An Epic of Women and Other Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

I was not with the rest at play;
My brothers laughed in joyous mood:
But I—I wandered far away
Into the fair and silent wood;
And with the trees and flowers I stood,
As dumb and full of dreams as they:
—For One it seemed my whole heart knew,
Or One my heart had known long since,
Was peeping at me through the dew;
And with bright laughter seemed to woo
My beauty, like a Fairy prince.

Oh, what a soft enchantment filled
The lonely paths and places dim!
It was as though the whole wood thrilled,
And a dumb joy, because of him,
Weighed down the lilies tall and slim,
And made the roses blush, and stilled
The great wild voices in half fear:
It was as though his smile did hold
All things in trances manifold;
And in each place as he drew near
The leaves were touched and turned to gold.

And well I seemed to know, the while,
It was for me and for my sake,
He wrought that magic with his smile,
And set the unseen spells to make
The lonely ways I loved to take
So full of sweetness, to beguile
My heart and keep me there for hours;
And sometimes I was sure he lay
Beside me hid among the flowers,
Or climbed above me, and in play
Shook down the white tree-bloom in showers.

But more and more he seemed to seek
My heart: till, dreaming of all this,
I thought one day to hear him speak,
Or feel, indeed, his sudden kiss
Bind me to some great unknown bliss:
Then there would stay upon my cheek
Full many a light and honied stain,
That told indeed how I had lain
Deep in the flowery banks all day;
And round me too there would remain
Some strange wood-blossom's scent alway.

'Twas not the bright and fond deceit
Of that first summer,—whose great bloom
Quite overcame me with its sweet,
And seemed to fill me and consume
My very brain with its perfume;—
'Twas no false spell made my heart beat
With such a joy to be alone
With all the bloom and all the scent:
It was a thing I dared not own,
Already whispered there and known,
Already with my whole life blent.

It was this secret, vast, sublime,
Too full of wonder to be told—
Whose extreme rapture from that time
Doth ever more and more enfold
My spirit, like a robe of gold,
Or, as it were, the magic clime
Of some fair heaven about me shed—
Wherein are songs of unseen birds,
And whispers of delicious words
More sweet than any man hath said
Of all the living or the dead.

—O, the incomparable love
Of him, my Lover !—O, to tell
Its way and measure were above
The throbbing chords of speech that swell
Within me !—Doth it not excel
All other, sung or written of?
Yea now, O all ye fair mankind—
Consider well the gracious line
Of those your lovers; call to mind
Their love of you, and ye shall find
Not one among them all like mine.

It seems as though, from calm to calm,
A whole fair age had passed me by,
Since first this Lover, through a charm
Of flowers, wooed so tenderly,
I had no fear of drawing nigh,
Nor knew, indeed, that—with an arm
Closed round and holding me—he led
My eager way from sight to sight
Of all the summer magic—right
To where himself had surely spread
Some pleasant snare for my delight.

And now, in an eternal sphere,
Beneath one flooding look of his—
Wherein, all beautiful and dear,
That endless melting gold that is
His love, with flawless memories
Grows ever richer and more clear—
My life seems held, as some faint star
Beneath its sun: and through the far
Celestial distances for miles,
To where vast mirage futures are,
I trace the gilding of his smiles.

And, in the long enthralling dream,
That, ever—through each purer zone
Of love translating me—doth seem
To bring my spirit near his own,
I hear the veiled angelic tone
Of many voices; as I deem,
Assuring me of something sweet,
And strange, and wondrous, and intense;
Which thing they evermore repeat
In fair half parables, from whence
I draw a vague all-blissful sense.

For, one by one, e'en as I rise,
And feel the pure Ethereal
Refining all before my eyes:
Whole beauteous worlds material
Are seen to enter gradual
The great transparent paradise
Of this my dream; and, all revealed,
To break upon me more and more
Their inward singing souls, and yield
A wondrous secret half concealed
In all their loveliness before.

