Yet that fine malice of your smile,
That faint and fluctuating glint
Between your eyelids, does it hint
Alone of matters mercantile?
Close lips that keep the secret in,
Half spoken by the stealthy eyes,
Is there indeed no word to win,
No secret, from the vague replies
Of lips and lids that feign to hide
That which they feign to render up?
Is there, in Tantalus’ dim cup,
The shadow of water, nought beside?
ON MEETING AFTER.
HER eyes are haunted, eyes that were
Scarce sad when last we met.
What thing is this has come to her
That she may not forget?
They loved, they married: it is well!
But ah, what memories
Are these whereof her eyes half tell,
Her haunted eyes?
IN BOHEMIA.
DRAWN blinds and flaring gas within,
And wine, and women, and cigars;
Without, the city’s heedless din;
Above, the white unheeding stars.
And we, alike from each remote,
The world that works, the heaven that waits,
Con our brief pleasures o’er by rote,
The favourite pastime of the Fates.
We smoke, to fancy that we dream,
And drink, a moment’s joy to prove,
And fain would love, and only seem
To love because we cannot love.