Never seek to tell thy Love
Never seek to tell thy love,
Love that never told can be;
For the gentle wind does move
Silently, invisibly.
I told my love, I told my love,
Trembling, cold, in ghastly fears,
Ah! she doth depart.
Soon as she was gone from me,
A traveller came by,
Silently, invisibly:
He took her with a sigh.
I saw a Chapel all of Gold
I saw a Chapel all of gold
That none did dare to enter in,
And many weeping stood without,
Weeping, mourning, worshipping.
I saw a Serpent rise between
The white pillars of the door,
And he forced and forced and forced;
Down the golden hinges tore,
And along the pavement sweet,
Set with pearls and rubies bright,
All his slimy length he drew,
Till upon the altar white
Vomiting his poison out
On the Bread and on the Wine.
So I turned into a sty,
And laid me down among the swine.
Silent, silent Night
Silent, silent Night,
Quench the holy light
Of thy torches bright;
For possessed of Day,
Thousand spirits stray
That sweet joys betray.
Why should joys be sweet
Used with deceit,
Nor with sorrows meet?
But an honest joy
Does itself destroy
For a harlot coy.
Why should I care for the men of Thames
Why should I care for the men of Thames,
Or the cheating waves of chartered streams;
Or shrink at the little blasts of fear
That the hireling blows to my ear?
Though born on the cheating banks of Thames,
Though his waters bathed my infant limbs,
The Ohio shall wash his stains from me:
I was born a slave, but I go to be free!
Thou has a lap full of seed
Thou hast a lap full of seed,
And this is a fine country.
Why dost thou not cast thy seed,
And live in it merrily.
Shall I cast it on the sand
And turn it into fruitful land?
For on no other ground
Can I sow my seed
Without tearing up
Some stinking weed.
To Nobodaddy
Why art thou silent and invisible,
Father of Jealousy?
Why dost thou hide thyself in clouds
From every searching eye?
Why darkness and obscurity
In all thy words and laws,
That none dare eat the fruit but from
The wily Serpent's jaws?
Or is it because secresy gains females' loud applause?
Are not the joys of morning sweeter
Are not the joys of morning sweeter
Than the joys of night?
And are the vigorous joys of youth
Ashamed of the light?
Let age and sickness silent rob
The vineyards in the night;
But those who burn with vigorous youth
Pluck fruits before the light.
Appendix to the Earlier Poems in
The Rossetti Manuscript
A Fairy skipped upon my knee
Singing and dancing merrily;
I said, 'Thou thing of patches, rings,
Pins, necklaces, and such-like things,
Disguiser of the female form,
Thou paltry, gilded, poisonous worm!'
Weeping, he fell upon my thigh,
And thus in tears did soft reply:
'Knowest thou not, O Fairies' lord!
How much by us contemned, abhorred,
Whatever hides the female form
That cannot bear the mortal storm?
Therefore in pity still we give
Our lives to make the female live;
And what would turn into disease
We turn to what will joy and please.'
Why was Cupid a boy
Why was Cupid a boy,
And why a boy was he?
He should have been a girl,
For aught that I can see.
For he shoots with his bow,
And the girl shoots with her eye,
And they both are merry and glad,
And laugh when we do cry.
And to make Cupid a boy
Was Cupid girl's mocking plan;
For a boy can't interpret the thing
Till he is become a man.
And then he is so pierced with cares,
And wounded with arrowy smarts,
That the whole business of his life
Is to pick out the heads of the darts.
'Twas the Greeks' love of war
Turned Love into a boy,
And woman into a statue of stone-
And away fled every joy.
The Everlasting Gospel
α
The Vision of Christ that thou dost see
Is my vision's greatest enemy.
Thine has a great hook nose like thine,
Mine has a snub nose like to mine.
Thine is the Friend of all Mankind;
Mine speaks in parables to the blind.
Thine loves the same world that mine hates;
Thy heaven doors are my hell gates.
Socrates taught what Meletus
Loathed as a nation's bitterest curse,
And Caiaphas was in his own mind
A benefactor to mankind.
Both read the Bible day and night,
But thou read'st black where I read white.
δ
This was spoken by my Spectre to Voltaire, Bacon, et cetera
Did Jesus teach doubt? or did He
Give any lessons of philosophy,
Charge Visionaries with deceiving,
Or call men wise for not believing? ...
θ
Epilogue
I am sure this Jesus will not do,
Either for Englishman or Jew.
There is not one moral value that Jesus inculcated but Plato and
Cicero did inculcate before him: what then did Christ inculcate?-
Forgiveness of Sins. This alone is the Gospel, and this is the life
and immortality brought to light by Jesus.