And so, when, through unmeasured days,
The far effulgence of the sea
Is holding me in long amaze,
And stealing with strange ecstasy
My heart all opened silently;—
There reach me, from among the sprays,
Ineffable faint words that sing
Within me,—how, for me alone,
One who is lover—who is King,
Hath dropt, as 'twere a precious stone,
That sea—a symbol of his throne.

And now, indeed, some precious time
It hath,—all inexpressible!
All rapture!—yea, through many a rhyme
Of wordless speech made fairly well,
And beauteous worlds' whole visible
Unbosomings of love sublime—
It hath some blessèd while become
Familiar, how all things take part
For him to whose love I am come,
And in their ways—not weak nor dumb—
Are ever calling on my heart.

And, through the long charmed solitude
Of throbbing moments, whose strong link
Is one delicious hope pursued
From trance to trance, the while I think
And know myself upon the brink
Of His eternal kiss,—endued
With part of him, the very wind
Hath power to ravish me in sips
Or long mad wooings that unbind
My hair,—wherein I truly find
The magic of his unseen lips.

And, so almighty is the thrill
I feel at many a faintest breath
Or stir of sound—as 'twere a rill
Of joy traversing me, or death
Dissolving all that hindereth
My thought from power to fulfil
Some new embodiment of bliss,—
I do consume with the immense
Delight as of some secret kiss,
And am become like one whose sense
Is used with raptures too intense!

O like some soft insidious breath,
Whose first invasion winneth quite
To all its madness or its death
The heart, resisting not the might
And poison of its new delight,—
E'en so is this that entereth
In whispers, or through subtly wrought
Enchantment snaring every thought;
Yea, by the whole mysterious pore
Of life,—this joy surpassing aught
That heart of man hath known before.

And, though, indeed, a hapless end
Of damning ruin were but sure,
Yet could I none of me defend
From such a sweet and perfect lure;
But must, as long as they endure,
To all these sorceries still lend
My heart; believing how I stand
Nigh some unearthly bliss that lies
Dissembled all before my eyes;—
Do I not see a radiant Hand
Transmuting earth, and air, and skies?

—And is not the great language mute
The stars' deep looks are wont to melt
Upon my soul, the very suit
Of this unearthly wooer—felt
So clearly pleading—I have knelt
Full oft, most dreading to pollute
The holy rapture with a sigh?
And doth not every accent nigh
Consume each Past to a thin shred;
While endless visions glorify
My sight, and haloes touch my head?

Yea, mystic consummation! yea,
O Wondrous suitor,—whosoe'er
Thou art; that in such mighty way,
In distant realms, athwart the air
And lands and seas, with all things fair,
Hast wooed me even till this day;—
It seems thou drawest near to me;
Or I, indeed, so nigh to thee,
I catch rare breaths of a delight
From thy most glorious country, see
Its distant glow upon some height.

At times there is vouchsafed me, e'en
Some sign that certainly foretells
Of thee at hand: so I have seen—
Caught by no earthly clash of bells—
A gleam of silver citadels;
Distant, and radiant with such sheen
As only on high virgin snows,
Or from the diamond one knows;
Displayed a moment, without shroud,
Eclipsing all the night's fair shows
From some dim pinnacle of cloud:

Or, through a calm hushed interval
Of most charmed thinking, there hath passed,
And with no rumour or footfall,
A troop of blonde ones who surpassed
All tales of loveliness amassed
In my child's dreamland; costumed all
As for a bridal; who did shine
With such a splendour on each face,
And light upon the garments fine,
I knew them surely of a race
That dwells in that fair realm of thine.

O thou my Destiny! O thou
My own—my very Love—my Lord!
Whom from the first day until now
My heart, divining, hath adored
So perfectly it hath abhorred
The tie of each frail human vow—
O I would whisper in thine ear—
Yea, may I not, once, in the clear
Pure night, when, only, silver shod
The angels walk?—thy name, I fear
And love, and tremble saying—GOD!