Collected Works (Vol. II)

<°TIS PITY——” 7 IN A LESBIAN MEADOW. I. UNDER the summer leaves In the half-light Love his old story weaves Far out of sight. Here we are lone, at last. Heaven is overcast Yet with no night. Ere her immortal wings Gather the thread of things Into her might, Up will the moon arise Through the black-azure skies : Birds shall sing litanies Still of delight. II. Let my lips wander where Tender moss grows, Where through their dusky air Beams a red rose. Where the bee honey sips Let my desirous lips, Kissing, unclose Delicate lips and chaste, Sweetness divine to taste While the sun glows ; There in the dusk to dwell By the sweet water-well In the wood’s deepest dell Where—my love knows. III. Skies are grown redder far; Tempest draws nigher ; Dark lowers a single star ; Mars, like the fire ! Fiercer our lips engage ; Limbs, eyes, ears, gather rage; Sharp grows desire. Hear thy short bitter cries? Pity thine agonies? Loose, though love tire? Nay, neither hear nor spare ; Frenzy shall mock at prayer ; Torture’s red torch shall flare Till thou expire. IV. Stars stud a cloudless sky ; Moon silvers blue ; Breeze is content to die; Lightly falls dew. Calm after strain and stress Now to our weariness Brings love anew. Peace brings her balm to us, Lying as amorous Still, and as true, Linked by new mystery, Lovers confessed. A sigh Sobs to the happy sky, ‘* Sorrow, go to!” <oTTS PITY——” —Forp,! BLow on the flame ! The charcoal’s vaporous fume Shall hide our shame ! Come, love, within the gloom ! For one last night, sweet sister, be the same ; Come, nestle with me in sweet Death’s hot womb! Two sunny eyes! And this is all my ruin! Two gleaming thighs ! And all to my undoing! Far-swelling curves in ivory rapture rise Warm and too white—bethink you of the wooing ! 1 John Ford, author of ‘'’Tis Pity she’s a Whore,” a drama of fraternal incest, and other well-known plays. »