Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). A Victorian Anthology, 1837–1895. 1895.
Charles Kent b. 1823Pope at Twickenham
B
A garden lattice like a door
Stands open in the sun,
Admitting fitful winds that set
Astir the fragrant mignonette
In waves of speckled dun:
Red roses bud, red roses blow,
In beds that gem the lawn—
Enamell’d rings and stars of flowers,
By summer beams and vernal showers
From earth nutritious drawn.
Lo! huddled in his easy-chair,
One hand upon his knee,
A hand so thin, so wan, so frail,
It tells of pains and griefs a tale,
A small bent form I see.
From neighboring thicket thrills the boon
The nuthatch yields in song:
All drench’d with recent rains, the leaves
Are dripping—drip the sheltering eaves,
The dropping notes among.
Show where the flitting zephyrs pass,
That shake the green blades dry;
And golden radiance fills the air
And gilds the floating gossamer
That glints and trembles by.
Strange anguish on his pallid face,
And eyes of dreamful hue,
That lonely man sits brooding there,
Still huddled in his easy-chair,
With memories life will rue.
A homely crumpled nightcap spread
Half veils the careworn brows;
In morning-gown of rare brocade
His puny shrunken shape array’d
His sorrowing soul avows:
Dejection words not thus define
So eloquent of woe;
Yet never to those mournful eyes,
The heart’s full-brimming fountains, rise
Sweet tears to overflow.
But plainest signs that win belief,
A simple scene and true.
Beside the mourner’s chair display’d,
The matin meal’s slight comforts laid
Trimly the board bestrew.
The chill’d and tarnish’d chocolate
On snow-white damask stands;
Untouch’d the trivial lures remain
In dainty pink-tinged porcelain,
Still ranged by usual hands.
Hums loitering in the sunny gleam
That tips each rim with gold;
A checker’d maze of light and gloom
Floats in the quaintly-litter’d room
With varying charms untold.
Still brooding with that face of care,
That gaze of tearless pain?
What bonds of woe his spirit bind,
What treasure lost can leave behind
Such stings within his brain?
He never more in life can love—
That mother newly dead;
He waits the artist-friend whose skill
Shall catch angel-beauty still
Upon her features spread.
And makes a throne of grief the chair
Where filial genius mourns:
Death proving still, at direst need,
Life’s sceptre-wand—a broken reed,
Love’s wreath—a crown of thorns.