Classic Poem

Shade of high shame and honourable blindness
When youth in storm of dizzy and distant things
Finds the wild windfall of a little kindness
And shakes to think that all the world has wings
The little smile that stirred the stars to laughter
The living hand that came from far away
God be their guard before their going and after
The little words that shall not pass away.

Make not this sex, this other side of things
A thing less distant than the world's desire
What colour to the edge of evening clings
And what far cry of frontiers and what fire
Fallen too far beyond the seas for seeking
Let it be with us when we closest come
And a wild signal in our secret speaking
To hang the proud horizon in our home.

Seal us for names and not for numbers, Master
Make us a home and not a herd, O God.
True lovers whom division no disaster
Brings by two ways to a trysting place untrod.