We will go far away.
Song will not care, who slays our souls each day
With the dark daggers of indignant eyes,
And lips’ sharp silence!... Had she sighed us lies,
Not passionate, yet falsely tremulous;
And lent her mouth to ours, in mockery; thus
Smiled from calm eyes a loveless negative;
Then, then our hearts had taught themselves to live
Feeding their love on her indifference.
But no!—so let us hence.
So be the Bible shut
Of Love and Beauty, and their wisdom but
A clasp of memory!—We will not seek
The light that came not when our souls were weak
With longing, and the darkness gave no sign
Of star-born comfort. Nay! why should we whine
Dull psalms of patience, or hosannas of
Old hope and dreary canticles of love?—
Leave us alone. My soul hath long supposed
For us God’s book was closed.
ROSEMARY
I
If she but breathe her wild breath in my face,
If she but shake her wild hair past mine eyes,
When life sits tearless in grief’s sunless chamber,
Then through the vasts of separating space,
Robed on with fire of hope my soul shall rise
And claim her.
II
When shall this be?—Not till within my soul
Joy’s lips are dumb, and dumb his instrument,
And love lies dead beside one withered flower,
And dark the gray walls of the home of dole,—
Whence the last flicker of hope’s taper went,—
Shall tower.
III
If she but bend her loving eyes on mine,
If she but give one loving thought to me,
When life sits sleepless in sleep’s caverned hollow,
Then in the night a sudden star shall shine,
And I shall rise, robed on with ecstasy,
And follow.