I

I CLASSED , appraising once,
Earth's lamentable sounds, — the welladay,
The jarring yea and nay,
The fall of kisses on unanswering clay,
The sobbed farewell, the welcome mournfuller, —
But all did leaven the air
With a less bitter leaven of sure despair
Than these words — " I loved ONCE ."

II

When we can all so excellently give
The measure of love's wisdom with a blow, —
Why can we not in turn receive it so,
And end this murmur for the life we live?
And when we do so frantically strive
To win strange faith, why do we shun to know
That in love's elemental over-glow
God's wholeness gleams with light superlative?

Oh, brother men, if you have eyes at all,
Look at a branch, a bird, a child, a rose,
Or anything God ever made that grows, —
Nor let the smallest vision of it slip,
Till you may read, as on Belshazzar's wall,

DEDICATION TO THE Nursery " A LICE ," 1889

A Mother's breast:
Safe refuge from her childish fears,
From childish troubles, childish tears,
Mists that enshroud her dawning years!
See how in sleep she seems to sing
A voiceless psalm — an offering
Raised, to the glory of her King,
In Love: for Love is Rest.

A Darling's kiss:
Dearest of all the signs that fleet
From lips that lovingly repeat
Again, again, their message sweet!
Full to the brim with girlish glee,
A child, a very child is she,

Around my lonely hearth, to-night,
Ghostlike the shadows wander:
Now here, now there, a childish sprite,
Earthborn and yet as angel bright,
Seems near me as I ponder.

Gaily she shouts: the laughing air
Echoes her note of gladness —
Or bends herself with earnest care
Round fairy-fortress to prepare
Grim battlement or turret-stair —
In childhood's merry madness!

New raptures still hath youth in store.
Age may but fondly cherish
Half-faded memories of yore —
Up, craven heart! repine no more!

Acrostic

“Seek ye Love, ye fairy-sprites?
 Ask where reddest roses grow.
Rosy fancies he invites,
And in roses he delights,
 Have ye found him?” “No!”

“Seek again, and find the boy
 In Childhood's heart, so pure and clear.”
Now the fairies leap for joy,
 Crying, “Love is here!”

“Love has found his proper nest;
 And we guard him while he dozes
In a dream of peace and rest
 Rosier than roses.”

The trail's high up on the ridge, on one goes down
But the east wind and the falling water the concave slope without a name to the little bay
That has no name either. The fish-hawk plunges
Beyond the long rocks, rises with streaming silver; the eagle strikes down from the ridge and robs the fish-hawk;
The stunted redwoods neither grow nor grow old
Up the steep slope, remembering winter and the sea-wind; the ferns are maiden green by the falling water;
The seas whiten on the reefs; nothing has changed

" Our bark's on the water; come down, come down,
I'll weave for thy fair head a leafy crown,
And in it I'll blend the roses bright,
With asphodel woven of faint sunlight.
But more precious than these I'll twine the pearls
In the flowing locks of thy chestnut curls;
And the gem and the flow'r from wave and from tree
Shall form a bright diadem, Bianca, for thee.
The sea is calm, and I will guard thee;
Oh what, sweet love, should thus retard thee?
Descend, fairest maiden, descend to the sea,
And sail o'er the motionless waters with me. "

I hate this yoke; for the world's sake here put it on:
Knowing 'twill weigh as much on you till life is gone.
Knowing you love your freedom dear, as I love mine —
Knowing that love unchained has been our life's great wine:
Our one great wine (yet spent too soon, and serving none;
Of the two cups free love at last the deadly one).

We grant our meetings will be tame, not honey-sweet,
No longer turning to the tryst with flying feet.
We know the toil that now must come will spoil the bloom
And tenderness of passion's touch, and in its room

I

Ah, what is love, our love, she said,
Ah, what is human love?
A fire, of earthly fuel fed,
Full fain to soar above.
With lambent flame the void it lips,
And of the impassive air
Would frame for its ambitious steps
A heaven-attaining stair.
It wrestles and it climbs — Ah me,
Go look in little space,
White ash on blackened earth will be

O Heaven, and thou most loving family
Of sister stars, whose intermingled light
From the blue home of this most quiet night
Shineth for aye in conscious unity!
Why bend ye thus your kind looks still on me,
That am a wretch, whose passions' ceaseless fight,
And gnawing thoughts of self—an inborn blight—
But vex the warmth of your pure sympathy?
Mine is no cup for you, blest stars, to pour
The rich draught of your sympathies therein;
It mantled once with all the joys of sin,
And I have quaffed them; now is nothing more,