Each shining light above us
    Has its own peculiar grace;
But every light of heaven
    Is in my darling's face.

For it is like the sunlight,
    So strong and pure and warm,
That folds all good and happy things,
    And guards from gloom and harm.

And it is like the moonlight,
    So holy and so calm;
The rapt peace of a summer night,
    When soft winds die in balm.

And it is like the starlight;
    For, love her as I may,
She dwells still lofty and serene
    In mystery far away.

I love thee, my darling, both now and forever,
    My heart feels the thralldom of love's mystic spell,
'Tis fettered with shackles which nothing can sever,
    To the heart which responds to its passionate swell.

I love thee, my darling, with love that is stronger,
    Than all the fond ties which the heart holds enshrined;
Adversity, sorrow or pain can no longer
    Detract from this heart, if with thine intertwined.

I love thee, my darling, with sacred affection,
    Which death, nor the cycles of time shall efface;
Nor from my heart's mirror, erase thy reflection,
    Nor tear thy fond heart from its fervent embrace.

She stood by my side with a queenly air,
Her face it was young and proud and fair;
She held my rose in her hands of snow;
It crimsoned her face with a deeper glow;
The sunlight drooped in her eyes of fire
And quickened my heart to a wild desire;
I envied the rose in her hands so fair,
I envied the flowers that gleamed in her hair.

Ah! many a suitor I knew before
Had knelt at her feet in the days of yore;
And many a lover as foolish as I,
Had proudly boasted to win or die.
She had scorned them all with a careless grace
And a woman's scorn on her beautiful face.
Yet now in the summer I knelt at her feet,
And dreamed a dream that was fair and sweet.

The roses drooped in her gold-brown hair,
And quivered and glowed in the sun-lit air;
The jew...

There is a long thin line of fading gold
    In the far West, and the transfigured leaves
    On some slight, topmost bough that sways and heaves
Hang limp and tremulous. Nor warm, nor cold
    The pungent air, and, 'neath the yellow haze,
    Show flushed and glad the wild, October ways.

There is a soft enchantment in the air,
    A mystery the Summer knows not, nor
    The sturdy, frost-crowned Winter. Nature wore
Her blandest smile to-day, as here and there
    I wandered, elf-beset, through wood and field
    And gleaned the glories of the autumn yield.

A bunch of purple aster, golden-rod
    Darkened by the first frost, a drooping spray
    Of scarlet barberry, and tall and gray
The silk-cored cotton with its bursting pod,
    Some tarnished m...

Of love that never found his earthly close,
What sequel? Streaming eyes and breaking hearts?
Or all the same as if he had not been?
Not so. Shall Error in the round of time
Still father Truth? O shall the braggart shout
For some blind glimpse of freedom work itself
Thro’ madness, hated by the wise, to law
System and empire? Sin itself be found
The cloudy porch oft opening on the Sun?
And only he, this wonder, dead, become
Mere highway dust? or year by year alone
Sit brooding in the ruins of a life,
Nightmare of youth, the spectre of himself!
If this were thus, if this, indeed, were all,
Better the narrow brain, the stony heart,
The staring eye glazed o’er with sapless days,
The long mechanic pacings to and fro,
The set gray life, and apathetic end.
B...

    There is no soul of anguish or repining,
        That doubts and trembles in the shades of gloom,
    But love can lead where softest suns are shining
        And fill his days with beauty and its bloom.
            Live life with love!

    There is no bosom dark with lonely caring,
        That sadly sorrows in the nights of woe,
    But love can soothe his torture and despairing,
        And scatter gladness where his feet may go.
            Live life with love!

    There is no scene of misery or sorrow
        That droops and withers in the dark of night,
    But love can bring fond yearnings for the morrow
        And heap the heart with hope's unfading light.
            Live life with love!

    There is in all the world no sinful creatu...

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 passions 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

I was so proud of you last night, dear girl,
While man with man was striving for your smile.
You never lost your head, nor once dropped down
From your high place
As queen in that gay whirl.

(It takes more poise to wear a little crown
With modesty and grace
Than to adorn the lordlier thrones of earth.)

You seem so free from artifice and wile:
And in your eyes I read
Encouragement to my unspoken thought.
My heart is eloquent with words to plead
Its cause of passion; but my questioning mind,
Knowing how love is blind,
Dwells on the pros and cons, and God knows what.

My heart cries with each beat,
'She is so beautiful, so pure, so sweet,
So more than dear.'
And then I hear
The voice of Reason, asking:    'Would she meet
Life's...

The spring may come in her pomp and splendor,
And Summer follow with rain and rose,
Or Fall lead in that old offender,
Winter, close-huddled up in snows:
Ever a-South the Love-wind blows
Into the heart, like a vane a-sway
From face to face of the girls it knows
But which is the fairest it 's hard to say.

If Lydia smile or Maud look tender,
Straight in your bosom the gladness glows;
But scarce at her side are you all surrender,
When Gertrude sings where the garden grows:
And your heart is a-bloom mid the blossoming rows,
For her hand to gather and toss away,
Or wear on her breast, as her fancy goes,
But which is the fairest it 's hard to say.

Let Helen pass, as a sapling slender,
Her cheek a berry, her mouth a rose,
Or Blanche or Laura to ...

Love, whose light thrills heaven and earth,
Smiles and weeps upon thy birth,
Child, whose mother's love-lit eyes
Watch thee but from Paradise.
Sweetest sight that earth can give,
Sweetest light of eyes that live,
Ours must needs, for hope withdrawn,
Hail with tears thy soft spring dawn.
Light of hope whose star hath set,
Light of love whose sun lives yet,
Holier, happier, heavenlier love
Breathes about thee, burns above,
Surely, sweet, than ours can be,
Shed from eyes we may not see,
Though thine own may see them shine
Night and day, perchance, on thine.
Sun and moon that lighten earth
Seem not fit to bless thy birth:
Scarce the very stars we know
Here seem bright enough to show
Whence in unimagined skies
Glows the vigil of such eyes.<...

