Her Passions
"I am Heathcliff"
'Leave the heart that now I bear,
And give me liberty!'
"What I love shall come like visitant of air,
Safe in secret power from lurking human snare;
Who loves me, no word of mine shall e'er betray,
Though for faith unstained my life must forfeit pay.
Burn, then, little lamp; glimmer straight and clear
Hush! a rustling wing stirs, methinks, the air:
He for whom I wait, thus ever comes to me;
Strange Power! I trust thy might; trust thou my constancy."
"I'll walk where my own nature would be leading:
It vexes me to choose another guide:
Where the gray flocks in ferny glens are feeding;
Where the wild wind blows on the mountain side
What have those lonely mountains worth revealing?
More glory and more grief than I can tell:
The earth that wakes one human heart to feeling
Can centre both the worlds of Heaven and Hell."
"There is a spot 'mid barren hills
Where winter howls and driving rain,
But if the weary tempest chills
There is a light that warms again.
The house is old, the trees are bare,
And moonless bends the misty dome,
But what on earth is half so dear,
So longed for as the hearth of home?
The mute bird sitting on the stone,
The dank moss dripping from the wall,
The garden walk with weeds o'ergrown,
I love them--how I love them all! "
* * * * *
'Leave the heart that now I bear,
And give me liberty!'
"What I love shall come like visitant of air,
Safe in secret power from lurking human snare;
Who loves me, no word of mine shall e'er betray,
Though for faith unstained my life must forfeit pay.
Burn, then, little lamp; glimmer straight and clear
Hush! a rustling wing stirs, methinks, the air:
He for whom I wait, thus ever comes to me;
Strange Power! I trust thy might; trust thou my constancy."
"I'll walk where my own nature would be leading:
It vexes me to choose another guide:
Where the gray flocks in ferny glens are feeding;
Where the wild wind blows on the mountain side
What have those lonely mountains worth revealing?
More glory and more grief than I can tell:
The earth that wakes one human heart to feeling
Can centre both the worlds of Heaven and Hell."
| "High waving heather, 'neath stormy blasts bending, Midnight and moonlight and bright shining stars; Darkness and glory rejoicingly blending, Earth rising to heaven and heaven descending, Man's spirit away from its drear dongeon sending, Bursting the fetters and breaking the bars. All down the mountain sides, wild forest lending One mighty voice to the life-giving wind; Rivers their banks in the jubilee rending, Fast through the valleys a reckless course wending, Wider and deeper their waters extending, Leaving a desolate desert behind. Shining and lowering and swelling and dying, Changing for ever from midnight to noon; Roaring like thunder, like soft music sighing, Shadows on shadows advancing and flying, Lightning-bright flashes the deep gloom defying, Coming as swiftly and fading as soon. "  |
"He comes with western winds, with evening's wandering airs,
With that clear dusk of heaven that brings the thickest stars;
Winds take a pensive tone, and stars a tender fire
And visions rise and change which kill me with desire
Desire for nothing known in my maturer years,
When joy grew mad with awe at counting future tears;
But first, a hush of peace, a soundless calm descends;
The struggle of distress and fierce impatience ends;
Mute music soothes my breast, unuttered harmony
That I could never dream till earth was lost to me
Then dawns the Invisible, the Unseen its truth reveals;
My outward sense is gone, my inward essence feels
Its wings are almost free, its home, its harbor found;
Measuring the gulf, it stoops and dares the final bound!
O dreadful is the check, intense the agony
When the ear begins to hear and the eye begins to see
When the pulse begins to throb, the brain to think again,
The soul to feel the flesh and the flesh to feel the chain!"
'I was only going to say that heaven did not seem to be my home; and I broke my heart with weeping to come back to earth; and the angels were so angry that they flung me out into the middle of the heath on the top of Wuthering Heights; where I woke sobbing for joy.
With that clear dusk of heaven that brings the thickest stars;
Winds take a pensive tone, and stars a tender fire
And visions rise and change which kill me with desire
Desire for nothing known in my maturer years,
When joy grew mad with awe at counting future tears;
But first, a hush of peace, a soundless calm descends;
The struggle of distress and fierce impatience ends;
Mute music soothes my breast, unuttered harmony
That I could never dream till earth was lost to me
Then dawns the Invisible, the Unseen its truth reveals;
My outward sense is gone, my inward essence feels
Its wings are almost free, its home, its harbor found;
Measuring the gulf, it stoops and dares the final bound!
O dreadful is the check, intense the agony
When the ear begins to hear and the eye begins to see
When the pulse begins to throb, the brain to think again,
The soul to feel the flesh and the flesh to feel the chain!"
'I was only going to say that heaven did not seem to be my home; and I broke my heart with weeping to come back to earth; and the angels were so angry that they flung me out into the middle of the heath on the top of Wuthering Heights; where I woke sobbing for joy.
"There is a spot 'mid barren hills
Where winter howls and driving rain,
But if the weary tempest chills
There is a light that warms again.
The house is old, the trees are bare,
And moonless bends the misty dome,
But what on earth is half so dear,
So longed for as the hearth of home?
The mute bird sitting on the stone,
The dank moss dripping from the wall,
The garden walk with weeds o'ergrown,
I love them--how I love them all! "
* * * * *
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