Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). A Victorian Anthology, 1837–1895. 1895.

Thomas Lovell Beddoes 1803–49

From “Torrismond”

Beddoes

Veronica. COME then, a song; a winding gentle song,

To lead me into sleep. Let it be low

As zephyr, telling secrets to his rose,

For I would hear the murmuring of my thoughts;

And more of voice than of that other music

That grows around the strings of quivering lutes;

But most of thought; for with my mind I listen,

And when the leaves of sound are shed upon it,

If there ’s no seed remembrance grows not there.

So life, so death; a song, and then a dream!

Begin before another dewdrop fall

From the soft hold of these disturbed flowers,

For sleep is filling up my senses fast,

And from these words I sink.

How many times do I love thee, dear?

Tell me how many thoughts there be

In the atmosphere

Of a new-fall’n year,

Whose white and sable hours appear

The latest flake of Eternity:

So many times do I love thee, dear.

How many times do I love again?

Tell me how many beads there are

In a silver chain

Of evening rain,

Unravell’d from the tumbling main,

And threading the eye of a yellow star:

So many times do I love again.

Elvira. She sees no longer: leave her then alone,

Encompass’d by this round and moony night.

A rose-leaf for thy lips, and then goodnight:

So life, so death; a song, and then a dream!