In cloudy legends of the dawn of years,
Or sculptured verse on shard or shattered stone,
The oldest lore is still of love and tears,
Of wild dark wars and cities overthrown,
And blows and bitter deeds and mad defeat,
Whereof the burden is, “Yet love is sweet.”

And from all ways, where men have dwelt and died,
From nations dwindled to a minstrel's song,
A sound of voices, mingled, multiplied,
A rumor of delight, despair and wrong,
Of sorrows infinite and strange amaze,
Waft down the troubled winds of many days.

Syn I fro Love escaped am so fat,
I never thenk to ben in his prison lene;
Syn I am free, I counte him not a bene.

He may answere, and saye this and that;
I do no fors, I speke right as I mene.
Syn I fro Love escaped am so fat.

Love hath my name ystrike out of his sclat,
And he is strike out of my bokes clene
For evermo; ther is non other mene.

Syn I fro Love escaped am so fat,
I never thenk to ben in his prison lene;
Syn I am free, I counte him not a bene.

The stars are gleaming far and bright;
The winds are keen and cold;
The woolly flocks, all snowy white,
Are cuddling in the fold.
But in my heart such longing lies—
Bright star of yonder shore!
Oh, look from out the shining skies
And hear me as of yore!

The world is wrapped in slumber deep,
All other hearts at rest,
While mine, too aching full for sleep,
Keeps up its lonely quest.
And still my prayers in ardor rise
And climb up more and more—
Oh, bend from out the starry skies
And kiss me as of yore!

Dreams come from Jove, the poet says;
But as I watch the smile
That on thy lips now softly plays,
I can but deem the while,
Venus may also send a shade
To whisper to a slumbering maid.

What dark-eyed youth now culls the flower
That radiant brow to grace,
Or whispers in the starry hour
Words fairer than thy face?
Or singles thee from out the throng
To thee to breathe his minstrel song?

The ardent vow that ne'er can fail,
The sigh that is not sad,
The glance that tells a secret tale,
The spirit hushed yet glad:

I have no beauty, oh, my Love,
Save what is given by Thee,
Save only when Thy loving eyes
See loveliness in me.

I do not wear it every day
As other women do.
It is a light—it will not stay—
It only comes for You.

Yet I would rather have it so,
A secret thing untamed,
Than have it trapped by alien eyes
Or be too lightly named.

Love, when the sweetness of your love
Beholds a grace in me,
It is as if a golden dove
Lit in a wild-wood tree.

The world was husht, the moon above
Sailed thro' ether slowly,
When near the casement of my love,
Thus I whispered lowly,—
“Awake, awake, how canst thou sleep?
“The field I seek to-morrow
“Is one where man hath fame to reap,
“And woman gleans but sorrow.”

“Let battle's field be what it may.”
Thus spoke a voice replying,
“Think not thy love, while thou'rt away,
“Will siThere idly sighing.
“No—woman's soul, if not for fame,
“For love can brave all danger!”
Then forth from out the casement came
A plumed and armed stranger.

Into the mystery of life,
Dear Lord, I cannot see;
I only know that I exist,
Made and upheld by Thee.

The brooding presence of Thy love
Encircles me about,
Nor leaves me room for any fear,
Nor place for any doubt.

I know Thee in the cloud by day
As in the fire by night;
Both lead me to my promised home,
The land of my delight.

The future cannot yield me proof
More tender or divine,
Than has the past, that all Thy thoughts
To meward are benign.

And backward if I look, I own
The leadings of Thy love;

I pray you if you love me, bear my joy
A little while, or let me weep your tears;
I, too, have seen the quavering Fate destroy
Your destiny's bright spinning—the dull shears
Meeting not neatly, chewing at the thread,—
Nor can you well be less aware how fine,
How staunch as wire, and how unwarranted
Endures the golden fortune that is mine.
I pray you for this day at least, my dear,
Fare by my side, that journey in the sun;
Else must I turn me from the blossoming year
And walk in grief the way that you have gone.
Let us go forth together to the spring:

O Lord, when Thou didst call me, didst Thou know
My heart disheartened thro' and thro',
Still hankering after Egypt full in view
Where cucumbers and melons grow?
—“Yea, I knew.”—

But, Lord, when Thou didst choose me, didst Thou know
How marred I was and withered too,
Nor rose for sweetness nor for virtue rue,
Timid and rash, hasty and slow?
—“Yea, I knew.”—

My Lord, when Thou didst love me, didst Thou know
How weak my efforts were, how few,
Tepid to love and impotent to do,
Envious to reap while slack to sow?
—“Yea, I knew.”—

Once a rose ever a rose, we say,
One we loved and who loved us
Remains beloved though gone from day;
To human hearts it must be thus,
The past is sweetly laid away.

Sere and sealed for a day and year,
Smell them, dear Christina, pray;
So nature treats its children dear,
So memory deals with yesterday,
The past is sweetly laid away.