University of Virginia Library

VII

MAN AND CRAFTSMAN

Trust not my words, for I can sing as sweet
To any woman as I sing to you.
Oh, pick me out a trull, a fright, a shrew,
That I may praise her as an artist's feat
And show how much my mastery is complete
By making the impossible ring true!
Yet I will not do this, which I might do,
Nor lay no lying song at alien feet.
—But you, if you would know me true indeed,
Trust not my songs, albeit they do not lie;
Try me by nothing but my naked soul,
Try me by nothing but that deathless deed—
For if I stood by you in act to die,
I could not speak myself more clean and whole.

MODELS

So memory and imagination bring
Their beauty to my dreams—for some I knew,
And some I guessed at, looking at the blue
Of the elusive sea and wondering.
Dear women with vain beauty vanishing,
I hold them for a moment in my view
And try if I may catch some little clew
To understand their mystery as I sing.
Dear women loved in fancy or indeed,
Dear loves and loves of dreams, I set them there
To find one note of all they echo of;—
But of such easel hours take thou no heed,
No, though I stripped their flushing spirits bare.
My models they, but only thou my love.

THE LAST LOVE OF GAWAINE

You will betray me—oh, deny it not!
What right have I, alas, to say you nay?
I, traitor of ten loves, what shall I say
To plead with you that I be not forgot?
My love has not been squandered jot by jot
In little loves that perish with the day.
My treason has been ever to the sway
Of queens; my faith has known no petty blot.
You will betray me, as I have betrayed,
And I shall kiss the hand that does me wrong.
And oh, not pardon—I need pardon more—
But in proud torment, grim and unafraid,
Burn in my hell nor cease the bitter song
Your beauty triumphs in forevermore.

WHAT THOUGH YOU LOVE ME

What though you love me? Have you no caprice
Would kill my heart if I but knew of it?
What kisses did you leave me to commit?
Through the long nights and days I have no peace
To think your hand may lie without release
One little moment, somewhere, where you sit—
You two—you and the other—fingers knit
Together while all words an instant cease!
Who he may be I know not—and I know
You love me, yes, you love me; but my mind
Is a dark wood where nightsome shadows start.
My hand is nervous as with daggers—Oh!
The jealousy that chokes and makes me blind!
The brooding menace of my bitter heart!

HURT ME

Hurt me! For your dear sake I could be driven
With whips of scorpions, and smile at Fate.
Hurt me! It greatens me—it greatens even
The love I have that is already great.
If you were always dear and sweet and true,
And came to me with kisses and delight,
How could I show the love I have for you,
How could that love attain its highest height?
Hurt me, and spare not! I am yours for joy,
And yours a hundred fold, then, for despair.
I would not change my rack for any toy
That sleek Antinous tosses in the air.
Ay, hurt me! For your sake I will endure
To make my pain the page to your amour.

FALSE TRUTH

Oh! stab me with denial of your love,
But do not torture me in this slow hell
Of thoughts I dare not tell the stars above,
Of fears I dare not hear the night winds tell!
If this be truth, oh! tell me any lie,
And I will wear my heart upon my sleeve,
Build me an altar where the words may lie
And make it my religion to believe!
But let it not be truth that you should give
Accustomed kisses lest a robber lack,
Not filch from Love his high prerogative
That Mercy wear false ermine on her back!
Let him be starved—and starve me if you will—
But not for less than love smite love and kill!

LOVE AND PITY

Are you too tender-hearted to be true?
True to your love, to me and your own soul?
Will you for pity give what is love's due
And leave love lorn and begging for a dole?
Then pity is a thief, that steals love's purse
To squander in dishonest charity;
Then love is outcast, with the exile's curse
Who sees his varlets loot his seigneury.
Is love so hard it recks not where I lie,
While pity melts at aught that he endures?
I deserve nothing, save that you ensky
No other with those vesper lips of yours—
I deserve nothing; but your love of me
Deserves of you the courage to be free.

LOVE'S SILENCE.

I do not ask your love as having rights
Because of all there is between us two.
Love has no rights, Love has but his delights,
Which but delight because they are not due.
The highest merit any man can prove
Is not enough to merit what Love gives,
And Love would lose its quality of love,
Lived it for any cause but that it lives.
Therefore I do not plead my gentle thought,
My foolish wisdom that would make you free.
My sacrifice, my broken heart be nought,
Even my great love itself, the best of me!
Martyr of Love, I see no other way
But to keep silence in your sight, and pray.