Fringilla: Some Tales in Verse - Richard Doddridge Blackmore (read aloud books .TXT) 📗

for thee I
'To-morrow, when my crescent tops yon oak,
'Thou shalt return unto thy proper yoke.'
She closed her lips, and like the barb of frost,
Her fingers on my bounding heart outspread:
My breast is ice, mv soul is of the dead:
The sod, the cold clay, are my marriage-bed;
Sweet sun, sweet flowers, sweet Love, forever lost!"

Pausias

"I'll not endure it; it shall ne'er be true;
If that cold tyrant comes--I'll run her through."

Glycera

"What can'st thou do against the Goddess trine,
Selene, Artemis, and Proserpine?
Oh love, thou hast before thee life and fame,
And some new Glycera with a loftier name.
So tender is my heart, that it would break,
To think that thou wert suffering for my sake.
Be angry with me; doubt my faith--or try;
And count it for a crime of mine to die:
Or tell thyself--if still a pain there be--
That wealth and grandeur were not meant for me.
Yet think sometimes, when thou art well consoled,
That no one loves thee, like some one of old."

Pausias

"My life, my soul, my heart of hearts, my all,
Together let us cling, till death befall."

Glycera

"The sun is gone; the crescent waxeth bright;
I fly to darkness, or eternal light.
Great are the Gods; but greater yet is love;
Here thou art mine, and I am thine above."

* * * * *

Pausias

"Oh fame, and conquest, pomp, and power, and state,
What are ye, when the heart is desolate?
A few more years of labour, and slow breath--
Till death benign hath overtaken death."

BUSCOMBE; OR, A MICHAELMAS GOOSE

When I was Head of Blunders school,
Before the age of stokers,
Compelled by rank to look a fool
Betwixt a pair of "chokers,"

Tom Tanner's father's wrote, to say
That we should both of us come,
To spend Saint Michael's holiday
At the Vicarage of Buscombe.

One trifle marred this merry plan--
I had contrived, though barr'd up,
To typify the future man,
By getting very hard up.

Oh bimetallic champion, some
New ratio doth seem proper,
When the circulating medium
Has fallen to half a copper.

Vile mammon hence! Thy low amount
Too paltry is to mope for;
The more we have in hand to count,
The less in heart to hope for.

Bright youth itself is golden ore,
And health the best gold-beater:
Without a sigh for two pence more,
We passed the gates of Peter.

A nod suffices surly Cop,
Who grins his bona fides;
As Cerberus preferred his sop
To Orpheus and Alcides.

But Mother Cop! Her cooking knack
Would conquer fifty Catos--
The Queen of tarts, and tuck, and tack,
And cream, and fried potatoes.

And rashers! Sweet Ulysses, say
Old Homer was mistaken;
The Goddess must have had her way,
And turned thee into bacon.

That Circe came, and wished us joy,
And said, "Goodbye, my dearie!"
Because I was an honest boy,
And pauper tneo aere.

So Tom and I, like men on strike,
Shook hands with all our cronies,
Walked fifty yards, to save the pike,
And jumped upon our ponies.

Of apples, nuts, and goose galore
I chattered, like a stupid,
And thought of shooting coneys, more
Than being shot by Cupid.

* * * * *

At racing pace the turnpike road
(Great Western, in this quicker age)
Was swallowed up with whip and goad,
And soon we saw the Vicarage.

A sweet seclusion, to forget
The world and its disasters,
And fill the mind with mignonette,
Clove-pinks, and German asters;

In pensive, or in playful mood,
To saunter here, and dally
With leafy calm of solitude,
Or sunshine of the valley.

The Vicar loved his parish well,
And well was he loved by it;
Religion did not him compel
To harass and defy it

No price he charged for Heavenly love,
No discount on Resurgo;
His conscience told him--one side-shove
Is worth ten kicks a tergo.

But while the path of life he showed
To win the Christian guerdon,
No post was he, to point the road,
But a man to share the burden.

The lapse of years made manifest
The sanctuary of holy age;
As clearer grows the ring-dove's nest,
When time hath stripp'd the foliage.

The Vicar's wife was much the same,
In fairer form presented--
A lively, yet a quiet dame,
With home, sweet home, contented.

In parish, needs; and household arts,
A lesson to this glib age;
Well versed in pickles, jams, and tarts,
Piano, chess, and cribbage.

And well she loved the flowers, that speak
A language undefiled--
The flowers that lift the dimpled cheek,
Or droop the dewy eyelid.

* * * * *

Now, if she lingers after us,
What ground have we for snarling?
What act prohibits private buss,
Reserved for "Tommy darling"?

* * * * *

But who are these, so fresh and sweet,
In lovely hats and dresses,
Who half advance, and half retreat,
And peep through clouds of tresses?

"Come, dears!" They shyly offer hand,
Beneath the jasmin trellis;
"Say who you are, girls"--Charlotte, and
Her sister, Caroline Ellis!

Sweet Charlotte hath a serious face,
A gaze almost parental;
A type of every maiden grace,
But a wee bit sentimental.

Bright Caroline hath eyes that dance,
While buoyant airs engirdle her;
Her playful soul may love romance,
But not a creepy curdler.

Sweet Charlotte's are the deep grey eyes
That win profound devotion;
Bright Carry's flash, like azure skies,
With heliograph in motion.

As merry as the vintage ray,
That dances down the grape-rill;
As tender as the dews of May,
Or apple-buds of April.

Their charms are safe to grow more bright
For at least two lustral stages;
And so it seems not unpolite
To enquire what their age is.

"Last May, I was fifteen"; with glee
Replies the laughing Carry;
Sage Charlotte