Poems and Ballads (second series)/A Song in Season

by Algernon Charles Swinburne

A SONG IN SEASON.

 

i.

Thou whose beauty

Knows no duty
Due to love that moves thee never;
Thou whose mercies
Are men's curses,
And thy smile a scourge for ever;

ii.

Thou that givest

Death and livest
On the death of thy sweet giving;
Thou that sparest
Not nor carest
Though thy scorn leave no love living;

iii.

Thou whose rootless

Flower is fruitless
As the pride its heart encloses,
But thine eyes are
As May skies are,
And thy words like spoken roses;

iv.

Thou whose grace is

In men's faces
Fierce and wayward as thy will is;
Thou whose peerless
Eyes are tearless,
And thy thoughts as cold sweet lilies;

v.

Thou that takest

Hearts and makest

Wrecks of loves to strew behind thee,
Whom the swallow
Sure should follow,
Finding summer where we find thee;

vi.

Thou that wakest

Hearts and breakest,
And thy broken hearts forgive thee,
That wilt make no
Pause and take no
Gift that love for love might give thee;

vii.

Thou that bindest

Eyes and blindest,
Serving worst who served thee longest;
Thou that speakest,
And the weakest
Heart is his that was the strongest;

viii.

Take in season

Thought with reason;
Think what gifts are ours for giving;
Hear what beauty
Owes of duty
To the love that keeps it living.

ix.

Dust that covers

Long dead lovers
Song blows off with breath that brightens;
At its flashes
Their white ashes
Burst in bloom that lives and lightens.

x.

Had they bent not

Head or lent not

Ear to love and amorous duties,
Song had never
Saved for ever,
Love, the least of all their beauties.

xi.

All the golden

Names of olden
Women yet by men's love cherished,
All our dearest
Thoughts hold nearest,
Had they loved not, all had perished.

xii.

If no fruit is

Of thy beauties,
Tell me yet, since none may win them,
What and wherefore
Love should care for
Of all good things hidden in them?

xiii.

Pain for profit

Comes but of it,
If the lips that lure their lover's
Hold no treasure
Past the measure
Of the lightest hour that hovers.

xiv.

If they give not

Or forgive not
Gifts or thefts for grace or guerdon,
Love that misses
Fruit of kisses
Long will bear no thankless burden.

xv.

If they care not

Though love were not,

If no breath of his burn through them,
Joy must borrow
Song from sorrow,
Fear teach hope the way to woo them.

xvi.

Grief has measures
Soft as pleasure's,
Fear has moods that hope lies deep in,
Songs to sing him,
Dreams to bring him,
And a red‑rose bed to sleep in.

xvii.

Hope with fearless

Looks and tearless
Lies and laughs too near the thunder;
Fear hath sweeter
Speech and meeter
For heart's love to hide him under.

xviii.

Joy by daytime

Fills his playtime
Full of songs loud mirth takes pride in;
Night and morrow
Weave round sorrow
Thoughts as soft as sleep to hide in.

xix.

Graceless faces,

Loveless graces,
Are but motes in light that quicken,
Sands that run down
Ere the sundown,
Roseleaves dead ere autumn sicken.

xx.

Fair and fruitless

Charms are bootless

Spells to ward off age's peril;
Lips that give not
Love shall live not,
Eyes that meet not eyes are sterile.

xxi.

But the beauty

Bound in duty
Fast to love that falls off never
Love shall cherish
Lest it perish,
And its root bears fruit for ever.