O beautiful sun wearer,
with the sun in thy crest!
Come and meet me,
come and meet me,
Meet me to day,
and greet me with a kiss;
Thy love is all my life.
In the name of thy beautiful, beatific vision,
Come to me,
my love! Come to me!
Love, my heart is faint with waiting,
Faint with hope and joy deferred,
All night long at this sad grating,
Sleepless like a prisoned bird,
Singing low,
Singing slow:
Come, ah come, love.--Not a word!
Love, in vain for thee this token
Did I tie, poor silken cord,
To my window. See, 'tis broken
And the strands fly heavenward.
All are free,
All but me.
Come, ah come, love.--Not a word!
Lo, the first sad streak of morning
Cleaves the heaven like a sword.
I love thy skies, thy sunny mists,
Thy fields, thy mountains hoar,
Thy wind that bloweth where it lists-
Thy will, I love it more.
I love thy hidden truth to seek
All round, in sea, on shore;
The arts whereby like gods we speak-
Thy will to me is more.
I love thy men and women, Lord,
The children round thy door;
Calm thoughts that inward strength afford-
Thy will than these is more.
But when thy will my life doth hold
Thine to the very core,
The world, which that same will doth mould,
Now what is Love, I pray thee, tell?
It is that fountain and that well
Where pleasure and repentance dwell;
It is, perhaps, the sauncing bell
That tolls all into heaven or hell;
And this is Love, as I hear tell.
Yet what is Love, I prithee, say?
It is a work on holiday,
It is December matched with May,
When lusty bloods in fresh array
Hear ten months after of the play;
And this is Love, as I hear say.
Yet what is Love, good shepherd, sain?
It is a sunshine mixed with rain,
Now that I have won
Long despaired of peace,
And those fears are flown
That vext so my heart's ease;
Shall I wish my love
Had found a path more smooth,
With no thorns to prove
Its constancy and truth?
Wish those nights not spent,
Long, unhappy nights,
Which in sighings went
Over lost delights?
Wish those tears unwept,
When you seemed unkind?
Nay; for these pangs kept
Love steadfast in my mind.
Out of these he came
Stronger, tenderer; tried
Now all the lovely days are past,
The hours of sun and leagues of sea,
And starry nights that lay between
Yourself and me.
Our boat has left the sea behind.
She lies beside the friendly dock.
And soon the gangway will go down,
And lips will meet, and hands will lock,
And carriers will come climbing up
To take my things and leave us free.
There's trams and streets and home at last
For you and me.
TAKE as you will, slake, solace, and possess
While Youth, with laughter, scatters tears that fall
Sudden and shaken sometimes at your call;
Pledge me in passion and in gentleness,--
In praise and prayer, I would not give you less,
Be less unconquerably true in all,
Take my young kisses,--my young spirit's thrall,
Forbid not Now's imperishable "Yes"!
When I am old, and cold, and wise, and grown
As far beyond as you outstrip me now,--
Nor plead, nor pant, nor challenge nor protest;
Oh, come not then, all these years less your own;
Not speaking of the way,
Not thinking of what comes after,
Not questioning name or fame,
Here, loving love,
You and I look at each other.
This is not Love, perhaps,
Love that lays down its life,
that many waters cannot quench,
nor the floods drown,
But something written in lighter ink,
said in a lower tone, something, perhaps, especially our own.
A need, at times, to be together and talk,
And then the finding we can walk
More firmly through dark narrow places,
And meet more easily nightmare faces;
A need to reach out, sometimes, hand to hand,
And then find Earth less like an alien land;
A need for alliance to defeat
I HAVE not yet I could have loved thee, sweet;
Nor know I wherefore, thou being all thou art,
The engrafted thought in me throve incomplete,
And grew to summer strength in every part
Of root and leaf, but hath not borne the flower.
Love hath refrained his fullness from my heart.
I know no better beauty, none with power
To hold mine eyes through change and change as thine,
Like southern skies that alter with each hour,
And yet are changeless, and their calm divine
From light to light hath motionlessly passed,
