IS it then given to some, life’s happiest hours
To blissfully enjoy, in love’s delight?
Behold, ye gods! I look upon the sight!
I swoon and die, to feel that nature’s flowers
Do, in my own experience, their powers
Of giving fragrance lose within the night.
Yet would my heart reveal the lover’s plight,
And seek, in thy pursuit, celestial bowers.
Oh, tell me that thou art not cold and dumb
To my entreaties for one little part
Of what thou holdest in impiety!
Here at thy feet, I beg but for a crumb
Of love’s own comfort, for this aching heart,
That doth deserve its full satiety.
XX
HAVE I not loved thee truthfully enough,
Sweetheart? How canst thou willingly deny
That through love’s intercourse I did comply
With every whim of thine? Couldst thou rebuff
The tenderness of love with paltry stuff
That men do flatter with, and thus defy
Far holier elements of life? Ah, why
Dost thou prefer a hand still stained and rough?
Is it not that, surrounding thee, are many
Who think less deeply than my heart would go,
To find a kindred being in the air
Of sacred treasures, that but few, if any,
Seek in this life (and thus their folly show),
While we might still love’s habitation share?
XXI
SHOULDST thou, perchance, peruse these simple lines,
I wonder even if thy heart would be
Touched by the pathos of my love, and see
In them the attitude that love defines,
Unfettered by the selfish light that shines
Through many a worldly eye. Perchance if she,
To whom my love is given, comes to me
In after years, while still my heart repines:
Ah then, how can I tell what memories
May not have saddened all that makes life cheery?
How can I know, it will not be too late,
And that, by then, these loving reveries
Disperse with time, when I am old and weary
Of my stern race with life and sterner fate?
XXII
IF love too oft repeats itself herein,
These verses testify to my dear cause;
To eagerly acclaim, but never pause,
In this belated quest, if I would win.
Let it not then be counted as a sin,
Should this one word occur in every clause,
That doth my heart describe with truth, because
No other dwells so fittingly therein.
For if not thus, how else may lovers speak,
Save in that self-same language, recognized
By all who have experienced the fire
Of love’s sweet passion, which, though strong or weak,
Gives that with which all men have sympathized,
And still on earth doth every soul inspire?
XXIII
HOW true it is that every joy we feel
Carries its own full price of equal pain,
And brings to us some sorrow in its train.
I thought me safe from love, yet now I kneel
Before thy lovely being, and conceal
But little of that joy which I obtain.
Still what I have seems mixed with thy disdain.
How can I then unto thy soul appeal?
If it is but the force of my disease
That makes me over-sensitive with thee,
And causes me to suffer at thy frown,
Or long thy fleeting anger to appease,
’Tis difficult for my blind love to see
How best with jewels thy fair head to crown!