All perfect things are saddening in effect. 
       The autumn wood robed in its scarlet clothes,
       The matchless tinting on the royal rose
     Whose velvet leaf by no least flaw is flecked,
     Love’s supreme moment, when the soul unchecked
       Soars high as heaven, and its best rapture knows—­
       These hold a deeper pathos than our woes,
     Since they leave nothing better to expect.

     Resistless change, when powerless to improve,
       Can only mar.  The gold will pale to gray;
       Nothing remains tomorrow as to-day;
     The lose will not seem quite so fait, and love
       Must find its measures of delight made less. 
       Ah, how imperfect is all Perfectness!

     [Illustration:  LOVE AND LIFE]

     ATTRACTION.

     The meadow and the mountain with desire
       Gazed on each other, till a fierce unrest
       Surged ’neath the meadow’s seemingly calm breast,
     And all the mountain’s fissures ran with fire.

     A mighty river rolled between them there. 
       What could the mountain do but gaze and burn? 
       What could the meadow do but look and yearn,
     And gem its bosom to conceal despair?

     Their seething passion agitated space,
       Till, lo! the lands a sudden earthquake shook,
       The river fled, the meadow leaped and took
     The leaning mountain in a close embrace.

     GRACIA.

     Nay, nay, Antonio! nay, thou shalt not blame her,
       My Gracia, who hath so deserted me. 
     Thou art my friend, but if thou dost defame her
       I shall not hesitate to challenge thee.

     “Curse and forget her?” So I might another,
       One not so bounteous-natured or so fair;
     But she, Antonio, she was like no other—­
       I curse her not, because she was so rare.

     She was made out of laughter and sweet kisses;
       Not blood, but sunshine, through her blue veins ran
     Her soul spilled over with its wealth of blisses;
       She was too great for loving but a man.

     None but a god could keep so rare a creature: 
       I blame her not for her inconstancy;
     When I recall each radiant smile and feature,
       I wonder she so long was true to me.

     Call her not false or fickle.  I, who love her,
       Do hold her not unlike the royal sun,
     That, all unmated, roams the wide world over
       And lights all worlds, but lingers not with one.

     If she were less a goddess, more a woman,
       And so had dallied for a time with me,
     And then had left me, I, who am but human,
       Would slay her and her newer love, maybe.

     But since she seeks Apollo, or another
       Of those lost gods (and seeks him all in vain)
     And has loved me as well as any other
       Of her men loves, why, I do not complain.