Perpetual Light : a memorial Part 12

I cannot tell them what you were; Yet, Death, you have not all of her.

No, I, the pa.s.sionate nondescript, Have wine your lips have never sipped,

Have wine of her in my heart's blood Whom I never understood.

You were tender and benign, Trusting--and all fire divine And a constellation's sign.

You the far and you the near, You heaven high and heaven here, You the quest, and closest dear.

Ah, G.o.d, you have not all of her, For still my cause she can prefer Where she goes, and where You were.

You could weep and you could rise With the Word clear in your eyes, With a strength beyond the wise.

Girl and G.o.ddess, will and love, Struggling, battling, winged above Memories I have memory of!

PERVIGILIUM

Oh, not in words--for what are words to seeing; Yet not in sight, for presence veils and hides; Not even in sleep, though then the gates of being Stand open to the large eternal tides; Neither in memory, embers fading ashen; Nor by the code, wherein the voice is dumb; Nor wild still love, fluttered by veils of pa.s.sion, Rise summit by summit to Janiculum!

Think not to speak and tell the riddling purport; Think not that sight of beauty caught the best; Nor any dream furls its dim sails in her port; Nor any memory makes her manifest; Nor by a measure of days mete out her measure, Nor through remembered poignance pluck her strings.

For she, like moonlight on some hidden treasure, Steals glimmering down and renders vain these things.

Then I cried, "Love!"--but stars not even shrinking Glittered the same and night remained the same.

Slowly I swam on dark tides of my thinking, Yet like no moon she rose to hear her name.

I lay like sand unrimmed of sea and crisping Under dead sunlight, parched as bleaching bone, Till all seas shrank and dried, and the last lisping Of beaded water vanished from the stone.

Then jagged lightning forked, the thunder shattered Like stunning guns. Amain the trees were blown And shrieked and writhed and whirled their branches tattered Like patriarchs waking to some end long-known,-- All my heart's storm--a.s.sault and wild repulsion-- And hissing sand-coils swaying high and dim-- Flash blinding-bright! And through that last revulsion I saw her pa.s.sing on the desert's rim.

TIME WAS

Time was when you would enter That door and I would be No longer in the darkness Upon the sea, Sailing through lowering tempest Of thoughts within the brain....

If that could be so Ever again....

Time was when your slight gesture Would bid the fairies dance And make the world a twilight Of woodland trance, And wake old aching music All honey through its pain....

If that could be so Ever again....

Time was when I would flout you With clever something said-- And could not live without you When you turned your head.

With me you walked the sunlight, With me you walked the rain....

If that could be so Ever again....

THE MASTERS

Two with great hearts, deeply you proved them.

Laughing you loved them, childlike you said, "Oh, but this is the part--!" Almost I reproved them Drawing you from me, minds long dead.

Yet forever your voice, wraith that was rapture!

What great-souled s.p.a.ces the while you read Joy--pain--mirth--all I would capture,-- d.i.c.kens and Browning--your bended head ...

Heaven of lamplight I long for lonely Where all the folk of their fancy tread; Three small faces, and mine,--and only d.i.c.kens and Browning--your bended head!

WHEN

It is when the trees have such radiant flowers, Such white and rosy showers, Such fragrant whispering,-- It is when the sun lights such mellow, yellow hours,-- _For lovers love the Spring!_

It is when the moon is so pale and drifting, Blossoms softly sifting From the vines that climb and cling, That my heart will stop to hear love's laughter lifting,-- _For lovers love the Spring!_

It is when the long evenings, their haze of violet wearing, Hold the pa.s.sing voices as on music's throbbing string, By some vague open window I shall sit long staring,-- _For lovers love the Spring!_

CHILDREN

Children, we played at games--your laughter still is round me.

Children, we called each other's names. I hid--you found me.

Children, we went in search of death, and came back often.

Children, we prayed with equal breath--_no time can soften!_

Children, I loved your pretty looks, your eyebrow lifted.

Children, we wandered story-books and star-dust sifted.

Children, we plucked amazing flowers in a walled garden.

Children, we dreamed through healing hours--_no time can harden!_

THE RETREAT

Some sunny close hung high In depths of sky, Vivid presentment of your old desire; No mult.i.tudes, but peace And the release From days and nights that are but pitch and fire.

Some simple garden, old Gray walls that fold Its fragrance in, and one slow softened bell; The waited Face, the light And inner sight And the good voices that you heard so well.

There may you quaintly move,-- You whom I love,-- Sometimes, even now, and make retreat at last With the truth known and rest Made manifest And all the meaning of the hurried past.

And may I find you there When the still air Holds yet the thrilling of His evening smile, And stand within the gate And watch and wait, Till, from your prayer, you turn after a while

To see me stained and torn And travel-worn But yet with all my love of you held fast; And wonder "Is it he?" and know it is-- All mysteries Being outdone by this mysterious last.

And as the evening glows In throbbing rose May you lift your arms then, lift your head and cry "Come!"--and yet sleep not wake Nor dreaming break-- But light forever fold us, you and I.

SEALED

Man has been famed Time out of mind For having gone lamed Or deaf or blind Or weighted down With loads that bind.

And eye and ear Now curtained are To see or hear Rhyme in a star Since you, my dear, Have gone so far.

And limbs that go And lips that speak Are not to know That which they seek....

Does Time jest so In a madman's freak?