University of Virginia Library


225

SONNET XIII
“LOVE ALONE”

Through life on weary life I seem to have passed,
Seeking for thee.—Now weariness supreme
Holds me. My lives' long battles like a dream
Melt from me, ghostlike to the very last.
My sword, all notched and blunted, lo! I cast
Into the eddies of death's silent stream,
Whereover floats full many a wan moonbeam:
I meet the stream's pale outlook, weird and vast.
Then lo! thy face burns on me, and thy heart
Turns meward. First for joy's own sake I weep;
And then a pang strikes through me wild and deep,—
A deathly wintry pallid icy dart:
For I can give thee nought but love, my own;
Love, love,—and love again,—and love alone.