Or would I were a little burnished apple
For you to pluck me, gliding by so cold,
While sun and shade your robe of lawn will dapple,
Your hair’s spun gold.
Yea, would to God I were among the roses
That lean to kiss you as you float between!
While on the lowest branch a bud uncloses
To touch you, Queen!
Nay, since you will not love, would I were growing
A happy daisy in the garden path;
That so your silver foot might press me going,
Even unto death!
Katherine Tynan.
GOOD-NIGHT.
IT is over now, she is gone to rest;
I have clasped the hands on the quiet breast;
Draw back the curtain, let in the light,
She will never shrink if it be too bright.
We were two in here but an hour gone by,
No streak was then in the midnight sky;
Now I am one to watch the day
Come glimmering up from the far-away.
What will he say when he comes in,
Waked by the city’s morning din,
Hoping to find and fearing to know
The sorrow he left but an hour ago?
What will he say who has watched so long,
When he shall find who has come and gone?
Come a watcher that will not bide
Love’s morning or noon or eventide.
He thought to kiss her by morning gray,
But God has thought to take her away.
What will he say? God knows, not I;
“Good-night,” he said, but never “good-bye.”
C. C. Fraser Tytler.