In all their fragrance underneath the skies;
Fairer than all those glories that arise
From earth, to give a delicate perfume
Unto the airs, that by their birth assume
New life and joyousness; I would surmise
To be thy charms, which frequently surprise
My soul with smiles that banish every gloom.
I would that I, one half as easily,
Might pluck thee from thy temporary bed
Of earthly pleasure, and possess the flower
Of thy young life, to keep it worthily
Within the garden of my heart, and wed
Thy true love to my own far greater power!
XXX
Consign me not, while honoring thy love,
To the sad realm of lovers who have lost
The prize, that oft to them their life hath cost;
Nor send me from th’ Olympian height above
This poor, imperfect life wherein we move,
Deep down into the nether world. At most,
Have pity on a lover that thou dost
Not have the heart to readily reprove.
My own, my loved one, oh, receive from Heaven
That which I pray for nightly, ere I lay
My suffering soul to rest! I would that I
Had power to give what Nature hath not given
To thy dear self, and that this looked-for day
Might yet be borne upon thee, by and by!
XXXI
Was it with joy or with time’s false relief,
That I perceived the presence of thy being,
Clothed all in charm, once more alone, and seeing,
Beheld in thee both happiness and grief?
For surely, Cupid, thou art but a thief,
To steal from man his heart, and, with it fleeing,
Reduce him to love’s penury, agreeing
The while to soon replace his lost belief.
Loved one, thou bringest with thee pleasant hours,
That, dying all too soon, leave me in pain
For many a day and weary week betimes;
Refusing strangely love’s perpetual flowers;
Without the which my love for thee seems vain,
Save for th’ alleviation of my rhymes.
XXXII
Dost thou not feel some longing in thy breast
For an affection that on earth must play
The part of Heaven’s imitation, yea,
The power on which true love must surely rest?
How willingly would I thy spirit wrest
From its cold prison house, and wake to-day
Some sentiment in thee, that should not say
My love was but a visionary quest!
What power can make thee understand, that I
Do feel for thee all Heaven and Hell combined
In one magnificent emotion here,
And that thou mightest profit well thereby,
Couldst thou but recognize the love confined
Within thy heart, and cause it to appear?
XXXIII
Even could to-day have brought thee unto me
But for one fleeting hour, I might rest
In the enchantment of thy bliss, and best
Enjoy this marking of the years that see
A quest of love, that from my birth must be
The strongest passion stirred within my breast.
Still, though my soul this prayer to thee addrest;
Thou wouldst not to so slight a gift agree.
And yet, how little honor, fame, compare,
In satisfaction to this longing heart,
With one delicious moment in thine arms!
Tormenting vision of the holy air
Of heaven, from which on earth we soon do part;
While nothing the uneasy spirit calms!
XXXIV
Dear heart! why dost thou shun my own desire
To be with thee each hour of every day,
Each day in every year, and with thee play
The game of love thy beauty would inspire?
I cannot now extinguish the sweet fire
That burns within my soul. To thee I say,
I am in an imperishable way
Thy faithful friend, whose love shall never tire.
Dost thou then fear committal to be mine,
Even for a space, lest scandal touch thy name?
No thought is further from my wish towards thee.
To make our sweet companionship, in time,
Ripen to all that life may bring to fame,
Is my intention for thyself and me.
XXXV
What fault within me dost thou cultivate?
What still reject, though I assure my heart
That I am all thine own, and not in part
The man thou dost possess and captivate?
Still, while I thank the gods, I would berate
The irony of nature that doth start
In me the wound that Cupid’s fiery dart
Hath caused to flow, and mourn it, now too late.
Why must the mistress of emotion give
To one a portion of divine desire,
And to another an unending flow
Of love’s untempered thought, that cannot live,
Save in some reservoir, that must inspire
The whole of thy fair being love to know?
XXXVI
Loved one, though thou shouldst spurn me as a thing
Unworthy of affection or regard,
Think not alone that vanity may guard
Thy spirit from the friend that thou wouldst fling
So heedlessly aside. For life may bring
Its own swift sorrow, sad, or cold, or hard;
Then mayst thou think, perchance, of that young bard,
Who came to thee, his song of love to sing!
And when thy heart repine thee, if it doth,
Take from my own the sorrow thou hast given,
Like to a travesty of happiness,
Devoured in its fulness by a moth,
That eats the leaf from off the tree of Heaven,
And leaves the soul of man in loneliness!
XXXVII
Didst have, for me, one fleeting hour of love?
