Page:The Fleshly school of poetry - Buchanan - 1872.djvu/75

 and scores of the author's pet phrases, the veriest pimples on the surface of style, like "wanton flowers," "murmuring sighs memorial," "sweet confederate music favourable," "hours eventual," "Love's philtred euphrasy," "culminant changes"—all familiar enough to us from the Della Cruscans; but culminating, in Sonnet XX., with an image in which the Euphuist would have rejoiced:—

Her set gaze gathered, thirstier than of late, (!) And as she kissed, her Mouth became her Soul!"

In Sonnet XXI., called "Parted Love," the lady has retired to get breath and arrange her clothes, and the lover is despairingly waiting from "the stark noon-height" to the "sunset's desolate disarray." Sonnets XXII. and XXIII. are too vague for description, but Landor would have stared to see his famous sea-shell image (which he accused Wordsworth of stealing) turned by the euphuistic-fleshly person into

The next four sonnets, called by the affected title of "Willow-wood," contain, besides the gem about "bubbling of brimming kisses," some fresh variations of a kiss:—

Fast together, alive from the abyss, Clung the soul-wrung implacable close kiss."

An "implacable" kiss! Also:—

So when the song died did the kiss unclose, And her face fell back drown'd."

The supreme silliness and worthlessness of "Willow-wood," however, could only be shown by quoting the four sonnets