Most High Love

899

All night upon mine heart I felt her warm heart beat, Night-long within mine arms in love and sleep she lay; Surely the kisses of her bought red mouth were sweet; But I was desolate and sick of an old passion,

When I awoke and found the dawn was gray: I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion.

I have forgot much, Cynara! gone with the wind,
Flung roses, roses riotously with the throng,
Dancing, to put thy pale, lost lilies out of mind;
But I was desolate and sick of an old passion,

Yea, all the time, because the dance was long:
I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion.

I cried for madder music and for stronger wine,
But when the feast is finished and the lamps expire,
Then falls thy shadow, Cynara! the night is thine;
And I am desolate and sick of an old passion,

Yea, hungry for the lips of my desire:

I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion.

Ernest Dowson (1867-1900]

MOST HIGH LOVE

WHY is there in the least touch of her hands
More grace than other women's lips bestow,
If love is but a slave to fleshly bands

Of flesh to flesh, wherever love may go?

Why choose vain grief and heavy-hearted hours
For her lost voice, and dear remembered hair,
If love may cull his honey from all flowers,
And girls grow thick as violets, everywhere?

Nay! She is gone, and all things fall apart;

Or she is cold, and vainly have we prayed;
And broken is the summer's splendid heart,
And hope within a deep-dark grave is laid.

As man aspires and falls, yet a soul springs

Out of his agony of flesh at last,

So love that flesh enthralls, shall rise on wings
Soul-centered, when the rule of flesh is past.

Then most High Love, or wreathed with myrtle sprays,
Or crownless and forlorn, nor less a star,

Thee may I serve and follow all my days,
Whose thorns are sweet as never roses are!

Ernest Dowson [1867-1900]

"SO SWEET LOVE SEEMED"
So sweet love seemed that April morn,
When first we kissed beside the thorn,
So strangely sweet, it was not strange
We thought that love could never change.

But I can tell-let truth be told-
That love will change in growing old;
Though day by day is naught to see,
So delicate his motions be.

And in the end 'twill come to pass
Quite to forget what once he was,
Nor even in fancy to recall
The pleasure that was all in all.

His little spring, that sweet we found,
So deep in summer floods is drowned,
I wonder, bathed in joy complete,
How love so young could be so sweet.

Robert Bridges [1844

AN OLD TUNE*

AFTER GÉRARD DE NERVAL

THERE is an air for which I would disown
Mozart's, Rossini's, Weber's melodies,-
A sweet sad air that languishes and sighs,
And keeps its secret charm for me alone.
* For the original of this poem see page 3592.

Refuge

Whene'er I hear that music vague and old,

Two hundred years are mist that rolls away; The thirteenth Louis reigns, and I behold

A green land golden in the dying day.

An old red castle, strong with stony towers,

And windows gay with many-colored glass; Wide plains, and rivers flowing among flowers,

That bathe the castle basement as they pass.

In antique weed, with dark eyes and gold hair,
A lady looks forth from her window high;

It may be that I knew and found her fair,
In some forgotten life, long time gone by.
Andrew Lang (1844-

REFUGE

SET your face to the sea, fond lover,-
Cold in darkness the sea-winds blow!
Waves and clouds and the night will cover
All your passion and all your woe:
Sobbing waves, and the death within them,
Sweet as the lips that once you pressed→→
Pray that your hopeless heart may win them!
Pray that your weary life may rest!

Set your face to the stars, fond lover,-
Calm, and silent, and bright, and true!--

They will pity you, they will hover

Softly over the deep for you.
Winds of heaven will sigh your dirges,
Tears of heaven for you be spent,
And sweet for you will the murmuring surges
Pour the wail of their low lament.

Set your face to the lonely spaces,

Vast and gaunt, of the midnight sky! There, with the drifting cloud, your place is, There with the griefs that cannot die.

901

Love is a mocking fiend's derision,
Peace a phantom, and faith a snare!
Make the hope of your heart a vision-
Look to heaven, and find it there!
William Winter [1836-

MIDSUMMER

AFTER the May time and after the June time
Rare with blossoms and perfume sweet,
Cometh the round world's royal noon time,
The red midsummer of blazing heat,
When the sun, like an eye that never closes,
Bends on the earth its fervid gaze,

And the winds are still, and the crimson roses
Droop and wither and die in its rays.

Unto my heart has come this season,
O, my lady, my worshiped one,
When, over the stars of Pride and Reason,
Sails Love's cloudless, noonday sun.
Like a great red ball in my bosom burning
With fires that nothing can quench or tame,
It glows till my heart itself seems turning
Into a liquid lake of flame.

The hopes half shy and the sighs all tender,
The dreams and fears of an earlier day,
Under the noontide's royal splendor,

Droop like roses, and wither away.

From the hills of Doubt no winds are blowing,
From the isles of Pain no breeze is sent,-

Only the sun in a white heat glowing
Over an ocean of great content.

Sink, O my soul, in this golden glory!

Die, O my heart, in thy rapture-swoon!

For the Autumn must come with its mournful story, And Love's midsummer will fade too soon.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1855

The Phantom of the Rose

ASHES OF ROSES

SOFT on the sunset sky

Bright daylight closes,
Leaving when light doth die,
Pale hues that mingling lie-
Ashes of roses.

When love's warm sun is set,
Love's brightness closes;
Eyes with hot tears are wet,
In hearts there linger yet

Ashes of roses.

Elaine Goodale Eastman [1863

SYMPATHY

THE color gladdens all your heart;
You call it Heaven, dear, but I—
Now Hope and I are far apart-
Call it the sky.

I know that Nature's tears have wet
The world with sympathy; but you,
Who know not any sorrow yet,

Call it the dew.

903

Althea Gyles [ ? ]

THE PHANTOM OF THE ROSE

SWEET lady, let your lids unclose-
Those lids by maiden dreams caressed;

I am the phantom of the rose

You wore last night upon your breast. Like pearls upon my petals lay

The weeping fountain's silver tears, Ere in the glittering array

You bore me proudly 'mid your peers.