Part 4 (1/2)

Tell me, my heart;--what angel-greeted door Or threshold of wing-winnowed thres.h.i.+ng-floor Hath guest fire-fledged as thine, whose lord is Love?

HOPE OVERTAKEN

I deemed thy garments, O my Hope, were grey, So far I viewed thee. Now the s.p.a.ce between Is pa.s.sed at length; and garmented in green Even as in days of yore thou stand'st to-day.

Ah G.o.d! and but for lingering dull dismay, On all that road our footsteps erst had been Even thus commingled, and our shadows seen Blent on the hedgerows and the water-way.

O Hope of mine whose eyes are living love, No eyes but hers,--O Love and Hope the same!-- Lean close to me, for now the sinking sun That warmed our feet scarce gilds our hair above.

O hers thy voice and very hers thy name!

Alas, cling round me, for the day is done!

LOVE AND HOPE

Bless love and hope. Full many a withered year Whirled past us, eddying to its chill doomsday; And clasped together where the blown leaves lay, We long have knelt and wept full many a tear.

Yet lo! one hour at last, the Spring's compeer, Flutes softly to us from some green byeway:*

Those years, those tears are dead, but only they:-- Bless love and hope, true soul; for we are here.

Cling heart to heart; nor of this hour demand Whether in very truth, when we are dead, Our hearts shall wake to know Love's golden head Sole suns.h.i.+ne of the imperishable land; Or but discern, through night's unfeatured scope, Scorn-fired at length the illusive eyes of Hope.

*[sic]

CLOUD AND WIND

Love, should I fear death most for you or me?

Yet if you die, can I not follow you, Forcing the straits of change? Alas! but who Shall wrest a bond from night's inveteracy, Ere yet my hazardous soul put forth, to be Her warrant against all her haste might rue?-- Ah! in your eyes so reached what dumb adieu, What unsunned gyres of waste eternity?

And if I die the first, shall death be then A lampless watchtower whence I see you weep?-- Or (woe is me!) a bed wherein my sleep Ne'er notes (as death's dear cup at last you drain), The hour when you too learn that all is vain And that Hope sows what Love shall never reap?

SECRET PARTING

Because our talk was of the cloud-control And moon-track of the journeying face of Fate, Her tremulous kisses faltered at love's gate And her eyes dreamed against a distant goal: But soon, remembering her how brief the whole Of joy, which its own hours annihilate, Her set gaze gathered, thirstier than of late, And as she kissed, her mouth became her soul.

Thence in what ways we wandered, and how strove To build with fire-tried vows the piteous home Which memory haunts and whither sleep may roam,-- They only know for whom the roof of Love Is the still-seated secret of the grove, Nor spire may rise nor bell be heard therefrom.

PARTED LOVE

What shall be said of this embattled day And armed occupation of this night By all thy foes beleaguered,--now when sight Nor sound denotes the loved one far away?

Of these thy vanquished hours what shalt thou say,-- As every sense to which she dealt delight Now labours lonely o'er the stark noon-height To reach the sunset's desolate disarray?

Stand still, fond fettered wretch! while Memory's art Parades the Past before thy face, and lures Thy spirit to her pa.s.sionate portraitures: Till the tempestuous tide-gates flung apart Flood with wild will the hollows of thy heart, And thy heart rends thee, and thy body endures.