Then conjure to thyself that thought again;
Nor from its own sweet constancy refrain,
Till earth and air, and everything above
This hemisphere of human hearts, doth have
No longer any substance in its train.
Toward this ideal I willingly would strain
Each nerve, my soul from endless grief to save.
Sweet, honeyed flower, whose breath, to me divine,
Makes earth at once seem Heaven, that Heaven thyself;
Bring me the fragrance of thy scented being,
More full of fair sensation than sweet wine,
That doth entice new torments to myself;
And give to me what I, half blind, am seeing.
XXXVIII
Ah me! Sad fate doth overcome my soul,
As the old year now passeth from my sight,
And many a hope lies dying with its flight,
To hear the death-knell of the hours toll.
Even as the sounds upon the night airs roll,
Death giveth place to birth, and Love’s delight
Is born, in some young heart, that soon may plight
Its simple troth, and reach the promised goal.
I would that, with this old year, there might die
In me all sorrow, or desire to have
That which I may not soon possess as mine,
Or that this hour new-born might still defy
My own well-founded fear, that thy true love
Should never once through life upon me shine!
XXXIX
And now what hope have I to touch thine heart,
As the new year brings joy to every land?
What chance is there that thou shouldst understand
That which defies my power to impart
To thy dear self its meaning, though I start
To win anew with love thy treasured hand?
Like some uncertain pebble on the sand,
I find me now, tossed by the waves that part.
Oh! canst thou not, sweet pearl upon the ocean
Of love’s resistless power to possess
All men in its divine and fair embrace,
Perceive my unmistakable devotion
To thy sweet self, and give but one caress
That might so easily thy presence grace?
XL
How often have I asked, through this past year,
If all that I have suffered did repay
My fleeting joy of Heaven for a day;
That made thy soul at once to me more dear
Than all else in the whole wide world. I fear
That, in my heart, I may not truly say
It brought Love’s recompense within its way,
Or caused the lowering of Love’s sky to clear.
And yet, although thou wouldst misuse my love,
Without apparently one real regret,
How shall I, loving as I do, despair
That thou mayst still, some happy day, disprove
The charge that stains thy name: soon to forget
That which thou wert the first one to declare?
XLI
Methinks the saddest of all pains to bear
Are those which break in twain the lover’s heart,
Which cling to life when love from life doth part,
And cause it to take sorrow for its share.
In vain do men go forth, in dim despair,
Seeking to extricate Love’s poisoned dart
From some dark spot whence it would not depart,
And still return to find it fastened there.
O god of Love! Some mercy to thy swains
Show in the hours of agony they feel!
Couldst thou but suffer half they do endure,
Or feel in part the measure of their pains;
With something, thou wouldst try their wounds to heal,
Or else endeavor thy disease to cure!
XLII
As the wild waves roll o’er some rock-bound coast,
And break in futile effort to possess
Something beyond their reach, I must confess
Am I in my fierce passion, that can boast
No more of thee than surging seas at most
Do find as they rebound in their distress,
Half-clothed in weeds and winter’s sombre dress;
So often have I thought thy love was lost!
Yet, at one little word or smile from thee,
These winter storms do change to summer seas,
And I am softened in a moment’s time.
So would the magic of thyself give me
A sweeter sentiment, that still doth please
More than the summits of desire to climb.
XLIII
While sad at heart, that thou wilt not give me
Thy treasured self, more often than the time
Of every year doth change; thy lover’s crime
I still may countervail, while I do see
Thy lovely form once more, enclosing thee
Reclining in my arms, and leave sad rhyme
For power to rejoice, that love sublime
Hath still returned again to solace me.
If not thyself, let that remembrance come:
The holiest hour that I have known in life,
When all I felt were God and Heaven and thee,
To still remain, when thou dost leave my home,
That without thee is only a sad strife
’Twixt my desire and that which cannot be.
XLIV
When clouds disperse, and sunshine fills the sky,
Then doth my heart think fittingly of thee;
And I imagine that thou think’st of me,
As one who loveth for eternity.
Fair one, could this but be a certainty,
No longer would I crave in vain to see
The face of Heaven after death, but be
Forever on this earth while thou wert by.
Ah! but such dreams of happiness disperse,
Like visionary clouds upon the air
That warms with sunlight o’er some summer’s day,
And chills again, as doth my passing verse,
Whenever thou refusest Love’s sweet lair,
To which thou know’st so well the only way!
XLV
Should I return, and find once more that thou
Wert willing to become but half my bride,
With what swift pace would I, in gladness, ride
O’er the salt seas or coursing streams, that plough
Their way ’twixt rocky chasms, and endow
Their passage with those dangers that betide
Love’s course, as we pursue it side by side.
