Kitabı oku: «Herbs and Apples», sayfa 2

FOR MUSIC

 
The Indian Summer and Love have fled,
Oh, red, red lips like a crimson rose,
Oh, slender hands with the tips of red,
You are lost in the land of Nobody-knows.
 
 
The sweet breeze blows but it comes not back,
The water flows in a silver stream,
But never returns on its moon-white track,
They are gone, past recall, like a lovely dream.
 
 
Ah, crimson lips like a tilted flower,
Where sweetest honey awaits the bee;
Come back, come back for a single hour,
Dear Love, my Summer, come back to me.
 

THE LITTLE GHOST

 
The little one who loved the sun
Who only lived for play,
Ah, why was she the one condemned
To dark and dreams for aye!
 
 
The perfect perfume of her life
Was as a rose's breath,
And now she treads eternally
The gusty walks of Death.
 

MADONNA EVE

 
From what far spicery derives your hair
The sweet faint fragrance that enslaves my sense?
What subtle love trick taught you to be fair
With overt lure and covert reticence?
 
 
Madonna Eve, you bear upon your breast
A hungry emerald like the desiring sea,
But warm upon your heart lie pearls of rest
What man could exorcise such witchery?
 

A CONVERSATION

 
"Laddy, leave your pedant's task,
Rove the world with me.
Fields and towns and pretty lands
Together we would see.
There be workers everywhere,
You would not be missed.
Come, ah come, and take for yours
The mouth you never kissed!"
 
 
"Lady, I am fain for play,
So I may not go.
Only those who hate to toil
The true enjoyment know;
But could you love a larrikin
Whose task he'd so resign?"
"Yes!—I'd love a larrikin
If only he were mine."
 

BE BRAVE

 
Be brave about yourselves, you little ones,
If in the crazy warp and woof you gleam
With the insistence of determined suns,
Shine, being true and modest in your dream.
 
 
If to the peace of nature you respond
Draw from her breast your milk, nor weep the high
Duties for lack of which you now despond,
Made for historic planets thro' the sky.
 
 
Knowing yourself a gay and careless weed,
Be you courageous in your light despair;
Sure that you fill a space of unknown need,
Idle and green in the bright coat you wear.
 
 
Strive to the uttermost to find your worth,
Jester or Gypsy, Body, Brain or Soul,
Filling with perfect cheer your place on earth,
So shall the tapestry of Time be whole.
 

FORFEITURE

 
So I have lost you. When the utter ache
Shall fade at length to mere despondency
What will the answer to this problem be?
They say that nothing dies, that all we stake
Brings some unknown return; what then shall make
An adequate exchange for love, to see
Your hand held out in friendship?—as for me
The episode is ended, for life's sake.
 
 
You want me still for that small joy I gave,
But now it ends for you. I am not brave
To love you seared; I have no happy days
To brood upon at dusk, and so I claim,
As all the wager that good fortune pays,
Complete obliteration of your name.
 

THE SEARCH

 
I tire of the struggle, the search for the ultimate I,
There hangs the chalice of sapphire, the infinite sky,
Why thro' the space of despair should my spirit be hurled
Seeking for truth, when beneath lies this pearl of a world?
 
 
Seers may direct us thro' pain to discover the soul,
Comforting joy may not give us the absolute whole,
But if the seers should be wrong, may the truth not be ours
Thanking dear Life for its light and its beautiful hours?
 

DUST

 
Motes of the city dust, could this thing be
That midst your myriad particles for me
Might come one atom out of Ispahan,
One spiced far memory of caravan.
 
 
Indrawn upon my breath I'd know an urge
To dissipate monotony, and purge
The spirit of its spleen; one with the man
Who takes the sun blue air of Ispahan.
 

NATURE'S CHILD

 
I had a friend whose soul was very fair,
His word was wisdom and his strength was sure;
His courage in the ills he had to bear
Made others strong and able to endure.
I asked no love, no tribute of the sense
For his companionship was recompense.
 
 
I thought I was beloved, but did not care,
He smiled on me as he on others smiled,
But one grey day a chill was in the air
And then to prove that I was Nature's child,
He spoke—"I do not love you very much—"
And all my friendship shattered at the touch.