Last Poems Part 10

Or the fire that it kindles at midnight, beneath the soft glow of thy kiss?

Ah, Love has a mighty dominion, he forges with pa.s.sionate breath The links which stretch out to the Future, with forces of life and of death, But great is the charm of the River, so soft is the sigh of the reeds, They give me, long sleepless from pa.s.sion, the peace that my weariness needs.

I float on the breast of my River, and startle the birds on the edge, To land on a newly found island, a boat that is caught in the sedge, The rays of the sun are still level, not yet has the heat of the day Deflowered the mists of the morning, that linger in delicate grey.

What land was his dwelling whose fancy first gave unto Paradise birth?

He never had swum in my River, or else he had fixed it on earth!

Oh, grace of the palm-tree reflections, Oh, sense of the wind from the sea!

Oh, divine and serene exultation of one who is lonely and free!

Ah, delicate breezes of daybreak, so scentless, refres.h.i.+ng and free!

And yet--had my midnight been lonely you had been less lovely to me.

This coolness comes laden with solace, because I am hot from the fire, As often devotion to virtue arises from sated desire.

_Gautama came forth from his Palace; he felt the night wind on his face,_ _He loathed, as he left, the embraces, the softness and scent of the place,_ _But, ah, if his night had been loveless, with no one to solace his need,_ _He never had written that sermon which men so devotedly read._

Ah, River, thy gentle persuasion! I doubt if I seek any more The beauty that hurts me and holds me beneath the low roof on the sh.o.r.e.

I loved thee, ay, loved--for a season, but thou, was it love or desire, The glow of the Sun in his glory, or only the heat of a fire?

I think not that thou wilt regret me, for thou art too joyous and fair, So many are keen to caress thee, thy pa.s.sionate midnights to share.

Thou wilt not have time to remember, before a new love-knot is tied, The stranger who loved thee and left thee, who drifted away on the tide.

Two things I have found that are lovely, though most things are sullen and grey; One: Peace--but what mortal has found him; and Pa.s.sion--but when would he stay?

So I shall return to my River, and floating at ease on its breast, Shall find, what Love never has given--a sense of most infinite rest.

When the years have gone by and departed, what thought shall I keep of this land?

A curl of thy waist-reaching-tresses? a flower received from thy hand?

Nay, if I can fathom the future, I fancy my relic will be Some sh.e.l.l, my beloved one, the River, has stol'n from the store of the sea.

Listen, Beloved

Listen, Beloved, the Casurinas quiver, Each ta.s.sel prays the wind to set it free, Hark to the frantic sobbing of the river, Wild to attain extinction in the sea.

All Nature blindly struggles to dissolve In other forms and forces, thus to solve The painful riddle of ident.i.ty.

Ah, that my soul might lose itself in thee!

Yet, my Beloved One, wherefore seek I union, Since there is no such thing in all the world,-- Are not our spirits linked in close communion,-- And on my lips thy clinging lips are curled?

Thy tender arms are round my shoulders thrown, I hear thy heart more loudly than my own, And yet, to my despair, I know thee far, As in the stellar darkness, star from star.

Even in times when love with bounteous measure A simultaneous joy on us has shed, In the last moment of delirious pleasure, Ere the sense fail, or any force be fled, My rapture has been even as a wall, Shutting out any thought of thee at all!

My being, by its own delight possessed, Forgot that it was sleeping on thy breast.

Ay, from his birth each man is vowed and given To a vast loneliness, ungauged, unspanned, Whether by pain and woe his soul be riven, Or all fair pleasures cl.u.s.tered 'neath his hand.

His gain by day, his ecstasy by night,-- His force, his folly, fierce or faint delight,-- Suffering or sorrow, fortune, feud, or care,-- Whate'er he find or feel,--he may not share.

Lonely we join the world, and we depart Even as lonely, having lived alone, The breast that feeds us, the beloved one's heart, The lips we kiss,--or curse--alike unknown.

Ay, even these lips of thine, so often kissed, What cert.i.tude have I that they exist?

Alas, it is the truth, though harsh it seems, I have been loved as sweetly in my dreams.

Therefore if I should seem too fiercely fond, Too swift to love, too eager to attain, Forgive the fervour that would forge beyond The limits set to mortal joy and pain.

