Songs before Sunrise (Swinburne)/A New Year's Message

by Algernon Charles Swinburne

A NEW YEAR'S MESSAGE.

To Joseph Mazzini.

"Send the stars light, but send not love to me."

Shelley.

1.

Out of the dawning heavens that hear

Young wings and feet of the new year
Move through their twilight, and shed round
Soft showers of sound,
Soothing the season with sweet rain,
If greeting come to make me fain,
What is it I can send again?

2.

I know not if the year shall send

Tidings to usward as a friend,
And salutation, and such things
Bear on his wings
As the soul turns and thirsts unto
With hungering eyes and lips that sue
For that sweet food which makes all new.

3.

I know not if his light shall be

Darkness, or else light verily:
I know but that it will not part
Heart’s faith from heart,
Truth from the trust in truth, nor hope
From sight of days unscaled that ope
Beyond one poor year’s horoscope.

4.

That faith in love which love’s self gives,

O master of my spirit, lives,
Having in presence unremoved
Thine head beloved,
The shadow of thee, the semitone
Of thy voice heard at heart and known,
The light of thee not set nor flown.

5.

Seas, lands, and hours, can these divide

Love from love’s service, side from side,
Though no sound pass nor breath be heard
Of one good word?
To send back words of trust to thee
Were to send wings to love, when he
With his own strong wings covers me.

6.

Who shall teach singing to the spheres,

Or motion to the flight of years?
Let soul with soul keep hand in hand
And understand,
As in one same abiding-place
We keep one watch for one same face
To rise in some short sacred space.

7.

And all space midway is but nought

To keep true heart from faithful thought,
As under twilight stars we wait
By Time’s shut gate
Till the slow soundless hinges turn,
And through the depth of years that yearn
The face of the Republic burn.

1870.