Poems of Passion | Page 5

we do with this fond love, dear heart?

It grows a heavier burden day by day.
Hide it? In all earth's caverns, void and vast,
There is not room
enough to hide it, dear;
Not even the mighty storehouse of the past

Could cover it from our own eyes, I fear.
Drown it? Why, were the contents of each ocean
Merged into one
great sea, too shallow then
Would be its waters to sink this emotion

So deep it could not rise to life again.
Burn it? In all the furnace flames below,
It would not in a thousand
years expire.
Nay! it would thrive, exult, expand, and grow,
For

from its very birth it fed on fire.
Starve it? Yes, yes, that is the only way.
Give it no food, of glance, or
word, or sigh;
No memories, even, of any bygone day;
No crumbs
of vain regrets--so let it die.
"THE BEAUTIFUL BLUE DANUBE."
They drift down the hall together;
He smiles in her lifted eyes;
Like
waves of that mighty river,
The strains of the "Danube" rise.
They
float on its rhythmic measure
Like leaves on a summer-stream;
And
here, in this scene of pleasure,
I bury my sweet, dead dream.
Through the cloud of her dusky tresses,
Like a star, shines out her
face,
And the form his strong arm presses
Is sylph like in its grace.

As a leaf on the bounding river
Is lost in the seething sea,
I know
that forever and ever
My dream is lost to me.
And still the viols are playing
That grand old wordless rhyme;
And
still those two ate swaying
In perfect tune and time.
If the great
bassoons that mutter,
If the clarinets that blow,
Were given a voice
to utter
The secret things they know,
Would the lists of the slam who slumber
On the Danube's
battle-plains
The unknown hosts outnumber
Who die 'neath the
"Danube's" strains?
Those fall where cannons rattle,
'Mid the rain
of shot and shell;
But these, in a fiercer battle,
Find death in the
music's swell.
With the river's roar of passion
Is blended the dying groan;
But here,
in the halls of fashion,
Hearts break, and make no moan.
And the
music, swelling and sweeping,
Like the river, knows it all;
But none
are counting or keeping

The lists of these who fall.
[Illustration: "THEY DRIFT DOWN THE HALL TOGETHER"]

ANSWERED.
Good-bye--yes, I am going.
Sudden? Well, you are right;
But a
startling truth came home to me
With sudden force last night.
What
is it? Shall I tell you?
Nay, that is why I go.
I am running away
from the battlefield
Turning my back on the foe.
Riddles? You think me cruel!
Have you not been most kind?
Why,
when you question me like that,
What answer can I find?
You fear
you failed to amuse me,
Your husband's friend and guest,
Whom he
bade you entertain and please--
Well, you have done your best.

Then why am I going?
A friend of mine abroad,
Whose theories I
have been acting upon,
Has proven himself a fraud.
You have heard
me quote from Plato
A thousand times no doubt;
Well, I have
discovered he did not know
What he was talking about.
You think I am speaking strangely?
You cannot understand?
Well,
let me look down into your eyes,
And let me take your hand.
I am
running away from danger;
I am flying before I fall;
I am going
because with heart and soul
I love you--that is all.
There, now you
are white with anger;
I knew it would be so.
You should not
question a man too close
When he tells you he must go.
[Illustration:]
THROUGH THE VALLEY.
[AFTER JAMES THOMSON.]
As I came through the Valley of Despair,
As I came through the
valley, on my sight,
More awful than the darkness of the night,

Shone glimpses of a Past that had been fair,
And memories of eyes
that used to smile,

And wafts of perfume from a vanished isle,
As I
came through the valley.

As I came through the valley I could see,
As I came through the
valley, fair and far,
As drowning men look up and see a star,
The
fading shore of my lost Used-to-be;
And like an arrow in my heart I
heard
The last sad notes of Hope's expiring bird,
As I came through
the valley.
As I came through the valley desolate,
As I came through the valley,
like a beam
Of lurid lightning I beheld a gleam
Of Love's great eyes
that now were full of hate.
Dear God! Dear God! I could bear all but
that;
But I fell down soul-stricken, dead, thereat,
As I came through
the valley.
BUT ONE.
The year has but one June, dear friend;
The year has but one June;

And when that perfect month doth end,
The robin's song, though loud,
though long,
Seems never quite in tune.
The rose, though still its blushing face
By bee and bird is seen,
May
yet have lost that subtle grace--
That nameless spell the winds know

Which makes it garden's queen.
Life's perfect June, love's red, red rose,
Have burned and bloomed for
me.
Though still youth's summer sunlight glows;
Though thou art
kind, dear friend, I find
I have no heart for thee.
[Illustration:]
[Illustration: A JUNE ROSE]
GUILO.
Yes, yes! I love thee, Guilo; thee alone.
Why dost thou sigh, and