Knowing the soul's unmeasured loneliness, My pa.s.sion must be mingled with distress, As I, despairing, struggle to draw near What is as unattainable as dear.

Thirst may be quenched at any kindly river, Rest may be found 'neath any arching tree.

No sleep allures, no draughts of love deliver My spirit from its aching need of thee.

Thy sweet a.s.sentiveness to my demands, All the caressive touches of thy hands,-- These soft cool hands, with fingers tipped with fire,-- They can do nothing to a.s.suage desire.

Sometimes I think my longing soul remembers A previous love to which it aims and strives, As if this fire of ours were but the embers Of some wild flame burnt out in former lives.

Perchance in earlier days I _did_ attain That which I seek for now so all in vain, Maybe my soul with thine _was_ fused and wed In some great night, long since dissolved and dead.

We may progress; but who shall answer clearly The riddle of the endless change of things.

Perchance in other days men loved more dearly, Or Love himself had wider ways and wings, Maybe we gave ourselves with less control, Or simpler living left more free the soul, So that with ease the flesh aside was flung,-- Or was it merely that _Mankind was young?_

Or has my spirit a divine prevision Of vast vague pa.s.sions stored in days to be, When some strong souls shall conquer their division And two shall be as one, eternally?

Finding at last upon each other's breast, Unutterable calm and infinite rest, While love shall burn with such intense a glow That both shall die, and neither heed or know.

Why do I question thus, and wake confusion In the soft thought that lights thy perfect face, Ah, shed once more thy perfumed hair's profusion, Open thine arms and make my resting place.

Lay thy red lips on mine as heretofore, Grant me the treasure of thy beauty's store, Stifle all thought in one imperious kiss,-- What shall I ask for more than this,--and this?

Oh, Unforgotten and Only Lover

Oh, unforgotten and only lover, Many years have swept us apart, But none of the long dividing seasons Slay your memory in my heart.

In the clash and clamour of things unlovely My thoughts drift back to the times that were, When I, possessing thy pale perfection, Kissed the eyes and caressed the hair.

Other pa.s.sions and loves have drifted Over this wandering, restless soul, Rudderless, chartless, floating always With some new current of chance control.

But thine image is clear in the whirling waters-- Ah, forgive--that I drag it there, For it is so part of my very being That where I wander it too must fare.

Ah, I have given thee strange companions, To thee--so slender and chaste and cool-- But a white star loses no glimmer of beauty In all the mud of a miry pool That holds the grace of its white reflection; Nothing could fleck thee, nothing could stain, Thou hast made a home for thy delicate beauty Where all things peaceful and lovely reign.

Doubtless the night that my soul remembers Was a sin to thee, and thine only one.

Thou thinkest of it, if thou thinkest ever, As a crime committed, a deed ill done.

But for me, the broken, the desert-dweller, Following Life through its underways,-- I know if those midnights thou hadst not granted I had not lived through these after days.

And that had been well for me; all would say so, What have I done since I parted from thee?

But things that are wasted, and full of ruin, All unworthy, even of me.

Yet, it was to me that the gift was given, No greater joy have the G.o.ds above,-- That night of nights when my only lover, Though all reluctant, granted me love.

For thy beauty was mine, and my spirit knows it, Never, ah, never my heart forgets, One thing fixed, in the torrent of changing, Faults and follies and fierce regrets.

Thine eyes and thy hair, that were lovely symbols Of that white soul that their grace enshrined, They are part of me and my life for ever, In every fibre and cell entwined.

Men might argue that having known thee I had grown faithful and pure as thee, Had turned at the touch of thy grace and glory From the average pathways trodden by me.

Hadst thou been kinder or I been stronger It may be even these things had been-- But one thing is clear to my soul for ever, I owe my owning of thee to sin.

Had I been colder I had not reached thee, Besmirched the ermine, beflecked the snow-- It was only sheer and desperate pa.s.sion That won thy beauty in years ago.

And not for the highest virtues in Heaven, The utmost grace that the soul can name, Would I resign what the sin has brought me, Which I hold glory, and thou--thy shame.

I talk of sin in the usual fas.h.i.+on, But G.o.d knows what is a sin to me-- We love more fiercely or love more faintly-- But I doubt if it matters how these things be.