Ambergris

AMBERGRIS 97 Some rosebud in the garden of spices blows, Some offshoot from the Rose Of the World, the Rose of all Delight, The Rose of Dew, the Rose of Love and Night. The Rose of Silence, covering as with a vesture The solemn unity of things Beheld in the mirror of truth, The Rose indifferent to God’s gesture, The Rose on moonlight wings That flies to the House of Fire, The Rose of Honey in Youth ! Ah ! No dim mystery of desire Fathoms this gulf ! No light invades The mystical musical shades Of a faith in the future, a dream of the day When athwart the dim glades Of the forest a ray Of sunlight shall flash and the dew die away ! 15. Let there then be obscurity in this ! There is an after rapture in the kiss. The fire, flesh, perfume, music that outpaced All time, fly off ; they are subtle : there abides A secret and most maiden taste ; Salt, as of the invisible tides Of the molten sea of gold Men may at times behold In the rayless scarab of the sinking sun ; And out of that is won Hardly, with labour and pain that are as pleasure, The first flower of the garden, the stored treasure That lies at the heart’s heart of eternity. This treasure is for thee. 16. O ! but shall hope arise in happiness ? That may not be. My life is like a golden grape ; the veins Peep through the ecstasy Of the essence of ivory and silk,