Collected Works (Vol. I)

THE FIVE KISSES 95 Struck from a diamond; listen, wife, and know How perfectly I love to watch you so. Wake, lover, wake, but stir not yet the child : Wake, and thy brow serene and low and mild Shall take my kisses, and my lips shall seek The pallid roses on thy perfect cheek, And kiss them into poppies, and thy mouth Shall lastly close to mine, as in the south We see the sun close fast upon the sea ; So, my own heart, thy mouth must close on me. Art thou awake? Those eyes of wondering love, Sweet as the dawn and softer than the dove, Seek no quick vision—yet they move to me And, slowly, to the child. How still are we! Yes, and a smile betokens that they wake Or dream a waking dream for kisses’ sake ; Yes, I will touch thee, O my low sweet brow ! My wife, thy lips to mine—yes, kiss me now ! IV. THE VOYAGE SOUTHWARD. Hoty as heaven, the home Of winds, the land of foam, The palace of the waves, the house of rain, Deeper than ocean, dark As dawn before the lark Flings his sharp song to skyward, and is fain To light his lampless eyes At the flower-folded skies Where stars are hidden in the blue, to fill llis beak with star-dropt dew, Llis little heart anew With love and song to swell it to his will ; Holy as heaven, the place Before the golden face Of God is very silent at the dawn. The even keel is keen To flash the waves between, But no soft moving current is withdrawn : We float upon the blue Like sunlight specks in dew, And like the moonlight on the lake we lie: The northern gates are past, And, following fair and fast, The north wind drove us under such a sky, Faint with the sun’s desire, And clad in fair attire Of many driving cloudlets; and we flew Like swallows to the South. The ocean’s curving mouth Smiled day by day and nights of starry blue ; Nights when the sea would shake Like sunlight where the wake Was wonderful with flakes of living things That leapt for joy to feel The cold exultant keel Flash, and the white ship dip her woven wings ; Nights when the moon would hold Eler lamp of whitest gold To see us on the poop together set With one desire, to be Alone upon the sea And touch soft hands, and hold white bosoms yet, And see in silent eyes Mote stars than all the skies Together hold within their limits gray, To watch the red lips move For slow delight of love Till the moon sigh and sink, and yield her sway Unto the eastern lord That draws a sanguine sword And starts up eager in the dawn, to see Bright eyes grow dim for sleep, And lazy bosoms keep Their slumber perfect and their sorcery, While dawny winds arise, And fast the white ship flies