Sweetheart! What would I give to see thee now!
And yet how sad, this knowledge that I hold,
From past experience, within my heart:
That even should I be within thy reach,
Thou wouldst not make one effort to enfold
Mine arms in thine, cold maiden that thou art!
How then, at last, love to thee shall I teach?
XLVI
What God hath made thee half of graven stone,
Half godlike, His own image to portray
That thou shouldst so continually stray
From every love-shaft that my verse hath thrown
For these long years toward thee, and still disown
The very sentiment that thou dost say
Moves thee to love, though in some other way
Than I to thee in my full heart have shown?
Loved angel, of some sphere so far beyond
The sordid realm of this poor fleeting life,
That thou art some fair spirit clothed with form,
Tell me, in truth, why thou dost still seem fond
Of me, yet ’neath my heart dost plunge the knife
Of love’s sad torture, and my spirit storm?
XLVII
Canst thou not feel the tragedy of love,
That followeth the train of thy delay
To give what thou hast owed, full many a day,
Unto my patient soul; that surely strove
Last year thy loving sentiment to move
Toward something higher than mere passion’s sway?
How canst thou then, in truth, to thine heart say
Thou hast fulfilled the duty of true love?
I fear me that, like many, thou dost find
A cruel joy in breaking this poor heart,
Whose only crime is that it loves too well.
Dost feel no obligation to be kind
To those who honor thee, nor to depart
From evils that no mortal can foretell?
XLVIII
To-morrow I must journey for a space.
A year it seemeth, though a month it be;
For in it thou remainest far from me;
Nor shall I once behold thy lovely face,
Whose coming doth so well my chamber grace;
But feel the hope, oft vain, that I may see
Some passing vision, or something of thee,
Which each new day I live doth grow apace.
Ah! Thou didst come with others to my shrine,
Even as the sun did set this afternoon,
And give to me one of those rare delights,
That move my soul to lose itself in thine;
Like some fleet harbinger of Love, that soon
Departs from me for many days and nights!
XLIX
For what strange purpose hath God sent this longing
Unto my soul, for thy most precious love,
To raise it suddenly to realms above,
And then deliver it to one belonging
More to the realm of Satan’s world, destroying
The fair ideal that all my life I strove
To realize? Oh, cause me to remove
This spell that is no happiness employing!
Yet who that falleth in love’s meshes knoweth
Why he hath fallen, or from whence he fell,
Or who in truth can understand love’s reason,
Save that some joy and pain it often soweth;
The most of which we cannot always tell,
When they at first appear in love’s sweet season.
L
How little comfort is there in the thought,
Kind friends so often give love’s bleeding heart:
That love’s sharp pain grows less whene’er we part,
And leave behind the prize so dearly bought!
Yet who doth learn this lesson he hath taught,
So that when love shall send its subtle dart
Within his soul, he may the same impart
Unto himself, and leave what he hath sought?
I know but few, among them not myself,
Who practise this sad cure for love’s disease,
That do not bear some wound, in after years,
More painful than love’s wounding pain itself;
Or that do find elsewhere, what doth appease
The hunger in their souls, or dry their tears.
LI
For each long league that bears me far from thee
Doth seem to take life’s blood from out my veins,
As every yearning hour that passeth drains
The spring of my affection, that might be
O’erflowing with love’s precious remedy.
Ah me! This is a grievous fate that stains
Love’s half-possessed ambition, and remains
To overshadow all that rests of me!
Loved one, I find not, as the world I roam,
A spirit half so comforting as thine,
Ev’n in thy moments of most wilful charm,
None that would half so fittingly my home
Grace with its presence, or from whose eyes shine
A sweeter light, while giving love’s alarm.
LII
When last I saw thee, thou wert uppermost
In every thought that stirred my inner being,
In every act thy presence I was seeing.
And now thou comest to me like a ghost,
While I receive thee as some phantom host;
For every time I touch thee thou art fleeing
Far from the tempest of my heart; agreeing
With some sad fate that happiness hath lost.
Now, though I strive to sever from my heart
Those elements divine that make thy love
For me the object of my life’s desire,
There cometh that, which doth from Heaven depart,
To lift me once again to Heaven above,
And thus forbid that I should quench love’s fire.
LIII
O mighty Prophet, who dost signify
To little man the vanity of life,
The folly of its temporary strife,
Give to the only one who doth deny
My love some passing sense, to gratify
The constant longing that is ever rife
Within my soul, and sever with a knife
This fatal cord, my love is fettered by.
