Classic Poem

Why do you love me? — He . —
— For your coal-black hair
â?ƒThat brings before my eyes the passionate South:
Because, although my lips in song despair,
â?ƒHope thrills them at the touching of your mouth.
Because, when life was weary and at an end,
â?ƒLike the bright soul of very Spring you came,
Sister and love, a sweetheart in a friend,
â?ƒAnd fanned with girlish breath joy's flickering flame
And so I love you. — She . —
— Will your love abide
â?ƒStedfast and faithful, since we cannot be
Sweetheart and lover, husband and fair bride,
â?ƒBut have to move apart eternally? — He . —

— Lady! the night when first you came to meet,
â?ƒA weary poet, placing trust in him,
Will fill my soul with memories starry-sweet
â?ƒTill on night's purple robe each star grows dim. — She . —
— But think, how long is life, how dull and cold!
â?ƒCan such a love as this content you well?
To love, but never to possess and hold,
â?ƒMen teach that this, to man, is worse than hell. — He . —

— Worse than a hell it is! Yet you are afir:
â?ƒGod made me love you, and such love is gain.
If love at times seems shadowed by despair,
â?ƒStill will I love, — if not in joy, in pain.
Perhaps, if early in life our eyes had met,
â?ƒThe strength for perfect love had not been ours:
But now upon the hills our feet are set,
â?ƒAnd we can gather noble mountain-flowers. — She . —

— But if you die, and if I marry then? — He . —

â?ƒ — Sweetheart, if God who made me love you so
Can take your lips, your heart, from me again,
â?ƒThere is no medicine for that mastering woe. — She . —

— Stay — — He . —
â?ƒâ?ƒ — Never! Did not God himself declare
â?ƒAs down the starry heights his great voice rang
That you were destined for the one thing fair
â?ƒFor me? So I took up my harp and sang.
Did God not let me kiss the coal-black hair?
â?ƒYes, God and you — allowing bliss and pang? — She . —

— But ought you thus to have acted? Was it wise,
â?ƒKnowing the barriers Fate has placed between? — He . —

— Lady, I met the splendour of your eyes,
â?ƒAnd barriers vanished at that glance, I ween! — She . —

— What is the gain? Ephemeral surely and small,
â?ƒWhen weighed with what man's heart counts gain and bliss? — He . —

— Not half your soul I ask. I ask for all.
â?ƒI ask for years of marriage in one kiss.
To feel your soul grow to me day by day
â?ƒWith lovely trust and confidence serene:
To know that doubts and fears have fled away:
â?ƒTo feel your girlish heart completely lean
On mine: this is the high reward I pray
â?ƒYour sovereign grace to gift me with, my queen! — She . —

— And is that marriage? — He . —
— That is the deep soul
â?ƒOr marriage, not the phantom and the form:
The marriage-love that, though wild thunders roll,
â?ƒCan breast the cloud-waves and defy the storm.
Yes, this is marriage. — She . —
— Is not marriage, then,
â?ƒThe orange-blossomed daily thing we see? — He . —
— Will lace and orange-blossoms help you when,
â?ƒLoveless, you have to face eternity?
Will silk and silver and gold and praise of men
â?ƒAssist, when you at last — look round for me? — She . —
— Nay, not so fast! — He . —
— Nay, faster — for I know,
â?ƒAs man knows deep by intuition's law,
I, having worshipped, having loved you so,
â?ƒWith such sweet homage and such rapturous awe,
That every other love, though it sound fair
â?ƒAnd whatsoever gifts its right hand bring,
Would in its left hand bring you black despair
â?ƒAnd sorrow past our mortal reckoning.
No woman ever is loved as I love you
â?ƒTwice on the earth, twice in eternity:
You'd miss my old grey eyes, and find the new
â?ƒBrown eyes a trifle tedious, it may be! — She . —
— Brown eyes are pretty. — He . —
— Yes, your brown eyes have
â?ƒThe Pyrenean magic in their gaze:
Most stately, queenly, thoughtful, noble, grave,
â?ƒThey make me dream of Southern hills and bays. — She . —
— But I, — I was not talking of my own — — He . —
â?ƒ — And I, — I never talk except of yours — — She . —
— To argue with a poet — — He . —
— Ah, your tone
â?ƒSo silver-sweet, ineffably allures! — She . —
— But, just to say the same old thing once more,
â?ƒWe are debarred and shut off, each from each. — He . —
— Can wave thrill wave along the shadowy shore,
â?ƒCan moonbeams mix above the glimmering beach,
Can star reach star across the tremulous night,
â?ƒCan sun touch sun across wan leagues of air,
And cannot we blend sorrow and delight
â?ƒAnd peace unchangeably, my one thing fair? — She . —
— A poet's thought and diction! — He . —
— Nay, the truth
â?ƒTo-day as ever is in a poet's dream:
True visions, as of everlasting youth
â?ƒAnd endless summer, through your glances gleam. — She . —
— And if I trust you utterly? — He . —
— Your trust
â?ƒWill not be misplaced. Set your lips on mine.
When heaven's stars vanish, worn to golden dust,
â?ƒUnwrecked, undaunted, shall our love-star shine. —