You came, but still, with heart full-given to gladness,
I paused, as one stands stricken ere he falls;
Not yet my fumblings swept their bounds, clogged sense its
Weakling walls.
Quaint spaceless musings held me--idiot Mind was
Gaped and gilled like a fish to suck through slow
Tentative pores swift sweetness of strange waters’
Ebb and flow.
Yet how could I praise in darkness?--Life, like a sodded
Seed, moved in drought-sleep and cleft its clay
Freshly it seemed, though each sap-season spired its
Stalks into day:
Till now (ah, deft magician!) your wand hovers
Over all Spirit--over those lost grey fields
Where one frail flower, with burning stem, glad, gradual
Petals yields;
And whose past pitiful bitter blooms live only
In the flushed mockery of remembering lovers.