Classic Poem

We slept again as dew-drops sleep
When kist into the sun;
As drowsy music melts
Into the chorus of the silences.
What lives we lived meanwhile
Is not my tale.
In Love's large plan
Is nothing else but life.
Enough that each had felt
The urge of immortality,
And stormed the gates of birth
For full expression of his latest dream.

How many years were we apart!
Long yearning years
That called to deed anew,
The world of truth like bending skies
O'erarching all our days.
And each was thrilled
With promise of an hour
When Love should bring together
With a sunrise pageantry
Two eager, waiting hearts
Who knew each other one.

Then came the day! We met!
The joy of starry cycles,
Pent in time's great ocean,
Burst its ancient shores,
And down the sluices of that dawn
Poured floods of chivalry and song.
The light of day,
The vastness of the night,
The wisdom of the ages,
All achievements of the mind,
Were nothing to that blazing splendour.

In tragic undiscernment
All the multitude
Said we were merely friends.
Mere friends! O blind of heart!
The outflung systems of the sky
In travail bowed,
Creation groaned for ages,
Suns emerged from chaos,
Stars were burned,
That your great soul and mine
Should be just friends.

Every noble avenue of earth
Is but a pathway bright with prophecy
And promise of that shining goal.
The harmonies of life,
The songs that shall endure,
And all the Art that thrills
With majesty and mystery
Would pass forever,
Fold themselves in vesture of decay
Were friendship dead.

The joy of motherhood
Is but one stone
In friendship's noble fane.
To be united as a man with woman
Is but to turn the steps,
The eyes, the heart, the life,
Into a vaster union.
The nearest, dearest obligations of the soul,
The circle of all lofty ties
And worthy recognitions
But aureole a mightier Love—
Love that is love,
Unparalleled by urge
Of contract or of sense—
A consciousness that he or she
Is of my blood, that is, myself;
Therefore I love him or love her.
Ay, we were friends;
And with that fact accomplishèd,
The stars laughed in their heavens,
The birds and streams
Rippled the air with liquid music,
And the flowers and forests
Gowned themselves with fragrant loveliness.
The heroes of the world
Were playmates of our past.
Greater than David, Heracles, St. George,
Who trampled dragons underfoot
And lions slew,
We had slain jealousy, intolerance,
And all the monster tyrannies;
Had subjugated circumstance,
Transfigured fate, annihilated destiny.

We learned to love the common good,
To live serene, strive upwards,
In high communion with dream-voices,
Yet were we self-restrained
And reverent of law.
Wide fame we scorned,
Since self-respect is better
Than the far repute
Of undiscerning and misjudging men.
Our higher Self had conquered self;
We loved, were loved,
And life was victory.

'Twas thus, heroic heart, you came,
And with you, as in dream,
The flowers we would not pluck,
But left upon their thrones of loveliness,
Deep in their wildernesses long ago,
To smile on heaven
And blush to crimson
'Neath the kiss of God.

O Friend of Friends, I think of you,
And all the air is fragrant once again
With breath of violets,
And plaintive with the murmur of the sea,
And rich beyond the power of words
Or grasp of thought
With music of your voice.

But, being thus your friend,
Am I the less your son,
Your husband, or your sire
In angel meaning,
Than when, long ago,
Enfolded in your dear, white arms,
I felt the dark grow lighter with your song?
Or when our home was Paradise,
And life was ecstasy
Because you were my queen?
Or when with you
I wandered in the wild,
And clasped you laughing,
In my arms, a lover-child?
I hear your voice—
The angels seem to sing
And breathe wild fragrances around!
Deep in your eyes,
The blue skies sleep,
The mountains rest,
And all the wide seas roll;
But Love Eternal never sleeps.
How could Love sleep,
Thou in His Universe?