With some such prayer to thee would I appeal,
In impotence, to strike ’gainst nature’s law,
That causeth love unhonored still to live.
Before thy throne now humbly do I kneel,
As at the feet of her whom I adore,
And pray that love to me thou still mayst give.
LIV
If thou hadst felt toward me as I to thee,
Since the first hour that love knocked at my heart,
And I, unwilling, opened it in part,
Then would all Heaven’s warmth have been to me
As noon-day sun upon some tranquil sea;
And every hour its blessing would impart
To both our souls, that never could depart
Till we had cast it from us willingly.
Then why, Sweet Love, should this not still be so?
A great ideal perchance we both conceive,
And striving, each in some vain way, to find,
Lose youth’s enduring treasure here below.
Why mayst thou not, then, in thy heart perceive
That thou art to thyself and me unkind?
LV
Like the soft air of summer is thy smile,
That, lighting on my sadness, clears the air,
To make this clouded life again seem fair,
With all thy deft enchantments, that beguile
The swains that follow thee for many a mile.
But with thy sunshine I find lurking there,
Something in thee that bringeth deep despair,
Seeming to savor of young Cupid’s wile.
Then hath he not, mayhap, enveigled thee
Into the mischief of his lover’s net,
And caused thee to torment thy swains anew,
With tricks, of which thou mayst the author be?
’Twould seem as if some love-snare he had set,
To wreck the lives of lovers not a few.
LVI
If every song I sing seems tinged with sadness;
If every hour I think of thee I sigh;
If I for love still grieve, ask me not why
I do not sing to-day in joy and gladness;
Nor tell me, if not so, that it is madness.
For such strange action would my heart belie,
And from my spirit ring a love-sick cry
Against so fair a semblance of its badness.
If reason thou wouldst have, ask thine own self
Why thou dost keep me, in love’s penury,
Upon the desert of my great desire,
And, like some oasis, receive myself
At distant spaces of its memory--
To burn my soul with an unquenchèd fire!
LVII
Like the new moon, cold mistress of the heaven,
A silver bow delightful to behold,
Art thou, sweet maid, sweet both to young and old,
Yet false in thy profession of love’s leaven;
Untrue to one who, true to thee, hath striven
(Since first thy love thou didst to him unfold)
To keep thee from becoming chill and cold
As the swift snows that by the winds are driven.
At times it seemeth thou dost act a part;
Now to deceive the depth of my life’s passion;
Now loving as no lover did before.
Then suddenly within my soul thou art
Like some ideal that God alone could fashion;
But with the moon depart to shine no more.
LVIII
Ah Love! Couldst thou but greet me every even,
And let thine eyes lose those soft rays in mine;
Couldst thou but share with me this bread and wine,
Or something of what God to me hath given,
Then might I feel, that not in vain was driven
This love-shaft in my soul; for it would shine
With gratitude, and round thine own entwine
The fairest flowers that e’er were grown in Heaven.
Had I but thee to share my pain with me,
Pain would be joy, and joy that pain dispelled.
Were thy dear form beside me, night and day,
Then could I grieve no longer, but would be
So happy, happiness would be impelled
To change my spirit in some magic way.
LIX
Love is not passion; nor is passion love.
The two are twined together in some wise.
Love, spiritual, cometh from the skies,
Ennobles life and lifts our thoughts above.
Passion we find oft lurking in some grove,
Where pleasant sights draw forth our pleasing cries,
And where some bird of plumage round us flies,
While we, half knowing, through the shadows rove.
Yet, with these two, we find ourselves on earth.
One seldom doth the other disengage.
Strange combination of life’s heaven and hell!
That giveth unto man his power of birth,
And causeth him to claim his parentage
Whenever, or where he may chance to dwell.
LX
What subtle fragrance, like some passion flower,
Lurks in the petals of thy love for me,
That seemeth every day more sweet to be,
Thou beautiful example of the power
That nature hath, with loveliness to shower
Her favored ones? I would that I might see,
In those blue eyes that show so much of thee,
Some deeper color, given as a dower.
Yet ne’er lose hope, my heart. Thou shalt succeed,
So thou persist in thy true quest, until
All barriers opposing thee do fall.
Ah, then in vain no longer shalt thou plead!
But of love’s welcome draft drink to thy fill,
And, in that hour, know life doth give thee all.
LXI
Unto the sea my love I would compare,
That shineth first beneath the morning sun,
And danceth with its beams, as if for fun.
