MUSE AND MINT
I mused upon the strangeness of all things,
So different from the dream
Whereof the morning mounted up on wings
Above the world agleam
With light that trembled into life and love
As when a censer swings
And joy of promise sings—
“The dream whereof
The gleam above
The world is love!”
Oh, bitterness to muse and neither find
The beauty of the Muse
Nor yet the music which the soul divined
Ere set the rosy hues
In sombre lines that disenchant and fret
The heart with growing grief
Which struggles for relief—
“O Muse, but let
My spirit yet
The rue forget!”
As if to answer me a little child,
To whom the sunshine’s glint
Was gloom forever, on the corner smiled
And vended sprigs of mint,
As though there were in blindness still a bloom
And fragrance which could reach
The passer-by and teach—
“In glint or gloom
There’s mint in bloom
To earth perfume!”