University of Virginia Library


208

II.

This is why woman with her subtle grace,
Her robe of tenderest flesh, in this our day
Hath gained the power to gather and convey
So strange a mystic sweetness,—not of face
Alone, but rather memories of some place
Beyond the stars, beyond the sun's red ray,
Beyond blue ocean, regions far away
That hold dim records of another race.
The angel-form within her form revives:
The old strange beauty now at last returns,
The scent of Eden's roses, Eden's ferns,
The clear remembrance of forgotten lives.
Aye, while man marvels, victory arrives
And Eden's light through the old tree-vistas burns.
July 31, 1901.