Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry. 1904.
IV. Wooing and WinningLove
Samuel Taylor Coleridge (17721834)A
Whatever stirs this mortal frame,
All are but ministers of Love,
And feed his sacred flame.
Live o’er again that happy hour,
When midway on the mount I lay
Beside the ruined tower.
Had blended with the lights of eve;
And she was there, my hope, my joy,
My own dear Genevieve!
The statue of the armèd knight;
She stood and listened to my lay,
Amid the lingering light.
My hope! my joy! my Genevieve!
She loves me best whene’er I sing
The songs that make her grieve.
I sang an old and moving story,—
An old rude song, that suited well
That ruin wild and hoary.
With downcast eyes and modest grace;
For well she knew, I could not choose
But gaze upon her face.
Upon his shield a burning brand;
And that for ten long years he wooed
The Lady of the Land.
The deep, the low, the pleading tone
With which I sang another’s love
Interpreted my own.
With downcast eyes and modest grace;
And she forgave me that I gazed
Too fondly on her face.
That crazed that bold and lovely Knight,
And that he crossed the mountain-woods,
Nor rested day nor night;
And sometimes from the darksome shade,
And sometimes starting up at once
In green and sunny glade,
An angel beautiful and bright;
And that he knew it was a Fiend,
This miserable Knight!
He leaped amid a murderous band,
And saved from outrage worse than death
The Lady of the Land;
And how she tended him in vain:
And ever strove to expiate
The scorn that crazed his brain;
And how his madness went away,
When on the yellow forest-leaves
A dying-man he lay;
That tenderest strain of all the ditty,
My faltering voice and pausing harp
Disturbed her soul with pity!
Had thrilled my guileless Genevieve;
The music and the doleful tale,
The rich and balmy eve;
An undistinguishable throng,
And gentle wishes long subdued,
Subdued and cherished long.
She blushed with love, and virgin shame;
And like the murmur of a dream,
I heard her breathe my name.
As conscious of my look she stept,—
Then suddenly, with timorous eye
She fled to me and wept.
She pressed me with a meek embrace;
And bending back her head, looked up,
And gazed upon my face.
And partly ’t was a bashful art
That I might rather feel than see
The swelling of her heart.
And told her love with virgin pride;
And so I won my Genevieve,
My bright and beauteous Bride.