Astrophel and Other Poems

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Title: Astrophel and Other Poems
Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles Swinburne, Vol. VI
Author: Algernon Charles Swinburne
Release Date: June 24, 2006 [EBook #18673]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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[TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: Greek words in this text have been transliterated and placed between +marks+.]
Astrophel and other poems
By
Algernon Charles Swinburne
Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles Swinburne--Vol. VI
THE COLLECTED POETICAL WORKS OF ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE
VOL. VI
A MIDSUMMER HOLIDAY: ASTROPHEL: A CHANNEL PASSAGE AND OTHER TALES
SWINBURNE'S POETICAL WORKS
I. POEMS AND BALLADS (First Series).
II. SONGS BEFORE SUNRISE, AND SONGS OF TWO NATIONS.
III. POEMS AND BALLADS (Second and Third Series), and SONGS OF THE
SPRINGTIDES.
IV. TRISTRAM OF LYONESSE, THE TALE OF BALEN, ATALANTA IN CALYDON,
ERECHTHEUS.
V. STUDIES IN SONG, A CENTURY OF ROUNDELS, SONNETS ON ENGLISH DRAMATIC
POETS, THE HEPTALOGIA, ETC.
VI. A MIDSUMMER HOLIDAY, ASTROPHEL, A CHANNEL PASSAGE AND OTHER POEMS.
LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN
A MIDSUMMER HOLIDAY: ASTROPHEL: A CHANNEL PASSAGE AND OTHER POEMS
By
Algernon Charles Swinburne
1917
LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN
_First printed_ (_Chatto_), 1904
_Reprinted_ 1904, '09, '10, '12
(_Heinemann_), 1917
_London: William Heinemann_, 1917
ASTROPHEL AND OTHER POEMS
ASTROPHEL 121
A NYMPHOLEPT 127
ON THE SOUTH COAST 141
AN AUTUMN VISION 149
A SWIMMER'S DREAM 159
GRACE DARLING 164
LOCH TORRIDON 171
THE PALACE OF PAN 178
A YEAR'S CAROLS 181
ENGLAND: AN ODE 186
ETON: AN ODE 191
THE UNION 194
EAST TO WEST 196
INSCRIPTIONS FOR THE FOUR SIDES OF A PEDESTAL 197
ON THE DEATH OF RICHARD BURTON 199
ELEGY 202
A SEQUENCE OF SONNETS ON THE DEATH OF ROBERT BROWNING 208
SUNSET AND MOONRISE 212
BIRTHDAY ODE 214
THRENODY 217
THE BALLAD OF MELICERTES 220
AU TOMBEAU DE BANVILLE 222
LIGHT: AN EPICEDE 223
THRENODY 225
A DIRGE 227
A REMINISCENCE 229
VIA DOLOROSA 230
I. TRANSFIGURATION 231
II. DELIVERANCE 232
III. THANKSGIVING 233
IV. LIBITINA VERTICORDIA 234
V. THE ORDER OF RELEASE 235
VI. PSYCHAGOGOS 236
VII. THE LAST WORD 237
IN MEMORY OF AURELIO SAFFI 238
THE FESTIVAL OF BEATRICE 242
THE MONUMENT OF GIORDANO BRUNO 243
LIFE IN DEATH 245
EPICEDE 246
MEMORIAL VERSES ON THE DEATH OF WILLIAM BELL SCOTT 249
AN OLD SAYING 253
A MOSS-ROSE 254
TO A CAT 255
HAWTHORN DYKE 258
THE BROTHERS 259
JACOBITE SONG 263
THE BALLAD OF DEAD MEN'S BAY 266
DEDICATION 271
ASTROPHEL AND OTHER POEMS
TO WILLIAM MORRIS
ASTROPHEL
AFTER READING SIR PHILIP SIDNEY'S ARCADIA IN THE?GARDEN OF AN OLD ENGLISH MANOR HOUSE
I
A star in the silence that follows?The song of the death of the sun?Speaks music in heaven, and the hollows?And heights of the world are as one;?One lyre that outsings and outlightens?The rapture of sunset, and thrills?Mute night till the sense of it brightens
The soul that it fills.
The flowers of the sun that is sunken?Hang heavy of heart as of head;?The bees that have eaten and drunken?The soul of their sweetness are fled;?But a sunflower of song, on whose honey?My spirit has fed as a bee,?Makes sunnier than morning was sunny
The twilight for me.
The letters and lines on the pages?That sundered mine eyes and the flowers?Wax faint as the shadows of ages?That sunder their season and ours;?As the ghosts of the centuries that sever?A season of colourless time?From the days whose remembrance is ever,
As they were, sublime.
The season that bred and that cherished?The soul that I commune with yet,?Had it utterly withered and perished?To rise not again as it set,?Shame were it that Englishmen living?Should read as their forefathers read?The books of the praise and thanksgiving
Of Englishmen dead.
O light of the land that adored thee?And kindled thy soul with her breath,?Whose life, such as fate would afford thee,?Was lovelier than aught but thy death,?By what name, could thy lovers but know it,?Might love of thee hail thee afar,?Philisides, Astrophel, poet
Whose love was thy star?
A star in the moondawn of Maytime,?A star in the cloudland of change;?Too splendid and sad for the daytime?To cheer or eclipse or estrange;?Too sweet for tradition or vision?To see but through shadows of tears?Rise deathless across the division
Of measureless years.
The twilight may deepen and harden?As nightward the stream of it runs?Till starshine transfigure a garden?Whose radiance responds to the sun's:?The light of the love of thee darkens?The lights that arise and that set:?The love that forgets thee not hearkens
If England forget.
II
Bright and brief in the sight of grief and love the light of thy
lifetime shone,?Seen and felt by the gifts it dealt, the grace it gave, and again
was gone:?Ay, but now it is death, not thou, whom time has conquered as years
pass on.
Ay, not yet may the land forget that bore and loved thee and
praised and wept,?Sidney, lord of the stainless sword, the name of names that her
heart's love kept?Fast as thine did her own, a sign to light thy life till it