HALF vex'd, half pleased, thy love will feel,
Shouldst thou her knot or ribbon steal;
To thee they're much I won't conceal;

Such self-deceit may pardon'd be;
A veil, a kerchief, garter, rings,
In truth are no mean trifling things,

But still they're not enough for me.

She who is dearest to my heart,
Gave me, with well dissembled smart,
Of her own life, a living part,

No charm in aught beside I trace;
How do I scorn thy paltry ware!
A lock she gave me of the hair

That wantons o'er her beauteous face.

If, loved one, we must sever'd be,
Wouldst thou not wholly fly from me,
I still possess this legacy,

To look at, and to kiss in play.
My fate is to the hair's allied,
We used to woo her with like pride,
<...

Life and I are lovers, straying
    Arm in arm along:
Often like two children Maying,
    Full of mirth and song.

Life plucks all the blooming hours
    Growing by the way;
Binds them on my brow like flowers;
    Calls me Queen of May.

Then again, in rainy weather,
    We sit vis-a-vis,
Planning work we'll do together
    In the years to be.

Sometimes Life denies me blisses,
    And I frown or pout;
But we make it up with kisses
    Ere the day is out.

Woman-like, I sometimes grieve him,
    Try his trust and faith,
Saying I shall one day leave him
    For his rival Death.

Then he always grows more zealous,
    Tender, and more true;
Loves the more for being jealous,
    As all lovers do.

I

Who was it held that Love was soothing or sweet?
Mine is a painful fire, at its whitest heat.

Who said that Beauty was ever a gentle joy?
Thine is a sword that flashes but to destroy.

Though mine eyes rose up from thy Beauty's banquet, calm and refreshed,
My lips, that were granted naught, can find no rest.

My soul was linked with thine, through speech and silent hours,
As the sound of two soft flutes combined, or the scent of sister flowers.

But the body, that wretched slave of the Sultan, Mind,
Who follows his master ever, but far behind,

Nothing was granted him, and every rebellious cell
Rises up with angry protest, "It is not well!

Night is falling; thou hast departed; I am alone;
And the Last Sweetness of Love thou hast n...

A ruddy drop of manly blood
The surging sea outweighs,
The world uncertain comes and goes;
The lover rooted stays.
I fancied he was fled,--
And, after many a year,
Glowed unexhausted kindliness,
Like daily sunrise there.
My careful heart was free again,
O friend, my bosom said,
Through thee alone the sky is arched,
Through thee the rose is red;
All things through thee take nobler form,
And look beyond the earth,
The mill-round of our fate appears
A sun-path in thy worth.
Me too thy nobleness has taught
To master my despair;
The fountains of my hidden life
Are through thy friendship fair.

What is Success? Out of the endless ore
Of deep desire to coin the utmost gold
Of passionate memory; to have lived so well
That the fifth moon, when it swims up once more
Through orchard boughs where mating orioles build
And apple flowers unfold,
Find not of that dear need that all things tell
The heart unburdened nor the arms unfilled.

O Love, whereof my boyhood was the dream,
My youth the beautiful novitiate,
Life was so slight a thing and thou so great,
How could I make thee less than all-supreme!
In thy sweet transports not alone I thought
Mingled the twain that panted breast to breast.
The sun and stars throbbed with them; they were caught
Into the pulse of Nature and possessed
By the same light that consecrates it so.
Love! - 'tis the payment ...

Why above others was I so blessed
    And honoured? to be chosen one
To hold you, sleeping, against my breast,
    As now I may hold your only son.

Twelve months ago; that wonderful night!
    You gave your life to me in a kiss;
Have I done well, for that past delight,
    In return, to have given you this?

Look down at his face, your face, beloved,
    His eyes are azure as yours are blue.
In every line of his form is proved
    How well I loved you, and only you.

I felt the secret hope at my heart
    Turned suddenly to the living joy,
And knew that your life and mine had part
    As golden grains in a brass alloy.

And learning thus, that your child was mine,
    Thrilled by the sense of its stirring life,
I held myself as a...

The wisest soul, by anguish torn,
    Will soon unlearn the lore it knew;
And when the shrining casket's worn,
    The gem within will tarnish too.

But love's an essence of the soul,
    Which sinks hot with this chain of clay;
Which throbs beyond the chill control
    Of withering pain or pale decay.

And surely, when the touch of Death
    Dissolves the spirit's earthly ties,
Love still attends the immortal breath,
    And makes it purer for the skies!

Oh Rosa, when, to seek its sphere,
    My soul shall leave this orb of men,
That love which formed its treasure here,
    Shall be its best of treasures then!

And as, in fabled dreams of old,
    Some air-born genius, child of time,
Presided o'er each star that rolled,

POET.
My haunting grief has vanished like a dream,
Its floating fading memory seems one
With those frail mists born of the dawn's first beam,
Dissolving as the dew melts in the sun.


MUSE.
What ailed thee then, O poet mine;
What secret misery was thine,
Which set a bar 'twixt thee and me?
Alas, I suffer from it still;
What was this grief, this unknown ill,
Which I have wept so bitterly?


POET.
'T was but a common grief, well known of men.
But, look you, when our heavy heart is sore,
Fond wretches that we are! we fancy then
That sorrow never has been felt before.


MUSE.
There cannot be a common grief,
Save that of common souls; my friend,
Speak out, and give thy heart relief,
Of this grim secret make an ...