Among the Millet and Other Poems

John Stuart Mill · en
Ah, sweet their dreams, and sweet the life they led
      With that great love that was their bosoms' all,
    Yet ever shadowed by some circling dread
      It gloomed at moments deep and tragical,
    And so for many a month they seemed to tread
      With fluttering hearts, whatever might befall,
    Half glad, half sad, their sweet and secret way
    To the soft tune of some old lover's lay.


IV.

    But she is gone, alas he knows not where,
      Or how his life that tender gift should lose:
    Indeed his love was ever full of care,
      The hasty joys and griefs of him who woos,
    Where sweet success is neighbour to despair,
      With stolen looks and dangerous interviews:
    But one long week she came not, nor the next,
    And so he wandered here and there perplext;


V.

    Nor evermore she came. Full many days
      He sought her at their trysts, devised deep schemes
    To lure her back, and fell on subtle ways
      To win some word of her; but all his dreams
    Vanished like smoke, and then in sore amaze
      From town to town, as one that crazèd seems,
    He wandered, following in unhappy quest
    Uncertain clues that ended like the rest.


VI.

    And now this midnight, as he sits forlorn,
      The printed page for him no meaning bears;
    With every word some torturing dream is born;
      And every thought is like a step that scares
    Old memories up to make him weep and mourn.
      He cannot turn but from their latchless lairs,
    The weary shadows of his lost delight
    Rise up like dusk birds through the lonely night.


VII.

    And still with questions vain he probes his grief,
      Till thought is wearied out, and dreams grow dim.
    What bitter chance, what woe beyond belief
      Could keep his lady's heart so hid from him?
    Or was her love indeed but light and brief,
      A passing thought, a moment's dreamy whim?
    Aye there it stings, the woe that never sleeps:
    Poor Nino leans upon his book, and weeps.


VIII.

    Until at length the sudden grief that shook
      His piercèd bosom like a gust is past,
    And laid full weary on the wide-spread book,
      His eyes grow dim with slumber light and fast;
    But scarcely have his dreams had time to look
      On lands of kindlier promise, when aghast
    He starts up softly, and in wondering wise
    Listens atremble with wide open eyes.


IX.

    What sound was that? Who knocks like one in dread
      With such swift hands upon his outer door?
    Perhaps some beggar driven from his bed
      By gnawing hunger he can bear no more,
    Or questing traveller with confusèd tread,
      Straying, bewildered in the midnight hoar.
    Nino uprises, scared, he knows not how,
    The dreams still pale about his burdened brow.


X.