free-verse128 lines

The Garden. (From Gilbert)

by Charlotte Bronte

Above the city hung the moon,

Right o'er a plot of ground

Where flowers and orchard-trees were fenced

With lofty walls around:

'Twas Gilbert's garden, there to-night

Awhile he walked alone;

And, tired with sedentary toil,

Mused where the moonlight shone.

This garden, in a city-heart,

Lay still as houseless wild,

Though many-windowed mansion fronts

Were round it; closely piled;

But thick their walls, and those within

Lived lives by noise unstirred;

Like wafting of an angel's wing,

Time's flight by them was heard.

Some soft piano-notes alone

Were sweet as faintly given,

Where ladies, doubtless, cheered the hearth

With song that winter-even.

The city's many-mingled sounds

Rose like the hum of ocean;

They rather lulled the heart than roused

Its pulse to faster motion.

Gilbert has paced the single walk

An hour, yet is not weary;

And, though it be a winter night

He feels nor cold nor dreary.

The prime of life is in his veins,

And sends his blood fast flowing,

And Fancy's fervour warms the thoughts

Now in his bosom glowing.

Those thoughts recur to early love,

Or what he love would name,

Though haply Gilbert's secret deeds

Might other title claim.

Such theme not oft his mind absorbs,

He to the world clings fast,

And too much for the present lives,

To linger o'er the past.

But now the evening's deep repose

Has glided to his soul;

That moonlight falls on Memory,

And shows her fading scroll.

One name appears in every line

The gentle rays shine o'er,

And still he smiles and still repeats

That one name, Elinor.

There is no sorrow in his smile,

No kindness in his tone;

The triumph of a selfish heart

Speaks coldly there alone;

He says: "She loved me more than life;

And truly it was sweet

To see so fair a woman kneel,

In bondage, at my feet.

"There was a sort of quiet bliss

To be so deeply loved,

To gaze on trembling eagerness

And sit myself unmoved.

And when it pleased my pride to grant

At last some rare caress,

To feel the fever of that hand

My fingers deigned to press.

"'Twas sweet to see her strive to hide

What every glance revealed;

Endowed, the while, with despot-might

Her destiny to wield.

I knew myself no perfect man,

Nor, as she deemed, divine;

I knew that I was glorious, but

By her reflected shine;

"Her youth, her native energy,

Her powers new-born and fresh,

'Twas these with Godhead sanctified

My sensual frame of flesh.

Yet, like a god did I descend

At last, to meet her love;

And, like a god, I then withdrew

To my own heaven above.

"And never more could she invoke

My presence to her sphere;

No prayer, no plaint, no cry of hers

Could win my awful ear.

I knew her blinded constancy

Would ne'er my deeds betray,

And, calm in conscience, whole in heart.

I went my tranquil way.

"Yet, sometimes, I still feel a wish,

The fond and flattering pain

Of passion's anguish to create

In her young breast again.

Bright was the lustre of her eyes,

When they caught fire from mine;

If I had power, this very hour,

Again I'd light their shine.

"But where she is, or how she lives,

I have no clue to know;

I've heard she long my absence pined,

And left her home in woe.

But busied, then, in gathering gold,

As I am busied now,

I could not turn from such pursuit,

To weep a broken vow.

"Nor could I give to fatal risk

The fame I ever prized;

Even now, I fear, that precious fame

Is too much compromised."

An inward trouble dims his eye,

Some riddle he would solve;

Some method to unloose a knot,

His anxious thoughts revolve.

He, pensive, leans against a tree,

A leafy evergreen,

The boughs, the moonlight, intercept,

And hide him like a screen

He starts, the tree shakes with his tremor,

Yet nothing near him pass'd;

He hurries up the garden alley,

In strangely sudden haste.

With shaking hand, he lifts the latchet,

Steps o'er the threshold stone;

The heavy door slips from his fingers,

It shuts, and he is gone.

What touched, transfixed, appalled, his soul?

A nervous thought, no more;

'Twill sink like stone in placid pool,

And calm close smoothly o'er.