me the kiss you owe. —You fly when I'd enfold you?
No! no! I say! now, no!
How often have I told you,
You must not treat me so?
More sweet the dusk for this is,
For lips that meet in kisses. —
Come! come! why run from blisses
As from a mortal foe?
5
How many words in the asking!
How easily I can grieve you! —
My "no" in a "yes" was a-masking,
Nor thought, dear, to deceive you. —
A kiss? – the humming-bird happiness here
In my heart consents… But what are words,
When the thought of two souls in speech accords?
Affirmative, negative – what are they, dear?
I wished to say "yes," but somehow said "no."
The woman within me thought you would know
Thought that your heart would hear.
So many hopes in a wooing! —
Therein you could not deceive me;
Some things are sweeter for the pursuing —
I knew what you meant, believe me. —
Bunched bells of the blush pomegranate, to fix
At your throat … six drops of fire they are…
Will you look where the moon and its following star
Rise silvery over yon meadow ricks?
While I hold – while I lean your head back, so —
For I know it is "yes" though you whisper "no,"
And my kisses, sweet, are six.
6
Look! – where the fiery
Glow-worm in briery
Banks of the moon-mellowed bowers
Sparkles – how hazily
Pinioned and arily
Delicate, warily,
Drowsily, lazily,
Flutter the moths to the flowers.
White as the dreamiest
Bud of the creamiest
Rose in the garden that dozes,
See how they cling to them!
Held in the heart of their
Hearts like a part of their
Perfume they swing to them
Wings that are soft as the roses.
Dim as the forming of
Dew in the warming of
Moonlight, they light on the petals;
All is revealed to them;
All – from the sunniest
Tips to the honiest
Heart, whence they yield to them
Spice through the darkness that settles.
So to our tremulous
Souls come the emulous
Spirits of love; through whose power
All that is best in us,
All that is beautiful,
All that is dutiful,
Is made confessed in us,
Even as the scent of a flower.
7
What makes you beautiful?
Answer, now, answer! —
Is it that dutiful
Souls are all beautiful?
Is't that romance or
Beauty of spirit,
Which souls of merit
Of heaven inherit? —
Have you no answer?
What makes you lovable?
Answer, dear, answer! —
Is it not provable
That man is lovable
Just because chance or
Nature makes woman
Love him? – Her human
Part's to illumine. —
Have you no answer?
8
Could I recall every joy that befell me
There in the past with its anguish and bliss,
Here in my heart it has whispered to tell me,
Those were no joys like this.
Were it not well if our love could forget them
Veiling the was with the dawn of the is?
Dead with the past we should never regret them,
Being no joys like this.
When they were gone and the Present stood speechful,
Ardent in word and in look and in kiss,
What though we know that their eyes are beseechful,
Those were no joys like this.
Is it not well to have more of the spirit,
Living for Futures where naught is amiss,
Less of the flesh with the Past pining near it?
Is there a joy like this?
9
We will leave reason,
Sweet, for a season;
Reason were treason
Now that the nether
Spaces are clad, oh,
In silvery shadow —
We will be glad, oh,
Glad as this weather!
Heart unto heart, where the moonlight is slanted,
Let us believe that our souls are enchanted: —
I in the castle-keep; you are the airy
Prince who comes seeking me; Love is the Fairy
Bringing our hearts together.
Starlight in masses
Over us passes;
And in the grass is
Many a flower:
Now will you tell me
How'd you enspell me?
What once befell me
There in your bower?
Soul
