VIII
Well, you have faults too! I can blame
If you choose: this hand is not so white
Or round as a little one that came
On my shoulder once or twice to-night
Like a soft white dove. Envy her now!
And when you talked to that padded thing
And I passed you leisurely by, your brow
Was cold, not a flush nor fluttering.
IX
Such foolish talk! while that one star still
Dwells o’er the mountain’s margin-line
Till the dawn takes all; one may drink one’s fill
Of such quiet; there’s a whisper fine
In the leaves a-tremble, and now ’tis dumb;
We have lived long years, love, you and I,
And the heart grows faint; your lips, then: come,—
It were not so very hard to die.
FROM APRIL TO OCTOBER
I. BEAUTY
The beauty of the world, the loveliness
Of woodland pools, which doves have coo’d to sleep,
Dreaming the noontide through beneath the deep
Of heaven; the radiant blue’s benign caress
When April clouds are rifted; buds that bless
Each little nook and bower, where the leaves keep
Dew and light shadow, and quick lizards peep
For sunshine,—these, and the ancient stars no less,
And the sea’s mystery of dusk and bright
Are but the curious characters that lie,
Priestess of Beauty, in thy robe of light.
Ah, where, divine One, is thy veiled retreat,
That I may creep to it and clasp thy feet,
And gaze in thy pure face though I should die?