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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

NOTES OF AN INTERVIEW by WILLIAM JOHNSON CORY

First Line: IT IS BUT LITTLE THAT REMAINETH
Last Line: TO THE SPLENDOUR BREAKING FROM YOU, THOUGH YOU VEIL IT.
Subject(s): FREEDOM; LAMENT; LIBERTY;
It is but little that remaineth
Of the kindness that you gave me,
And that little precious remnant you withhold.
Go free; I know that time constraineth,
Wilful blindness could not save me:
Yet you say I caused the change that I foretold.

At every sweet unasked relenting,
Though you'd tried me with caprice,
Did my welcome, did my gladness ever fail?
To-day not loud is my lamenting:
Do not chide me; it shall cease:
Could I think of vanished love without a wail?

Elsewhere, you lightly say, are blooming
All the graces I desire:
Thus you goad me to the treason of content:
If ever, when your brow is glooming,
Softer faces I admire,
Then your lightnings make me tremble and repent.

Grant this: whatever else beguileth
Restless dreaming, drowsy toil,
As a plaything, as a windfall, let me hail it.
Believe: the brightest one that smileth
To your beaming is a foil,
To the splendour breaking from you, though you veil it.



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