The Last Gift
What shall I give to her who will not care
If I give soul or roses, will not know
How that, for sweets she’ll spend, light smiles she’ll sow,
I will reap bitter tears? If she could wear
Those tears as stars to sparkle in her hair!
What shall I give? I have not fall’n so low
I may not lay one gift before I go
Upon the altar of my heart’s despair.
She will not know; yet, in my love a king,
I must be worthy of my crown and throne,
And so can sacrifice no little thing.
My life, my soul are worthless since her scorn.
Slay we then love on love’s red altar-stone—
Beggared of all, I face the world forlorn.
XXVIII
Amor Mysticus
Not you, nor all the gauds that Fate bestows,
Can make me swerve so little from my dream.
Across my veil of mystery you seem
Perhaps a little dearer than the rose,
Perhaps more fair than the long light that flows
Between the lids of twilight. But the gleam
Of iris on the breast of wisdom’s stream
Is of a radiance that no rival knows.
My heart is not my heart, or it might chance
To sorrow for the sorrow in your tears;
My soul is locked against all circumstance
Of life or love or death or heaven or hell;
I have no place for laughter in my years,
No room where little, little love might dwell.