Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 05
History
Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 05
Literature -- Collections
Her principal claim to literary fame is however based upon her verse.
This is from all periods of her productivity. In addition to the book of
poems already noticed, she has written 'The Prophecy of St. Oran, and
other Poems,' 1882; 'The Heather on Fire,' a protest against the wrongs
of the Highland crofters, 1886; 'The Ascent of Man,' her most ambitious
work, 1889; 'Dramas in Miniature' 1892; 'Songs and Sonnets,' 1893; and
'Birds of Passage: Songs of the Orient and Occident,' 1895.
'The Ascent of Man' is a poetical treatment of the modern idea of
evolution, and traces the progress of man from his primitive condition
in a state of savagery to his present development. Miss Blind has been
an ardent advocate of the betterment of the position of woman in society
and the State. To this end she has worked and written for an improved
education, and against a one-sided morality for the sexes. In her verse
she shows characteristically a keen appreciation of nature. Her minor
poems particularly, many of which are strong in feeling and admirable in
form, entitle her to a distinguished place among the lyric poets
of England.
She died in London near the end of November, 1896.
FROM 'LOVE IN EXILE'
I charge you, O winds of the West, O winds with the wings of the
dove,
That ye blow o'er the brows of my Love, breathing low that I
sicken for love.
I charge you, O dews of the Dawn, O tears of the star of the morn,
That ye fall at the feet of my Love with the sound of one weeping
forlorn.
I charge you, O birds of the Air, O birds flying home to your nest,
That ye sing in his ears of the joy that for ever has fled from my
breast.
I charge you, O flowers of the Earth, O frailest of things, and most
fair,
That ye droop in his path as the life in me shrivels, consumed by
despair.
O Moon, when he lifts up his face, when he seeth the waning of thee,
A memory of her who lies wan on the limits of life let it be.
Many tears cannot quench, nor my sighs extinguish, the flames of
love's fire,
Which lifteth my heart like a wave, and smites it, and breaks its
desire.
I rise like one in a dream when I see the red sun flaring low,
That drags me back shuddering from sleep each morning to life with
its woe.
I go like one in a dream; unbidden my feet know the way
To that garden where love stood in blossom with the red and white
hawthorn of May.
The song of the throstle is hushed, and the fountain is dry to its
core;
The moon cometh up as of old; she seeks, but she finds him no more.
The pale-faced, pitiful moon shines down on the grass where I weep,
My face to the earth, and my breast in an anguish ne'er soothed
into sleep.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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