Then as the clouds would turn them to despair,
The beams soon disappear upon the air,
Like fairy jewels, that away would run.
Then, as their beauty doth its surface shun,
It heaves as if it doth some sorrow share.
Far down the sea of mine own love doth sink;
But, soon returning on itself, a wave
Of real emotion rolleth o’er my heart;
And all that thou hast been to me, I think,
Is like some treasure I must strive to save,
And guard thee well, so thou canst ne’er depart.
LXII
There is a lovely avenue of trees,
That winds its way o’er many a meadow-land,
And leads in time to the salt sea and sand,
Where I have walked and felt the summer breeze
Waft the sweet air that fans with perfect ease
The trembling leaves, the ferns on every hand;
A place wherein might sport some fairy band,
And in their gaiety my fancy seize.
In some such place would I find love awaiting,
Ready to guide me by the trickling brooks,
And lead me to some soft and rustic lair.
With thee, my well-beloved, would I be mating
(Like birds in springtime ’neath the shaded nooks),
The vision of thy love to my despair!
LXIII
Upon the highland spaces greet me, Love,
And with the fir and hemlock all around thee,
Twine thy fair self about my soul, and be
Therein the wood-nymph of my rustic grove.
Now dost thou fly towards me like some sweet dove,
Lighting from branch to branch, and willingly,
A group of blossoms bringing unto me
From the ethereal atmosphere above.
’Tis in the air of nature then that we
Find through its simple pleasure love’s delight,
Free from the turmoil that doth find its birth
In following the paths that others see.
Then would the stars illuminate the night,
And turn to Heaven the very things of earth.
LXIV
When the red sun sinks toward the western line,
That separates our vision of the sky,
And each soft ray far from the earth would fly,
To touch the clouds above the salt sea-brine
With magic tones and colors half divine;
Then doth my soul seek thine alone, and try
These tears of disappointed love to dry,
Imagining that life on me doth shine.
Then in the clouds, o’er Love’s blue sky, reflecting
The golden radiance of thyself, I see
Some likeness to the blood-stains on my heart,
That thou hast pierced and wounded, while rejecting
The sunbeams of my spirit, given to thee,
That hold thy glory, even as we part.
LXV
Whenever thou dost let a passing thought
Inhabit the domain of my desire,
I wonder just how thou mayst then inquire
Within thy heart, as yet untouched though sought,
How great love’s sacrifice, to have been brought
So strangely to thy life, and set on fire
The soul of one who doth thine own admire,
Although thou givest in return but nought.
Were it but given to thine eye to see
The splendor of love’s passion in its prime,
Burning upon the rock of thine own being,
Nature might then increase her power in thee,
And thou might’st find a summit here to climb,
That would eclipse all objects thou art seeing.
LXVI
If in the years to come life bringeth thee
Some of love’s sorrow, to carry in thine hand;
If thou shouldst thus experience it, and
By its strange weight, be forced to think and see
What youth casts from it in its extasy;
Then only couldst thou learn to understand
How suffering hath held me in its band,
Since I first found how cruel love could be.
Ah me! Though by this means thou mightest come
To know the value of love’s equipage,
And in its chariot ride toward my soul,
I would not wish that thou shouldst know, as some
Like me have known, from youth to hoary age,
The price they pay to reach so dear a goal.
LXVII
Oh! when the cold, fleet-footed hour of dawn
Awaketh me once more to consciousness,
My first thought is of thee, but with distress;
And every thought that followeth (from morn,
Till night her robe of darkness ’round hath drawn)
Is still of thee, of thee I do confess,
Clothed in sweet love’s most tantalizing dress;
Yet of love’s satisfaction stripped and shorn!
Then doth each hour in withered hope pass by,
Each day and week and month seem endless death.
And when thou answerest not my call to thee,
I watch, till hope dead in my heart doth lie;
For it would seem some evil spirit saith,
That I forever in love’s hell must be.
LXVIII
If, when thou hast found out that life is sorrow,
More frequent than youth’s careless jollity,
And when thou pay’st its bitter penalty,
And on thy cheek Time draweth his deep furrow,
Perchance thine own experience may borrow
From mine some of love’s rare humility.
Then be not in that hour at enmity
With all that is most worthy of the morrow.
For so hath haughty youth in age to bow,
And unto life do homage for its power,
And grovel in great shame when it doth find
Its fancied value Time doth not allow,
Ah! then mayst thou not pluck so false a flower;
Nor say, “To me love hath been so unkind!”
LXIX