A Womans Love Letters | Page 8

fears,?For the quest and the mystery.
It wails to me, it wails to me,?Of the deep dark graves in the yawning sea;?And I hear the voice of a boy that is gone.?But the lad sleeps sound till the judgment-dawn?In the heart of the wind-swept sea.
Incompleteness.
Since first I met thee, Dear, and long before?I knew myself beloved, save by the sense?All women have, a shadowy confidence?Half-fear, that _feels_ its bliss nor asks for more,?I have learned new desires, known Love's distress?Sounded the deepest depths of loneliness.
I was a child at heart, and lived alone,?Dreaming my dreams, as children may, at whiles,?Between their hours of play, and Earth's broad smiles Allured my heart, and ocean's marvellous tone?Woke no strange echoes, and the woods' complain?Made chants sonorous, stirred no thoughts of pain.
And if, sometimes, dear Nature spoke to me?In tones mysterious, I had learned so much?Dwelling beside her daily, that her touch?Made me discerning. Though I might not see?Her purpose nor her meaning, I had part?In the proud throbbing of that mighty heart.
But now the earth has put a tiring-cloth?About her face; even in the mountains' cheer?There is a lack, and in the sea a fear,?The glad, rash sea, whose every mood, if wroth?Or soothing mild, is dear to me as are?Joy's new-born kisses on the lips of Care.
Since I have known thee, Dear, all life has grown?An expectation. As the swelling grain?Trembles to harvesting, and earth in pain?Travails till Spring is born, so felt alone?Is the dumb reaching out of things unborn,?The night's gray promise of the amber morn.
I long to taste my pleasures through thy lips,?To sail with thee o'er foaming waves and feel?Our spirits rise together with the reel?Of waters and the wavering land's eclipse;?To see thy fair hair damp with salt sea-spray?And in thine eyes the wildness of the way.
I long to share my woods with thee, to fly?To some black-hearted forest where the trail?Of mortals lingers not,--to hear the gale.?Sweep round us with a shuddering ecstasy,?To feel, night's tumult passed, the cool soft hand?Of the untroubled dawn move o'er the land.
To swim with thee far out into the bay,?A trembling glitter on the waves, the shore?Glowing with noontide fervor, nevermore?To fear the treacherous depths, though long the way.?Sweet beyond words the sighs that breathe and blow,?The moist salt kisses, and the glad warm glow.
And when the unrest, the vague desires that rush?Over our lives and may not be denied,--?Gone in the tasting,--lure us where the tide?Of men sweeps on, let us forget the hush?Together, and in city madness drain?Our cup of pleasure to its dregs of pain.
Ever I need thee. Incomplete and poor?This life of mine. Yet never dream my soul?Craves the old peace. Till I may have the whole?My joy is my abiding, and what more?Of dreams and waking bliss the Fates allow?Comes as a gift of Love's great overflow.
Song.
Deep in the green bracken lying,?Close by the welcoming sea,?Dream I, and let all my dreaming?Drift as it will, Love, to thee.
Sated with splendid caresses?Showered by the sun in his pride,?Scorched by his passionate kisses?Languidly ebbs the tide.
Life's Joys.
I have been pondering what our teachers call?The mystery of Pain; and lo! my thought?After it's half-blind reaching out has caught?This truth and held it fast. We may not fall?Beyond our mounting; stung by life's annoy,?Deeper we feel the mystery of Joy.
Sometimes they steal across us like a breath?Of Eastern perfume in a darkened room,?These joys of ours; we grope on through the gloom?Seeking some common thing, and from its sheath?Unloose, unknowing, some bewildering scent?Of spice-thronged memories of the Orient.
Sometimes they dart across our turbid sky?Like a quick flash after a heated day.?A moment, where the sombrous shadows lay?We see a glory. Though it passed us by?No earthly power can filch that dazzling glow?From memory's eye, that instant's shine and show.
Life is so full of joys. The alluring sea,?This morning clear and placid, may, ere night,?Toss like a petulant child, and when the light?Of a new morning dawns sweep grand and free?A mighty power. If fierce, or mild, or bright,?With every tide flows in a fresh delight.
I can remember well when first I knew?The fragrance of white clover. There I lay?On the warm July grass and heard the play?Of sun-browned insects, and the breezes blew?To my drowsed sense the scent the blossoms had;?The subtle sweetness stayed, and I was glad.
Nor passed the gladness. Though the years have gone?(A many years, Beloved, since that day,)?Whenever by the roadside or away?In radiant summer fields, wandering alone?Or with glad children, to my restless sight?Shows that pale head, comes back the old delight.
Oh! the dark water, and the filling sail!?The scudding like a sea-mew, with the hand?Firm on the tiller! See, the red-shored land?Receding, as we brave the hastening gale!?White gleam the wave-tops, and the breakers' roar?Sounds thunderingly on the far distant shore.
This mad hair