The Poems of Adam Lindsay Gordon | Page 6

Many seek for peace and riches,
Length of days and life of ease;
I
have sought for one thing, which is
Fairer unto me than these.
Often,
too, I've heard the story,
In my boyhood, of the doom
Which the
fates assigned me -- Glory,
Coupled with an early tomb.
Swift assault and sudden sally
Underneath the Trojan wall;
Charge,
and countercharge, and rally,
War-cry loud, and trumpet call;

Doubtful strain of desp'rate battle,
Cut and thrust and grapple fierce,

Swords that ring on shields that rattle,
Blades that gash and darts
that pierce; --

I have done with these for ever;
By the loud resounding sea,
Where
the reedy jav'lins quiver,
There is now no place for me.
Day by day
our ranks diminish,
We are falling day by day;
But our sons the
strife will finish,
Where man tarries man must slay.
Life, 'tis said, to all men sweet is,
Death to all must bitter be;

Wherefore thus, oh, mother Thetis!
None can baffle Jove's decree?
I
am ready, I am willing,
To resign my stormy life;
Weary of this
long blood-spilling,
Sated with this ceaseless strife.
Shorter doom I've pictured dimly,
On a bed of crimson sand;

Fighting hard and dying grimly,
Silent lips, and striking hand.
But
the toughest lives are brittle,
And the bravest and the best
Lightly
fall -- it matters little;
Now I only long for rest.
I have seen enough of slaughter,
Seen Scamander's torrent red,
Seen
hot blood poured out like water,
Seen the champaign heaped with
dead.
Men will call me unrelenting,
Pitiless, vindictive, stern;

Few will raise a voice dissenting,
Few will better things discern.
Speak! the fires of life are reeling,
Like the wildfires on the marsh,

Was I to a friend unfeeling?
Was I to a mistress harsh?
Was there
nought save bloodshed throbbing
In this heart and on this brow?

Whisper! girl, in silence sobbing!
Dead Patroclus! answer thou!
Dry those violet orbs that glisten,
Darling, I have had my day;
Place
your hand in mine and listen,
Ere the strong soul cleaves its way

Through the death mist hovering o'er me,
As the stout ship cleaves
the wave,
To my fathers gone before me,

To the gods who love the
brave!
Courage, we must part for certain;
Shades that sink and shades that
rise,
Blending in a shroud-like curtain,
Gather o'er these weary eyes.

O'er the fields we used to roam, in
Brighter days and lighter cheer,


Gathers thus the quiet gloaming --
Now, I ween, the end is near.
For the hand that clasps your fingers,
Closing in the death-grip tight,

Scarcely feels the warmth that lingers,
Scarcely heeds the pressure
light;
While the failing pulse that alters,
Changing 'neath a death
chill damp,
Flickers, flutters, flags, and falters,
Feebly like a
waning lamp.
Think'st thou, love, 'twill chafe my ghost in
Hades' realm, where
heroes shine,
Should I hear the shepherd boasting
To his Argive
concubine?
Let him boast, the girlish victor,
Let him brag; not thus,
I trow,
Were the laurels torn from Hector,
Not so very long ago.
Does my voice sound thick and husky?
Is my hand no longer warm?

Round that neck where pearls look dusky
Let me once more wind
my arm;
Rest my head upon that shoulder,
Where it rested oft of
yore;
Warm and white, yet seeming colder
Now than e'er it seem'd
before.
'Twas the fraud of Priam's daughter,
Not the force of Priam's son,

Slew me -- ask not why I sought her,
'Twas my doom -- her work is
done!
Fairer far than she, and dearer,
By a thousandfold thou art;

Come, my own one, nestle nearer,
Cheating death of half his smart.
Slowly, while your amber tresses
Shower down their golden rain,

Let me drink those last caresses,
Never to be felt again;
Yet th'
Elysian halls are spacious,
Somewhere near me I may keep
Room --
who knows? -- The gods are gracious;
Lay me lower -- let me sleep!
Lower yet, my senses wander,
And my spirit seems to roll
With the
tide of swift Scamander
Rushing to a viewless goal.
In my ears, like
distant washing
Of the surf upon the shore,
Drones a murmur,
faintly splashing,
'Tis the splash of Charon's oar.
Lower yet, my own Briseis,
Denser shadows veil the light;
Hush,

what is to be, to be is,
Close my eyes, and say good-night.
Lightly
lay your red lips, kissing,
On this cold mouth, while your thumbs

Lie on these cold eyelids pressing --
Pallas! thus thy soldier comes!
Gone
In Collins-street standeth a statue tall -- *
A statue tall on a pillar of
stone,
Telling its story, to great and small,
Of the dust reclaimed
from the sand waste lone.
Weary and wasted, and worn and wan,

Feeble and faint, and languid and low,
He lay on the desert a dying
man,
Who has gone, my friends, where we all must go.
There are perils by land, and perils by water,
Short, I ween, are the
obsequies
Of the landsman lost, but they may be shorter
With the
mariner lost in the trackless seas;
And well for him when the timbers
start,
And the stout ship reels and settles below,
Who goes to his
doom with as bold a heart
As that dead man gone where we all must
go.
Man is stubborn his rights to yield,
And redder than dews at eventide

Are the dews of battle, shed on the field,
By a nation's wrath or a
despot's pride;
But few who have heard their