Love's Farewell

" No more!" I said to Love. " No more!
I scorn your baby-arts to know!
Not now am I as once of yore;
My brow the Sage's line can show!"
" Farewell!" he laughed. " Farewell! I go!"
And clove the air with fluttering track.
" Farewell!" he cried far off; — but lo!
He sent a Parthian arrow back!

Chorus

Vaine man, borne to noe happinesse,
but by the title of distresse,
Alli'de to a Capacitie
of Joye, only by missery;
whose pleasures are but remidies,
and best delights but the supplies
of what hee wantes, who hath noe sence
but poverty and indigence:
Is itt not paine still to desire
and carry in our breast this fyer?
is it not deadnesse to have none,
and satisfyed, are wee not stone?
Doeth not our Cheifest Blisse then lie
Betwixt thirst and satiety,
in the midd way? which is alone

Three Guests

She whispered: " Love is dead. "
She saw the raven hearse go down the street,
And closed her door.

Then Passion rose and pled,
Even more wild, even more fiery-sweet
Than Love, before,

And lingered in the room,
Out of an anguished moment to coerce
Dreams that had been:

Till forth into the gloom
Passion went following the raven hearse.
And Peace came in.

The Love-Letter

If this should fail, why then I scarcely know
What could succeed. Here's brilliancy (and banter),
Byron ad lib. , a chapter of Rousseau; —
If this should fail, then tempora mutantur ;
Style's out of date, and love, as a profession,
Acquires no aid from beauty of expression.

" The men who think as I, Ifear, are few,"
(Cynics would say 'twere well if they were fewer);
" I am not what I seem," — (indeed, 'tis true;

The Christ-Sword

The while my mad brain whirled around
She only looked with eyes elate
Immortal love at me. I found
How deep the glance of love can wound,
How cruel pity is to hate.

I was begirt with hostile spears:
My angel warred in me for you
Whose gentle calmness all too fierce
Made unseen lightnings to pierce
My heart that dripped with ruddy dew.

I know how on the final day
The hosts of darkness meet with death:
The angels with their love shall slay,
Flowing to meet the dark array

The Song of Werner

O roman maid! why do you try
To win a heart you cannot hold
With honeyed word and witching eye?
For ah! the ancient fire is cold.

Beyond the virgin Alpine snow,
My lady sleeps beside the Rhine —
Upon her grave three roses blow,
Her grave — who was the love of mine.

O, maid of Rome! you cannot move
The heart that sorrow steeped in gloom;
For me alone but one to love,
My lady sleeping in the tomb.

The Silence of Love

I could praise you once with beautiful words ere you came
And entered my life with love in a wind of flame.
I could lure with a song from afar my bird to its nest,
But with pinions drooping together silence is best.

In the land of beautiful silence the winds are laid,
And life grows quietly one in the cloudy shade.
I will not waken the passion that sleeps in the heart,
For the winds that blew us together may blow us apart.

Fear not the stillness; for doubt and despair shall cease
With the gentle voices guiding us into peace.

Three Songs from the Remembered Gods

A NGUS' S ONG

Are the gods forgotten in Morven of the hinds.
The beauty that slew men the golden eyes that shone
The gods that will be walking on the rocks of the winds
That little men would die for the love of looking on?

Are the gods forgotten in Morven of the stags,
The old gods, the fair gods that were too high for love,
The white feet pressing on the grasses of the crags,

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