The Winged Beetle

10 ROSA COELI But when I came between the hills, behold The moon’s silver and gold Stood in the zenith, that I lost my guide. There stood I passion-pale Like a lost lamb that seeks the starry fold Within that warm and scented vale Clothed with narcissus, hyacinth, tuberose, Snowdrop and lily, all white, all cream, all gold, With never a blush like dawn’s to flush or fail Upon their garden-close. O wide is the world, wide, wide ! Be sure that I was lost, Lost, lost for ever ; are there palimpsests Wherein a man might study at great cost His journey thence ? O Rose of gramarye, My riddle you shall ree. My head was happy, laid betwixt your breasts. XI Another time I passed the holy well And plunged (as Phoebus in the western ocean) Into a forest of fine flame that crowned The holy hill ; all was enchanted ground, The flames like scented tendrils of a vine Or sensitive rays that spell Strange curves to match their master-god’s emotion, And ever nearer to the scarlet slash I clomb, where the strange perfumes struck me like a lash And the dread fires scorched up my life. There, O insufferable delight