Volume Ii Part 154 (1/2)

That sunny hair is dim, lad, They said was like a crown-- The red gold turned to gray, lad, The night a s.h.i.+p went down.

If you be yet May Margaret, May Margaret now as then, Then where's that bonny smile of yours That broke the hearts of men?

The bonny smile is wan, lad, That once was glad as day-- And oh! 'tis weary smiling To keep the tears away.

If you be that May Margaret, As yet you swear to me, Then where's that proud, cold heart of yours That sent your love to sea?

Ah, me! that heart is broken, The proud, cold heart has bled For one light word outspoken, For all the love unsaid.

Then Margaret, my Margaret, If all you say be true, Your hair is yet the sunniest gold, Your eyes the sweetest blue.

And dearer yet and fairer yet For all the coming years-- The fairer for the waiting, The dearer for the tears!

Theophile Marzials [1850-

RONDEL

Kissing her hair, I sat against her feet, Wove and unwove it, wound and found it sweet; Made fast therewith her hands, drew down her eyes, Deep as deep flowers and dreamy like dim skies; With her own tresses bound and found her fair, Kissing her hair.

Sleep were no sweeter than her face to me, Sleep of cold sea-bloom under the cold sea; What pain could get between my face and hers?

What new sweet thing would love not relish worse?

Unless, perhaps, white death had kissed me there, Kissing her hair.

Algernon Charles Swinburne [1837-1909]

A SPRING JOURNEY

We journeyed through broad woodland ways, My Love and I.

The maples set the s.h.i.+ning fields ablaze.

The blue May sky Brought to us its great Spring surprise; While we saw all things through each other's eyes.

And sometimes from a steep hillside Shone fair and bright The shadhush, like a young June bride, Fresh clothed in white.

Sometimes came glimpses glad of the blue sea; But I smiled only on my Love; he smiled on me.

The violets made a field one ma.s.s of blue-- Even bluer than the sky; The little brook took on that color too, And sang more merrily.

”Your dress is blue,” he laughing said. ”Your eyes,”

My heart sang, ”sweeter than the bending skies.”

We spoke of poets dead so long ago, And their wise words; We glanced at apple-trees, like drifted snow; We watched the nesting birds,-- Only a moment! Ah, how short the day!

Yet all the winters cannot blow its sweetness quite away.

Alice Freeman Palmer [1855-1902]