By the Fireside. How well I know what I mean to do When the long dark autumn evenings come; I shall be found by the fire, suppose, O'er a great wise book, as beseemeth age; Till the young ones whisper, finger on lip, Now then, or never, out we slip ΙΟ To cut from the hazels by the creek A mainmast for our ship!" 15 I shall be at it indeed, my friends! Greek puts already on either side Such a branch-work forth as soon extends And I pass out where it ends. The outside frame, like your hazel-trees- And a rarer sort succeeds to these, And we slope to Italy at last And youth, by green degrees. 20 25 3. Is.-The present with future meaning: "Where will be thy pleasant hue?" I follow wherever I am led, Knowing so well the leader's hand: Look at the ruined chapel again A turn, and we stand in the heart of things; The thread of water single and slim, Does it feed the little lake below? That speck of white just on its marge Is Pella; see, in the evening-glow, How sharp the silver spear-heads charge When Alp meets heaven in snow! On our other side is the straight-up rock; The marks on a moth, and small ferns fit Their teeth to the polished block. 50 Oh the sense of the yellow mountain-flowers, The chestnuts throw on our path in showers! 55 45 40 35 330 That crimson the creeper's leaf across Like a splash of blood, intense, abrupt, By the rose-flesh mushrooms, undivulged 60 Where a freaked fawn-colored flaky crew 65 And yonder, at foot of the fronting ridge Is the chapel reached by the one-arched bridge, Where the water is stopped in a stagnant pond 70 The chapel and bridge are of stone alike, Blackish-gray and mostly wet; Cut hemp-stalks steep in the narrow dike. See here again, how the lichens fret And the roots of the ivy strike! 75 Poor little place, where its one priest comes To the dozen folk from their scattered homes, By the dozen ways one roams— 80 To drop from the charcoal-burners' huts, Or climb from the hemp-dressers' low shed, 73. Hemp - stalks steep.-Hemp that is soaking in preparation for dressing. 74. Fret. The lichens ornament, as with raised work. Leave the grange where the woodman stores his nuts, It has some pretension too, this front, Set over the porch, Art's early wont : Not from the fault of the builder, though, Where three carved beams make a certain show, 85 90 'Five, six, nine, he lets you know. 95 And all day long a bird sings there, And a stray sheep drinks at the pond at times; The place is silent and aware; It has had its scenes, its joys and crimes, But that is its own affair. 100 My perfect wife, my Leonor, Oh heart, my own, Oh eyes, mine too, Whom else could I dare look backward for, For it leads to a crag's sheer edge with them ; Not they; age threatens and they contemn, Till they reach the gulf wherein youth drops, 98. Aware.-Self-conscious. 101. My Leonor.-The "perfect wife," with the "great brow" and the "spirit-small hand," can be no other than Elizabeth Barrett Browning. The poem, though in its circumstances purely dramatic and imaginary, is autobiographic in soul. Other beautiful allusions to Mrs. Browning may be found in One Word More, Prospice, and My Star. |