lyrical poetry - OUDL Home

ARNOLD AND PRE-RAPHAELITE GROUPto actual song of his lyrics are the beautiful lines ToFausta:Joy comes and goes : hope ebbs and flowsLike the wave,where he is following Shelley, a little awkwardly, and" Strew on her roses, roses." His tone in general isthat of a meditative chant rather than of song, in metreswhich, though irregular, do not give such an impressionof virtuosity as the elaborate cadences and vowelmusicof Tennyson or the varied and sometimeofreakish experiments of Browning. His lyrics might beclassified as poems in ballad or other comparativelysimple forms, lyrics in irregular measures with orwithout rhyme, and odes in stanzas. In Obermann andObermann Once More he has used the ballad measurefor two poems which in their fulness of thought, clearnessof vision and plangency of rhythm, are, especiallythe latter, the most simply effective of his metaphysicallyrical poems:She heard it, the victorious WestIn crown and sword array'd !She felt the void which mined her breast,She shiver'd and obey'd.She veil'd her eagles, snapp'd her sword.And laid her sceptre down ;Her stately purple she abhorr'd,And her imperial crown ;She broke her flutes, she stopp'd her sportyHer artists could not please ;She tore her books, she shut her courts,She fled her palaces ;Lust of the eye and pride of lifeShe left it all behind,And hurried, torn with inward strife,The wilderness to find.95