The key in the latch and the strong, quick tread --
But oh, the woman over the sea
Waiting at dusk for one who is dead!
Peace
Peace flows into me
As the tide to the pool by the shore;
It is mine forevermore,
It will not ebb like the sea.
I am the pool of blue
That worships the vivid sky;
My hopes were heaven-high,
They are all fulfilled in you.
I am the pool of gold
When
sunset burns and dies --
You are my deepening skies;
Give me your stars to hold.
Moods
I am the still rain falling,
Too tired for singing mirth --
Oh, be the green fields calling,
Oh, be for me the earth!
I am the brown bird pining
To leave the nest and fly --
Oh, be the fresh cloud shining,
Oh, be for me the sky!
Houses of Dreams
You took my empty dreams
And filled them every one
With
tenderness and nobleness,
April and the sun.
The old empty dreams
Where my thoughts would throng
Are far too full of happiness
To even hold a song.
Oh, the empty dreams were dim
And the empty dreams were wide,
They were sweet and
shadowy houses
Where my thoughts could hide.
But you took my dreams away
And you made them all come true --
My thoughts have no place now to play,
And nothing now to do.
Lights
When we come home at night and close the door,
Standing together in the
shadowy room,
Safe in our own love and the gentle gloom,
Glad of familiar wall and chair and floor,
Glad to leave far below the clanging city;
Looking far
downward to the glaring street
Gaudy with light, yet tired with many feet,
In both of us wells up a wordless pity;
Men have tried hard to put away the dark;
A million lighted windows brilliantly
Inlay with squares of gold the winter night,
But to us
standing here there comes the stark
Sense of the lives behind each yellow light,
And not one
whollyjoyous, proud, or free.
"I Am Not Yours"
I am not yours, not lost in you,
Not lost, although I long to be
Lost as a candle lit at noon,
Lost as a snowflake in the sea.
You love me, and I find you still
A spirit beautiful and bright,
Yet I am I, who long to be
Lost as a light is lost in light.
Oh
plunge me deep in love -- put out
My senses, leave me deaf and blind,
Swept by the
tempest of your love,
A taper in a rushing wind.
Doubt
My soul lives in my body's house,
And you have both the house and her --
But sometimes she is less your own
Than a wild, gay adventurer;
A
restless and an eager wraith,
How can I tell what she will do --
Oh, I am sure of my body's faith,
But what if my soul broke faith with you?
The Wind
A wind is blowing over my soul,
I hear it cry the whole night through --
Is there no peace for me on earth
Except with you?
Alas, the wind has made me wise,
Over my naked soul it blew, --
There is no peace for me on earth
Even with you.
Morning
I went out on an April morning
All alone, for my heart was high,
I was a child of the shining meadow,
I was a sister of the sky.
There in the windy flood of morning
Longing lifted its weight from me,
Lost as a sob in the midst of cheering,
Swept as a sea-bird out to sea.
Other Men
When I talk with other men
I always think of you --
Your words are keener than their words,
And they are gentler, too.
When I look at other men,
I wish your face were there,
With its gray eyes and dark skin
And tossed black hair.
When I think of other men,
Dreaming alone by day,
The thought of you like a strong wind
Blows the dreams away.
Embers
I said, "My youth is gone
Like a fire
beaten out by the rain,
That will never sway and sing
Or play with the wind again."
I said, "It is no great sorrow
That quenched my youth in me,
But only little sorrows
Beating ceaselessly."
I thought my youth was gone,
But you returned --
Like a flame at the call of the wind
It leaped and burned;
Threw off its ashen cloak,
And gowned anew
Gave itself like a bride
Once more to you.
Message
I heard a cry in the night,
A thousand miles it came,
Sharp as a flash of light,
My name, my name!
It was your voice I heard,
You waked and loved me so --
I send you back this word,
I know, I know!
The Lamp
If I can bear your love like a lamp before me,
When I go down the long steep Road of Darkness,
I shall not fear the
everlasting shadows,
Nor cry in terror.
If I can find out God, then I shall find Him,
If none can find Him, then I shall sleep soundly,
Knowing how well on earth your love sufficed me,
A lamp in darkness.
IV
A November Night
There! See the line of lights,
A chain of stars down either side the street --
Why can't you lift the chain and give it to me,
A
necklace for my
throat? I'd twist it round
And you could play with it. You smile at me
As though I were a little
dreamy child
Behind whose eyes the fairies live. . . . And see,
The people on the street look up at us
All
envious. We are a king and queen,
Our royal
carriage is a motor bus,
We watch our subjects with a
haughty joy. . . .
How still you are! Have you been hard at work
And are you tired to-night? It is so long
Since I have seen you -- four whole days, I think.
My heart is
crowded full of foolish thoughts
Like early flowers in an April meadow,
And I must give them to you, all of them,
Before they fade. The people I have met,
The play I saw, the
trivial, shifting things
That loom too big or
shrink too little, shadows
That hurry, gesturing along a wall,
Haunting or gay -- and yet they all grow real
And take their proper size here in my heart
When you have seen them. . . . There's the Plaza now,
A lake of light! To-night it almost seems
That all the lights are gathered in your eyes,
Drawn somehow toward you. See the open park
Lying below us with a million lamps
Scattered in wise
disorder like the stars.
We look down on them as God must look down
On constellations floating under Him
Tangled in clouds. . . . Come, then, and let us walk
Since we have reached the park. It is our garden,
All black and blossomless this winter night,
But we bring April with us, you and I;
We set the whole world on the trail of spring.
I think that every path we ever took
Has marked our footprints in
mysterious fire,
Delicate gold that only fairies see.
When they wake up at dawn in hollow tree-trunks
And come out on the
drowsy park, they look
Along the empty paths and say, "Oh, here
They went, and here, and here, and here! Come, see,
Here is their bench, take hands and let us dance
About it in a windy ring and make
A
circle round it only they can cross
When they come back again!" . . . Look at the lake --
Do you remember how we watched the swans
That night in late October while they slept?
Swans must have
stately dreams, I think. But now
The lake bears only thin reflected lights
That shake a little. How I long to take
One from the cold black water -- new-made gold
To give you in your hand! And see, and see,