ABOUT ROSSETTI'S POETIC STYLE

Rossetti's poetry is marked by an extraordinary fastidiousness of expression and beauty of diction; the form and colour of his style are alike marvellous in clearness and loveliness of language. But the dominant characteristic, after all, is the underlying idea, the romantic motive. Rossetti's poetry is as full, as his pictures, of the true romantic feeling, the ever-present apprehension of the spiritual world and of that struggle of the soul with earthly conditions.


EXCERPTS

- LOVESIGHT

When do I see thee most, beloved one?
When in the light the spirits of mine eyes
Before thy face, their altar, solemnize
The worship of that Love through thee made known?
Or when in the dusk hours, (we two alone,)
Close-kissed and eloquent of still replies
Thy twilight-hidden glimmering visage lies,
And my soul only sees thy soul its own?
O love, my love! if I no more should see
Thyself, nor on the earth the shadow of thee,
Nor image of thine eyes in any spring,—
How then should sound upon Life's darkening slope
The ground-whirl of the perished leaves of Hope,
The wind of Death's imperishable wing?

- THE KISS

What smouldering senses in death's sick delay
Or seizure of malign vicissitude
Can rob this body of honour, or denude
This soul of wedding-raiment worn to-day?
For lo! even now my lady's lips did play
With these my lips such consonant interlude
As laurelled Orpheus longed for when he wooed
The half-drawn hungering face with that last lay.
I was a child beneath her touch,—a man
When breast to breast we clung, even I and she,—
A spirit when her spirit looked through me,—
A god when all our life-breath met to fan
Our life-blood, till love's emulous ardours ran,
Fire within fire, desire in deity.

- NUPTIAL SLEEP

At length their long kiss severed, with sweet smart:
And as the last slow sudden drops are shed
From sparkling eaves when all the storm has fled,
So singly flagged the pulses of each heart.
Their bosoms sundered, with the opening start
Of married flowers to either side outspread
From the knit stem; yet still their mouths, burnt red,
Fawned on each other where they lay apart.
Sleep sank them lower than the tide of dreams,
And their dreams watched them sink, and slid away.
Slowly their souls swam up again, through gleams
Of watered light and dull drowned waifs of day;
Till from some wonder of new woods and streams
He woke, and wondered more: for there she lay.


CONTENTS

PART I. YOUTH AND CHANGE

INTRODUCTORY SONNET
LOVE ENTHRONED
BRIDAL BIRTH
REDEMPTION
LOVESIGHT
HEART’S HOPE
THE KISS
NUPTIAL SLEEP
SUPREME SURRENDER
LOVE’S LOVERS
PASSION AND WORSHIP
THE PORTRAIT
THE LOVE-LETTER
THE LOVERS’ WALK
ANTIPHONY
YOUTH’S SPRING-TRIBUTE
THE BIRTH-BOND
A DAY OF LOVE
BEAUTY’S PAGEANT
GENIUS IN BEAUTY
SILENT NOON
GRACIOUS MOONLIGHT
LOVE-SWEETNESS
HEART’S HAVEN
LOVE’S BAUBLES
PRIDE OF YOUTH
WINGED HOURS
MID-RAPTURE
HEART’S COMPASS
SOUL-LIGHT
THE MOONSTAR
LAST FIRE
HER GIFTS
EQUAL TROTH
VENUS VICTRIX
THE DARK GLASS
THE LAMP’S SHRINE
LIFE-IN-LOVE
THE LOVE-MOON
THE MORROW’S MESSAGE
SLEEPLESS DREAMS
SEVERED SELVES
THROUGH DEATH TO LOVE
HOPE OVERTAKEN
LOVE AND HOPE
CLOUD AND WIND
SECRET PARTING
PARTED LOVE
BROKEN MUSIC
DEATH-IN-LOVE
WILLOWWOOD
WITHOUT HER
LOVE’S FATALITY
STILLBORN LOVE
TRUE WOMAN
LOVE’S LAST GIFT

PART II. CHANGE AND FATE

TRANSFIGURED LIFE
THE SONG-THROE
THE SOUL’S SPHERE
INCLUSIVENESS
ARDOUR AND MEMORY
KNOWN IN VAIN
HEART OF THE NIGHT
THE LANDMARK
A DARK DAY
AUTUMN IDLENESS
THE HILL SUMMIT
THE CHOICE
OLD AND NEW ART
SOUL’S BEAUTY
BODY’S BEAUTY
THE MONOCHORD
FROM DAWN TO NOON
MEMORIAL THRESHOLDS
HOARDED JOY
BARREN SPRING
FAREWELL TO THE GLEN
VAIN VIRTUES
LOST DAYS
DEATH’S SONGSTERS
HERO’S LAMP
THE TREES OF THE GARDEN
‘RETRO ME, SATHANA!’
LOST ON BOTH SIDES
THE SUN’S SHAME
MICHELANGELO’S KISS
THE VASE OF LIFE
LIFE THE BELOVED
A SUPERSCRIPTION
HE AND I
NEWBORN DEATH
THE ONE HOPE