All thoughts of you are joys
And wistful fun!
My heart is like a boy's,
What have you done?

For I can no more think
Of pounds and pence
Just now, than I can think
With commonsense.

The leaves of forest glades
Where you are seen
Are still light yellow blades
Before their green;

Each soaking meadow pool
That's blurred with blue
To me, who am a fool,
The eyes of you!

The glistening breezes spilt
Through aspen tops
Where April kicks her quilt
Of buttercups

And makes the meadow sway
Its counterpane, —
As if Doll Tearsheet lay
And leapt again,

Are surely hints enough
That sweet and sure
Was he with: " Youth's a stuff
Will not endure. "

So let us find a bank. . . .
What's this? You won't?
You think I mean to rank —
Indeed I don't —

Doll Tearsheet with yourself,
My Dear, you're dull!
How could a lanky elf
Suggest a trull?

But she was meant to show,
(If Will gave lessons)
That only women know
The human essence,

And see beneath a part,
Though clothed upon
By Evil, the rich heart
Of gross Sir John;

Which no one else perceived.
When he was sickly,
Who was it for him grieved
But Doll and Quickly?

Significant and sad!
But each descendant
Of Adam, good or bad,
Is Eve's dependant.

We are a sorry race
Whose horoscope,
Uncast by Woman's grace,
Portends faint hope.

And now I find that he
Who stole and cheated,
Compared with honest me
Was kindlier treated. . . .

You used to love the Bard,
Then more's the pity
That now you disregard
What's blithe and witty!

And play the Grandmamma,
Aloof, sedate:
" Our pleasant Willie, ah!
Is dead in you of late! "

There! there! I don't suggest
You are not fit to live
Up to the very best
That life in Art can give.

See, there's a bank that's fenced,
Wherein, whereon
Joy may be lodged against
Oblivion;

And we hereafter, say
That we of yore,
One slanting sunny day
Could do no more

Than make this gentle bank
Joy's strong redoubt
Which years may not outflank,
Nor Memory flout.

" Well, to accomplish that
What must we do? "
" We must do something pat,
Something Come-to. "

Love can't be made by proxy,
Lest faith in Love should fail.
Heigh with the orthodoxy,
Come with me o'er the dale!

The only way to capture
What may not be expressed
Is turn it into rapture
Or turn it into jest.

So when you're old and fading,
A Christian Scientist,
Intent on self-persuading
That Evil can't exist

And I, for all my slimming,
Of somewhat stouter build, —
" To Rescue Fallen Women " —
Am Chairman of — The Guild...

(My Dear, we can't eschew it,
For Fate is farcical.
The mighty poet knew it:
There's Falstaff in us all.)

When, after much persuasion,
In public we appear
To grace a State occasion,
Both you and I, my Dear,

Well honoured and respected,
We meet our troops of friends:
Since on the Undetected,
Respect so much depends,

I'll give you formal greeting
And bow while whispering
This spell: " My pretty sweeting! "
To plunge our hearts in Spring;

For they, who hold together
Half shares in Love's secret,
Can conjure Spring, and tether
The years that bring regret.