 | Leaves of life |  |
158
IN A NINETEENTH-CENTURY EDEN.
Just for this once, this once I will be wise!
No blossom here shall turn to fruit for me.
This sweet half-certainty that is not doubt,
This sadness that joy's mists are wreathed about,
These long looks, lengthened out in dreams again,
I would keep these, renouncing other gain.
I pluck and wear my flower of Paradise;
I will not have the apple it might be!
No blossom here shall turn to fruit for me.
This sweet half-certainty that is not doubt,
This sadness that joy's mists are wreathed about,
These long looks, lengthened out in dreams again,
I would keep these, renouncing other gain.
I pluck and wear my flower of Paradise;
I will not have the apple it might be!
For flowers mean perfume, promise of delight
More dear than fruit has ever granted yet:
And fruit is much too sweet, and much too sour,
And, with the first bite, one regrets the flower.
The flower will die—but your clear eyes shall weep
A gathered flower, whose fragrance time shall keep,
And its white memory shall light my night
—Dark with the thousand things one would forget.
More dear than fruit has ever granted yet:
And fruit is much too sweet, and much too sour,
And, with the first bite, one regrets the flower.
The flower will die—but your clear eyes shall weep
A gathered flower, whose fragrance time shall keep,
And its white memory shall light my night
—Dark with the thousand things one would forget.
159
For—since we have not talked of love, but gazed
The one sweet second more than others do,
Touched hands, and known the electric flash that flies
From each to each, through meeting hands and eyes,
Have dreamed and doubted, questioned and replied,
And laughed not gaily, and not sadly sighed—
All we might be and are not,—heavens untried—
In each for each eternally abide.
I am to you what no man else can be,
You, what no woman ever was to me,
A splendid light, a life's ideal raised
Above the dust mere loves degrade one to.
The one sweet second more than others do,
Touched hands, and known the electric flash that flies
From each to each, through meeting hands and eyes,
Have dreamed and doubted, questioned and replied,
And laughed not gaily, and not sadly sighed—
All we might be and are not,—heavens untried—
In each for each eternally abide.
I am to you what no man else can be,
You, what no woman ever was to me,
A splendid light, a life's ideal raised
Above the dust mere loves degrade one to.
Yet, how refuse, when lips like yours invite?
When eyes like yours look sad, how turn away?
I cannot tell you why my lips are fain
From this sweet offered apple to refrain,
For, at the word, our blossom shed would be
And the mere fruit be left for you and me:
The only word could save, would ruin all!
So—the old tale! The bloom will slowly fall,
The fruit grows ripe—I, spite of will and wit,
Must bite the apple if you offer it;
Then will the dream-lights flicker out and die,
And we shall wail, awakened, you and I,
That I to you am nothing any more
Than what some other fool has been before,
And you to me no more my sweet Dream-queen,
But what some fifty other fools have been.
I cannot save you, Eve! Your apple bite!
And—ere your teeth have met—our world grows gray.
When eyes like yours look sad, how turn away?
I cannot tell you why my lips are fain
From this sweet offered apple to refrain,
For, at the word, our blossom shed would be
And the mere fruit be left for you and me:
The only word could save, would ruin all!
So—the old tale! The bloom will slowly fall,
The fruit grows ripe—I, spite of will and wit,
Must bite the apple if you offer it;
160
And we shall wail, awakened, you and I,
That I to you am nothing any more
Than what some other fool has been before,
And you to me no more my sweet Dream-queen,
But what some fifty other fools have been.
I cannot save you, Eve! Your apple bite!
And—ere your teeth have met—our world grows gray.
| Leaves of life | |