What better praise for all her ways
Than that all days her ways illume?
Such brightness as the maiden year
Knows, when God’s kindness seems as near
As flowers whose wisdom ’s but to bloom.
Hers the deep hair: a face more fair
Than roses June sets blossoming:
The sunshine of her gladness gleams
In bloom-bright lips and cheeks, and dreams
Upon her throat’s soft coloring.
Her voice is sweet as birds that greet
With song the coming of the light:
The serious happy gleam that lies
In the dark lustre of her eyes
Is as the starlight to the night.
Beyond the sea such girls as she
It was whom Titian loved to paint,
With calm Madonna eyes, and hair
Rich auburn; robed in gold and vair,
Fair as the vision of a saint.
THE SUMMER SEA
Over the summer sea,
When the white-eyed stars look pale,
And the moonbeams make a trail
Of gold through the waves for me,
I turn my ghostly sail
Away, away,
And follow the form I see
Over the summer sea.
Over the misty sea,
Ere the cliff which highest soars
From the billow-beaten shores
Reddens all rosily,
Where the witch-white water roars,
Far on, far on.
Through the foam she beckons me
Over the summer sea.
Over the haunted sea,
When the great, gold moon low lies
On the rim of the western skies,
’Twixt the moon, she comes, and me,
And gazes in my eyes;
Low down, low down,
’Twixt the orbéd moon and me,
Over the summer sea.
Deep in the bitter sea,
Wilt thou drag me down, O sweet?
Down, down! from hair to feet
Filled with thee utterly?
Against thy heart’s wild beat?—
At last! at last!
Wilt drag me down with thee,
Deep in the summer sea?