Atalanta in Calydon And Lyrical Poems Author:Algernon Charles Swinburne General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1901 Original Publisher: B. Tauchnitz Subjects: Fiction / Literary Poetry / General Poetry / English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the Gene... more »ral Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: The burden of much gladness. Life and lust Forsake thee, and the face of thy delight; And underfoot the heavy hour strews dust, And overhead strange weathers burn and bite; And where the red was, lo the bloodless white, And where truth was, the likeness of a liar, And where day was, the likeness of the night; This is the end of every man's desire. L'envoy. Princes, and ye whom pleasure quickeneth, Heed well this rhyme before your pleasure tire; For life is sweet, but after life is death. This is the end of every man's desire. SAPPHO. (from Anactoria.) For who shall change with prayers or thanksgivings The mystery of the cruelty of things? Or say what God above all gods and years, With offering and blood-sacrifice of tears, With lamentation from strange lands, from graves Where the snake pastures, from scarred mouths of slaves, From prison, and from plunging prows of ships Through flamelike foam of the sea's closing lips -- With thwartings of strange signs, and wind-blown hair Of comets, desolating the dim air, When darkness is made fast with seals and bars, And fierce reluctance of disastrous stars, Eclipse, and sound of shaken hills, and wings Darkening, and blind inexpiable things -- With sorrow of labouring moons, and altering light And travail of the planets of the night, And weeping of the weary Pleiads seven, Feeds the mute melancholy lust of heaven? Is not this incense bitterness, his meat Murder? his hidden face and iron feet Hath not...« less