Poetical Works of Robert Bridges, Volume 2 — A Closer Reading

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Authors: Bridges, Robert, 1844-1930 Digital Source: Project Gutenberg Gutenberg Release Year: 2017 First Publication Year: Not confirmed

Key Word: English poetry; English drama Target Reader: Readers of public-domain and historical texts

Book Edition: Project Gutenberg digital edition Book Language: en

Edition facts

Words 31,268

Reading time 136 min

Text sections 131

The catalog record for Poetical Works of Robert Bridges, Volume 2 — A Closer Reading provides practical reading context through 31,268 words, 2 hr 16 min estimated reading time, and 131 detected text sections.

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Source: Project Gutenberg record #55178

This second volume of Robert Bridges' collected poems gathers his Shorter Poems (Books I–IV) and New Poems, with notes on earlier publication. The excerpts show a poet attentive to seasonal change, natural detail, and the interplay of memory and landscape, often in elegiac or reflective lyric forms.

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an, I would not chafe and fret As thou, because a limit To thy desires is set.

I would be blue, and gentle, Patient, and calm, and see If my smiles might not tempt her, My love, to come to me.

I’d make my depths transparent, And still, that she should lean O’er the boat’s edge to ponder The sights that swam between.

I would command strange creatures, Of bright hue and quick fin, To stir the water near her, And tempt her bare arm in.

I’d teach her spend the summer With me: and I can tell, That, were I thou, O ocean, My love should love me well.

But on the mad cloud scudded, The breeze it blew so stiff; And the sad ocean bellowed, And pounded at the cliff.

I heard a linnet courting His lady in the spring: His mates were idly sporting, Nor stayed to hear him sing His song of love.— I fear my speech distorting His tender love.

The phrases of his pleading Were full of young delight; And she that gave him heeding Interpreted aright His gay, sweet notes,— So sadly marred in the reading,— His tender notes.

And when he ceased, the hearer Awaited the refrain, Till swiftly perching nearer He sang his song again, His pretty song:— Would that my verse spake clearer His tender song!

Ye happy, airy creatures! That in the merry spring Think not of what misfeatures Or cares the year may bring; But unto love Resign your simple natures, To tender love.

Dear lady, when thou frownest, And my true love despisest, And all thy vows disownest That sealed my venture wisest; I think thy pride’s displeasure Neglects a matchless treasure Exceeding price and measure.

But when again thou smilest, And love for love returnest, And fear with joy beguilest, And takest truth in earnest; Then, though I sheer adore thee, The sum of my love for thee Seems poor, scant, and unworthy.

I will not let thee go. Ends all our month-long love in this? Can it be summed up so, Quit in a single kiss? I will not let thee go.

I will not let thee go. If thy words’ breath could scare thy deeds, As the soft south can blow And toss the feathered seeds, Then might I let thee go.

I will not let thee go. Had not the great sun seen, I might; Or were he reckoned slow To bring the false to light, Then might I let thee go.

I will not let thee go. The stars that crowd the summer skies Have watched us so below With all their million eyes, I dare not let thee go.

I will not let thee go. Have we not chid the changeful moon, Now rising late, and now Because she set too soon, And shall I let thee go?

I will not let thee go. Have not the young flowers been content, Plucked ere their buds could blow, To seal our sacrament? I cannot let thee go.

I will not let thee go. I hold thee by too many bands: Thou sayest farewell, and lo! I have thee by the hands, And will not let thee go.

I found to-day out walking The flower my love loves best. What, when I stooped to pluck it, Could dare my hand arrest?

Was it a snake lay curling About the root’s thick crown? Or did some hidden bramble Tear my hand reaching down?

There was no snake uncurling, And no thorn wounded me; ’Twas my heart checked me, sighing She is beyond the sea.

A poppy grows upon the shore, Bursts her twin cup in summer late: Her leaves are glaucous-green and hoar, Her petals yellow, delicate.

Oft to her cousins turns her thought, In wonder if they care that she Is fed with spray for dew, and caught By every gale that sweeps the sea.

