SONG

My Fair, no beauty of thine will last
   Save in my love’s eternity. 
   Thy smiles, that light thee fitfully,
Are lost for ever—­their moment past—­
   Except the few thou givest to me.

Thy sweet words vanish day by day,
   As all breath of mortality;
   Thy laughter, done, must cease to be,
And all thy dear tones pass away,
   Except the few that sing to me.

Hide then within my heart, oh, hide
   All thou art loth should go from thee. 
   Be kinder to thyself and me. 
My cupful from this river’s tide
   Shall never reach the long sad sea.

SONNET—­IN FEBRUARY

Rich meanings of the prophet-Spring adorn,
   Unseen, this colourless sky of folded showers,
   And folded winds; no blossom in the bowers. 
A poet’s face asleep is this grey morn.

Now in the midst of the old world forlorn
   A mystic child is set in these still hours. 
   I keep this time, even before the flowers,
Sacred to all the young and the unborn;

To all the miles and miles of unsprung wheat,
   And to the Spring waiting beyond the portal,
      And to the future of my own young art,

And, among all these things, to you, my sweet,
   My friend, to your calm face and the immortal
      Child tarrying all your life-time in your heart.

SAN LORENZO GIUSTINIANI’S MOTHER

I had not seen my son’s dear face
(He chose the cloister by God’s grace)
   Since it had come to full flower-time. 
   I hardly guessed at its perfect prime,
That folded flower of his dear face.

Mine eyes were veiled by mists of tears
When on a day in many years
   One of his Order came.  I thrilled,
   Facing, I thought, that face fulfilled. 
I doubted, for my mists of tears.

His blessing be with me for ever! 
My hope and doubt were hard to sever. 
   —­That altered face, those holy weeds. 
   I filled his wallet and kissed his beads,
And lost his echoing feet for ever.

If to my son my alms were given
I know not, and I wait for Heaven. 
   He did not plead for child of mine,
   But for another Child divine,
And unto Him it was surely given.

There is One alone who cannot change;
Dreams are we, shadows, visions strange;
   And all I give is given to One. 
   I might mistake my dearest son,
But never the Son who cannot change.

SONNET—­THE LOVE OF NARCISSUS

Like him who met his own eyes in the river,
   The poet trembles at his own long gaze
   That meets him through the changing nights and days
From out great Nature; all her waters quiver
With his fair image facing him for ever;
   The music that he listens to betrays
   His own heart to his ears; by trackless ways
His wild thoughts tend to him in long endeavour.