=Song=

  I

  The lintwhite and the throstlecock
      Have voices sweet and clear;
    All in the bloomed May. 
  They from the blosmy brere
  Call to the fleeting year,
  If that he would them hear
      And stay. 
  Alas! that one so beautiful
    Should have so dull an ear.

  II

  Fair year, fair year, thy children call,
      But thou art deaf as death;
    All in the bloomed May. 
  When thy light perisheth
  That from thee issueth,
  Our life evanisheth: 
      Oh! stay. 
  Alas! that lips so cruel dumb
    Should have so sweet a breath!

  III

  Fair year, with brows of royal love
      Thou comest, as a King. 
    All in the bloomed May. 
  Thy golden largess fling,
  And longer hear us sing;
  Though thou art fleet of wing,
      Yet stay. 
  Alas! that eyes so full of light
  Should be so wandering!

  IV

  Thy locks are full of sunny sheen
      In rings of gold yronne,[C]
    All in the bloomed May,
  We pri’ thee pass not on;
  If thou dost leave the sun,
  Delight is with thee gone,
      Oh! stay. 
  Thou art the fairest of thy feres,
    We pri’ thee pass not on.

[Footnote C:  His crispe hair in ringis was yronne.—­Chaucer, Knight’s Tale. (Tennyson’s note.)]

=Contributions to Periodicals 1831-32=

XXV

=A Fragment=

[Published in The Gem:  a Literary Annual.  London:  W. Marshall, Holborn Bars, mdcccxxxi.]

  Where is the Giant of the Sun, which stood
  In the midnoon the glory of old Rhodes,
  A perfect Idol, with profulgent brows
  Far sheening down the purple seas to those
  Who sailed from Mizraim underneath the star
  Named of the Dragon—­and between whose limbs
  Of brassy vastness broad-blown Argosies
  Drave into haven?  Yet endure unscathed
  Of changeful cycles the great Pyramids
  Broad-based amid the fleeting sands, and sloped
  Into the slumberous summer noon; but where,
  Mysterious Egypt, are thine obelisks
  Graven with gorgeous emblems undiscerned? 
  Thy placid Sphinxes brooding o’er the Nile? 
  Thy shadowy Idols in the solitudes,
  Awful Memnonian countenances calm
  Looking athwart the burning flats, far off
  Seen by the high-necked camel on the verge
  Journeying southward?  Where are thy monuments
  Piled by the strong and sunborn Anakim
  Over their crowned brethren [Greek:  ON] and [Greek:  ORE]? 
  Thy Memnon, when his peaceful lips are kissed
  With earliest rays, that from his mother’s eyes
  Flow over the Arabian bay, no more
  Breathes low into the charmed ears of morn
  Clear melody flattering the crisped Nile
  By columned Thebes.  Old Memphis hath gone down: 
  The Pharaohs are no more:  somewhere in death
  They sleep with staring eyes and gilded lips,
  Wrapped round with spiced cerements in old grots
  Rock-hewn and sealed for ever.