She has no lovers like the red, That dances with the noble corn: Her blossoms on the waves are shed, Where she stands shivering and forlorn.

Sometimes when my lady sits by me My rapture’s so great, that I tear My mind from the thought that she’s nigh me, And strive to forget that she’s there. And sometimes when she is away Her absence so sorely does try me, That I shut to my eyes, and assay To think she is there sitting by me.

Long are the hours the sun is above, But when evening comes I go home to my love.

I’m away the daylight hours and more, Yet she comes not down to open the door.

She does not meet me upon the stair,— She sits in my chamber and waits for me there.

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Robert Bridges' Poetical Works, Volume 2 collects his Shorter Poems (Books I–IV) and a section of New Poems, with appended notes on earlier publication history. The excerpts reveal a poet who returns repeatedly to the English countryside as a setting for meditation on time, loss, and the persistence of natural cycles. Bridges' voice is measured and musical, often employing regular stanzas and rhyme schemes that echo traditional lyric forms. The opening elegy addresses a stream as a familiar witness to youthful dreams, while later poems observe winter landscapes, bird song, and the slow arrival of spring. The catalog subjects classify this work as English poetry and drama, but the excerpts show no dramatic scenes; instead, they present a series of lyrical observations grounded in precise natural imagery.

Seasonal Structure and Natural Observation

The excerpts are organized by season, moving from an elegy set beside a stream in summer to a winter poem titled "January" that describes "the sunless sky with faded gleams" and trees holding their buds in trust. Bridges does not simply describe weather; he links seasonal states to emotional and philosophical reflection. In "The Palm Willow," the poet asks "When cometh Spring?" while observing that the willow stands "a lonely bush / Of nebulous gold." The poems accumulate specific details—the starling that "chaps his bill," the chestnut's "gluey knops upthrust"—that ground abstraction in the tangible world. This attention to the physical signs of seasonal change gives the collection a coherent temporal framework, even though the poems were originally published across multiple books.

Recurring Motifs: Streams, Birds, and Memory

Two motifs recur across the excerpts: flowing water and birds. The opening elegy addresses a "clear and gentle stream" as a repository of memory, while later poems feature larks, yellow birds, and rooks. In "Larks," the birds' songs are described as "dome us with joy as bright / As heaven's best azure," and in "Asian Birds" the poet wishes to "so fashion into rhyme" that his poem "would be the voice of spring." These avian images often serve as bridges between the observed world and the poet's inner state. The stream in the first elegy is explicitly linked to the poet's "old lament" and "idle dream," establishing a pattern where natural features become emblems of personal history. The excerpts do not reveal a narrative arc, but the recurrence of these motifs suggests a deliberate thematic unity.

Formal Craft and Metrical Control

Bridges employs a variety of stanza forms, from the six-line stanzas of the first elegy to the shorter, song-like lines of "Larks" and "Asian Birds." The poems are consistently metrical, often using iambic or anapestic rhythms, and they maintain tight rhyme schemes. In "So sweet love seemed that April morn," the poet uses a simple abab pattern to explore how love changes imperceptibly with age: "Though day by day is nought to see, / So delicate his motions be." The control of meter and rhyme gives the poems a formal polish that aligns with Bridges' reputation as a prosodic craftsman. The notes at the end of the volume, which record earlier publication dates and editions, further indicate the author's attention to the textual history of his work.

Readers approaching this volume should expect a collection of lyric poems rather than a dramatic or narrative work. The notes provide useful context for the publication history of individual poems, but the excerpts themselves offer no plot or character development. The poems reward attention to their formal structures and natural imagery, and they invite comparison with Bridges' other volumes. The catalog subject "drama" may mislead; the text contains no dialogue or stage directions.

There are hours when Bridges’ careful lines about light on old stone feel like a quiet hand on the shoulder, a reminder that the past lingers in every familiar walk. I found that same gentle tug while browsing A Golfing Idyll; Or, The Skipper's Round with the Deil On the Links of St. Andrews — Reading Companion, its wit softening into something surprisingly fond. Both hold a kind, unhurried ache for seasons gone.