GEORGE MEREDITH

Across her sky he laid his hand; And bird he starved, he stifTen'd worm ; A sightless heaven, a shaven land. Her shivering Spring feign'd fast asleep, The bitten buds dared not unfold : We raced on roads and ice to keep Thought of the girl we love from cold.

But now the North wind ceases, The warm South-west awakes, The heavens are out in fleeces, And earth's green banner shakes.

��77 ;-. Love's Grave

��where the pressing wind shoots javelin-like, Its skeleton shadow on the broad-back'd wave ! Here is a fitting spot to dig Love's grave ; Here where the ponderous breakers plunge and strike, And dart their hissing tongues high up the sand : In hearing of the ocean, and in sight Of those ribb'd wind-streaks running into white. If I the death of Love had deeply plann'd, I never could have made it half so sure, As by the unblest kisses which upbraid The full-waked sense ; or failing that, degrade ! 'Tis morning: but no morning can restore What we have forfeited. I see no sin : The wrong is mix'd. In tragic life, God wot, No villain need be ! Passions spin the plot : We are betray'd by what is false within.

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