Chapter III

With scents of heat, dew-chilled and sweet,
The new-cut hay smells by the bight;
The ghost of some dead pansy bloom,
The butterfly dreams in the gloom,
Its pied wings folded tight.
The world is lost in fantasy,--
Come dance with us in Faery,
Come dance with us to-night.

THE WORLD'S DESIRE

The roses of voluptuousness Wreathe her dark locks and hide her eyes; Her limbs are flower-like nakedness, Wherethrough the fragrant blood doth press, The blossom-blood of Paradise.

She stands with Lilith finger tips, With Lilith hands; and gathers up The wild wine of all life; and sips With Lilith-laughter-lightened lips The soul as from a crystal cup.

What though she cast the cup away! The empty bowl that flashed with wine! Her curled lips' kiss, that stained the clay, Her fingers' touch--shall not these stay, That made its nothingness divine?

Through one again shall live the glow, Immortalizing, of her touch; And through the other, sweet to know How life swept flame once 'neath the snow Of her mooned breasts,--and this is much!

THE UNATTAINABLE

Mark thou! a shadow crowned with fire of hell. Man holds her in his heart as night doth hold The moonlight memories of day's dead gold; Or as a winter-withered asphodel In its dead loveliness holds scents of old. And looking on her, lo, he thinks 'tis well.

Who would not follow her whose glory sits, Imperishably lovely on the air? Who, from the arms of Earth's desire, flits With eyes defiant and rebellions hair?-- Hers is the beauty that no man shall share.

He who hath seen, what shall it profit him? He who doth love, what shall his passion gain? When disappointment at her cup's bright brim Poisons the pleasure with the hemlock pain? Hers is the passion that no man shall drain.

How long, how long since Life hath touched her eyes, Making their night clairvoyant! And how long Since Love hath kissed her lips and made them wise, Binding her brow with prophecy and song! Hope clad her nakedness in lovely lies, Giving into her hands the right of wrong!

Lo! in her world she sets pale tents of thought, Unearthly bannered; and her dreams' wild bands Besiege the heavens like a twilight fraught With recollections of lost stars. She stands Radiant as Lilith given from God's hands.

The golden rose of patience at her throat Drops fragrant petals--as a pensive tune Drops its surrendered sweetness note by note;-- And from her hands the buds of hope are strewn, Moon-flowers, mothered of the barren moon.

So in her flowers man seats him at her feet In star-faced worship, knowing all of this; And now to him to die seems very sweet, Fed with the fire of her look and kiss; While in his heart the blood's tumultuous beat Drowns, in her own, the drowsing serpent's hiss.

He who hath dreamed but of her world shall give All of his soul unto her restlessly: He who hath seen but her far face shall live No more for things we name reality: Such is the power of her tyranny.

He, whom she wins, hath nothing 'neath the sun; Forgetting all that she may not forget He loves her, who still feeds his soul upon Dreams and desires, and doubt and vain regret,-- Life's bitter bread his heart's fierce tears make wet.

What word of wisdom hast thou, Life, to wake Him now! or song of magic now to dull The dreams he lives in! or what charm to break The spell that makes her evil beautiful! What charm to show her beauty hides a snake, Whose basilisk eyes burn dark behind a skull.

REMEMBERED

Here in the dusk I see her face again As then I knew it, ere she fell asleep; Renunciation glorifying pain Of her soul's inmost deep.

I shall not see its like again! the brow Of passive marble, purely aureoled,-- As some pale lily in the afterglow,-- With supernatural gold.

As if a rose should speak and, somehow heard By some strange sense, the unembodied sound Grow visible, her mouth was as a word A sweet thought falters 'round.

So do I still remember eyes imbued With far reflections--as the stars suggest The silence, purity and solitude Of infinite peace and rest.

She was my all. I loved her as men love A high desire, religion, an ideal-- The meaning purpose in the loss whereof God shall alone reveal.

THE SEA SPIRIT

Ah me! I shall not waken soon From dreams of such divinity! A spirit singing in the moon To me.

White sea-spray driven of the storm Were not so wildly white as she! She beckoned with a foam-white arm To me.

With eyes dark green, and golden-green Loose locks that sparkled drippingly, Out of the green wave she did lean To me.

And sang; till Earth and Heaven were A far, forgotten memory; For more than Heaven seemed hid in her To me:--

Sleep, sweeter than love's face or home; Love, more than immortality; And music of the dreamy foam For me.

Pass over her with all thy ships With all thy stormy tides, O sea! The memory of immortal lips For me!

A DREAM SHAPE

With moon-white hearts that held a gleam, I gathered wild flowers in a dream, And shaped a woman, whose sweet blood Was odor of the wildwood bud.

From dew, the starlight arrowed through, I wrought a woman's eyes of blue; The lids, that on her eyeballs lay, Were rose-pale petals of the May.

I took the music of the breeze, And water whispering in the trees, And shaped the soul that breathed below A woman's blossom breasts of snow.

Out of a rose-bud's veins I drew The fragrant crimson beating through The languid lips of her, whose kiss Was as a poppy's drowsiness.

Out of the moonlight and the air I wrought the glory of her hair, That o'er her eyes' blue heaven lay Like some gold cloud o'er dawn of day.

A shadow's shadow in the glass Of sleep, my spirit saw her pass: And, thinking of it now, meseems We only live within our dreams.

For in that time she was to me More real than our reality; More real than Earth, more real than I-- The unreal things that pass and die.

THE VAMPIRE

A lily in a twilight place? A moonflow'r in the lonely night?-- Strange beauty of a woman's face Of wildflow'r-white!

The rain that hangs a star's green ray Slim on a leaf-point's restlessness, Is not so glimmering green and gray As was her dress.

I drew her dark hair from her eyes, And in their deeps beheld a while Such shadowy moonlight as the skies Of Hell may smile.

She held her mouth up redly wan, And burning cold,--I bent and kissed Such rosy snow as some wild dawn Makes of a mist.

God shall not take from me that hour, When round my neck her white arms clung! When 'neath my lips, like some fierce flower, Her white throat swung!

Or words she murmured while she leaned! Witch-words, she holds me softly by,-- The spell that binds me to a fiend Until I die.

WILL-O'-THE-WISP