats,
 Our quiet walks, our solitary bower.
 Some we love well; the early presences
 That were first round us, and the silvery tones
 Of those most far--away and dreamy voices
 That sounded all about us at the dawn
 Of our young life,--these, as the world of things
 Sets in upon our being like a tide,
 Keep with us, and are ever uppermost.
 And some there are, tall, beautiful, and wise,
 Whose step is heaven ward, and whose souls have past
 Out from the nether darkness, and been born
 Into a new and glorious universe,
 Who speak of things to come; but there is that
 In thy soft eye and long--accustomed voice
Would win me from them all. For since our birth
 Our thoughts have flowed together in one stream:
 All through the seasons of our infancy
 The same hills rose about us--the same trees,
 Now bare, now sprinkled with the tender leaf,
 Now thick with full dark foliage; the same church,
 Our own dear village--church, has seen us pray,
 In the same seat, with hands clasped side by side;
 And we have sung together; and have walked
 Full of one thought, along the homeward lane;
 And so were we built upwards for the storm
 That on my walls hath fallen unsparingly,
 Shattering their frail foundations; and which thou
 Hast yet to look for,--but hast found the help
 Which then I knew not--rest thee firmly there!

 When first I issued forth into the world,
 Well I remember--that unwelcome morn,
 When we rose long before the accustomed hour
 By the faint taper--light; and by that gate
 We just now swung behind us carelessly,
 I gave thee the last kiss:--I travelled on,
 Giving my mind up to the world without,
 Which poured in strange ideas of strange things,
 New towns, new churches, new inhabitants:--
 And ever and anon some happy child
 Beneath a rose--trailed porch played as I past:
 And then the thought of thee swept through my soul.
 And made the hot drops stand in either eye:--
 And so I travelled--till between two hills,
 Two turf--enamelled mounds of brightest green,
 Stretched the blue limit of the distant sea,
 Unknown to me before:--then with strange joy,
 Forgetting all, I gazed upon that sea,
 Till I could see the white waves leaping up,
 And all my heart leapt with them:--so I past
 Southward, and neared that wilderness of waves,
 And stopt upon its brink; and when the even
 Spread out upon the sky unusual clouds,
 I sat me down upon a wooded cliff,
  Watching the earth's last daylight fade away,
  Till that the dim wave far beneath my feet
  Did make low moanings to the infant moon,
  And the lights twinkled out along the shore;
  Then I looked upwards, and I saw the stars,
  Sirius, Orion, and the Northern Wain,
  And the Seven Sisters, and the beacon--flame
  Of bright Arcturus,--every one the same
  As when I showed them thee.--``But yesternight,''
  I said, ``she gazed with me upon those stars:
  Why did we not agree to look on them
  Both at one moment every starlight night,
  And think that the same star beheld us both?''

  But I shall weary thee.--That very night,
  As I past shorewards under the dark hills,
  I made a vow that I would live on love,
  Even the love of thee;--this all my faith,
  My only creed, my only refuge this.
  So day past after day; and every one
  Gave me a fainter image of thy face,
  Till thou wert vanished quite: nor could I then--
  No, not with painful strain of memory,
  Bring back one glimpse of thy lost countenance.
  Then I would sit and try to hear thy voice,
  And catch and lose its tones successively,
  Till that, too, left me--till the very words
  Which thou hadst written had no trace of thee--
  But it was pain to see them. So my soul,
  Self--bound and self--tormented, lingered on,
  Evermore vainly striving after love,
  Which evermore fled from her, till at last
  She ceased to strive, and sunk, a lifeless thing--
  No sense, no vigour--dead to all around,
  But most to thee. Meanwhile the golden hours
  Of life flowed on apace, but weary seemed
  The universe of toil, weary the day;
  I had no joy but sleep, rare visitant
Of my lone couch. What times of purest joy
  Were then my brief returns:--what greetings then,
  What wanderings had we on our native slopes:
  What pleasant mockings of the tearful past.
  And I remember well, one summer's night,
  A clear, soft, silver moonlight, thou and I
  Sat a full hour together silently,
  Looking abroad into the pure pale heaven:
  Perchance thou hast forgotten; but my arm
  Was on thy shoulder, and thy clustering locks
  Hung lightly on my hand, and thy clear eye
  Glistered beside my forehead; and at length
  Thou saidst, ``'Tis time we went to rest;'' and then
  We rose and parted for the night. No words
  But those were spoken, and we never since
  Have told each other of that moment. Oft
  Has it come o'er me, and I oft have thought
  Of sharing it with thee; but my resolve
  Has been spread over with a thousand things
  Of various import, till this April morn,
And we have shared it now. But soon again
  I left my home. There was no beauty now
  Of lands new seen, but the same dreary road
  Which bore me from thee first. I had no joy
  In looking on the ocean; and, full sad
  With inward frettings and unrest, I reached
  That steep--built village on the southern shore.

  Sometimes I wandered down the wooded dells
  That sloped into the sea, and sat me down
  On piles of rocks, in a most private place,
  Not without melody of ancient stream
  Down--dripping from steep sides of brightest moss,
  And tumbling onwards through the dark ravine;
  While the lithe branches of the wizard elm
  Dangled athwart the deep blue crystalline.--
  Often the memory comes o'er me now,
  Like life upon a long--entranc