vowed no more To sacrifice, for “Might is right” they said. And pleasure, leaping in the streets with sin, Caroused through many days till wearily She tired and met with death in bitter pain. “Alas! God help us if no God we gain.”

A few rose up and speaking, “O be strong,” Were answered, “There’s no reason for your right,” But many crept in thankfulness for rest Into the river’s darkness out of sight; And others with their limbs deformed, or sore Seared flesh, shrieked out their patient years of pain. Crying to Death for their lost plains of Heaven. “Alas! God help us if no God we gain.”

p. 36LOVE

p. 36

Deep in the moving depths Of yellow wine, I swore I’d drown your face, O love of mine; All clad in yellow hue, So fair to see, You crouched within my cup And laughed at me.

Twice o’er a learned page I turned and tossed, For would I not forget The love I lost. All stern and robed in gloom, You read it too, I could not see the words—  Saw only you.

Within the hungry chase I thought to kill You, love, who haunted thus Without my will, p. 37But in the gentle gaze Of fawn and deer, Your eyes disarmed my hand, And shook my spear.

p. 37

Beneath a maid’s dark lash I swore you’d drown, Sink in the laughing blue—  Give in, go down: But no! you bathèd there Right joyously, And from her liquid eyes You laughed at me.

p. 38WISHES

p. 38

I wish we could live as the flowers live, To breathe and to bloom in the summer and sun; To slumber and sway in the heart of the night, And to die when our glory had done.

I wish we could love as the bees love, To rest or to roam without sorrow or sigh; With laughter, when, after the wooer had won, Love flew with a whispered good-bye.

I wish we could die as the birds die, To fly and to fall when our beauty was best: No trammels of time on the years of our face; And to leave but an empty nest.

p. 39CUPID SLAIN

p. 39

I come from a burial; Hush! let me be: I have put away my love, Fair exceedingly.

 Prev. P 21/40 next