The Garden of Dreams Part 8

To say to hope,--Take all from me, And grant me naught: The rose, the song, the melody, The word, the thought: Then all my life bid me be slave,-- Is all I crave.

To say to time,--Be true to me, Nor grant me less The dream, the sigh, the memory, The heart's distress; Then unto death set me a task, Is all I ask.

III.

I came to you when eve was young.

And, where the park went downward to The river, and, among the dew, One vesper moment lit and sung A bird, your eyes said something dear.

How sweet it was to walk with you!

How, with our souls, we seemed to hear The darkness coming with its stars!

How calm the moon sloped up her sphere Of fire-filled pearl through pa.s.sive bars Of clouds that berged the tender east!

While all the dark inanimate Of nature woke; initiate With th' moon's arrival, something ceased In nature's soul; she stood again Another self, that seemed t' have been Dormant, suppressed and so unseen All day; a life, unknown and strange And dream-suggestive, that had lain,-- Masked on with light,--within the range Of thought, but unrevealed till now.

It was the hour of love. And you, With downward eyes and pensive brow, Among the moonlight and the dew,-- Although no word of love was spoken,-- Heard the sweet night's confession broken Of something here that spoke in me; A love, depth made inaudible, Save to your soul, that answered well, With eyes replying silently.

IV.

Fair you are as a rose is fair, There where the shadows dew it; And the deeps of your brown, brown hair, Sweet as the cloud that lingers there With the sunset's auburn through it.

Eyes of azure and throat of snow, Tell me what my heart would know!

Every dream I dream of you Has a love-thought in it, And a hope, a kiss or two, Something dear and something true, Telling me each minute, With three words it whispers clear, What my heart from you would hear.

V.

Summer came; the days grew kind With increasing favors; deep Were the nights with rest and sleep: Fair, with poppies intertwined On their blonde locks, dreamy hours, Sunny-hearted as the rose, Went among the banded flowers, Teaching them, how no one knows, Fresher color and perfume.-- In the window of your room Bloomed a rich azalea. Pink, As an egret's rosy plumes, Shone its tender-tufted blooms.

From your care and love, I think, Love's rose-color it did drink, Growing rosier day by day Of your 'tending hand's caress; And your own dear naturalness Had imbued it in some way.

Once you gave a blossom of it, Smiling, to me when I left: Need I tell you how I love it Faded though it is now!--Reft Of its fragrance and its color, Yet 'tis dearer now than then, As past happiness is when We regret. And dimmer, duller Though its beauty be, when I Look upon it, I recall Every part of that old wall; And the dingy window high, Where you sat and read; and all The fond love that made your face A soft sunbeam in that place: And the plant, that grew this bloom Withered here, itself long dead, Makes a halo overhead There again--and through my room, Like faint whispers of perfume, Steal the words of love then said.

VI.

All of my love I send to you, I send to you, On thoughts, like paths, that wend to you, Here in my heart's glad garden, Wherein, its lovely warden, Your face, a lily seeming, Is dreaming.

All of my life I bring to you, I bring to you, In deeds, like birds, that sing to you, Here, in my soul's sweet valley, Wherethrough, most musically, Your love, a fountain, glistens, And listens.

My love, my life, how blessed in you!

How blessed in you!

Whose thoughts, whose deeds find rest in you, Here, on my self's dark ocean, Whereo'er, in heavenly motion, Your soul, a star, abideth, And guideth.

VII.

Where the old Kentucky wound Through the land,--its stream between Hills of primitive forest green,-- Like a goodly belt around Giant b.r.e.a.s.t.s of grandeur; with Many an unknown Indian myth, On the boat we steamed. The land Like an hospitable hand Welcomed us. Alone we sat On the under-deck, and saw Farm-house and plantation draw Near and vanish. 'Neath your hat, Your young eyes laughed; and your hair, Blown about them by the air Of our pa.s.sage, clung and curled.

Music, and the summer moon; And the hills' great shadows hewn Out of silence; and the tune Of the whistle, when we whirled Round a moonlit bend in sight of Some lone landing heaped with hay Or tobacco; where the light of One dim solitary lamp Signaled through the evening's damp: Then a bell; and, dusky gray, Shuffling figures on the sh.o.r.e With the cable; rugged forms On the gang-plank; backs and arms With their cargo bending o'er; And the burly mate before.

Then an iron bell, and puff Of escaping steam; and out Where the stream is wheel-whipped rough; Music, and a parting shout From the sh.o.r.e; the pilot's bell Beating on the deck below; Then the steady, quivering, slow Smooth advance again. Until Twinkling lights beyond us tell There's a lock or little town, Clasped between a hill and hill, Where the blue-gra.s.s fields slope down.-- So we went. That summer-time Lingers with me like a rhyme Learned for dreamy beauty of Its old-fashioned faith and love, In some musing moment; sith Heart-a.s.sociated with Joy that moment's quiet bore, Thought repeated evermore.

VIII.

Three sweet things love lives upon: Music, at whose fountain's brink Still he stoops his face to drink; Seeing, as the wave is drawn, His own image rise and sink.

Three sweet things love lives upon.

Three sweet things love lives upon: Odor, whose red roses wreathe His bright brow that shines beneath; Hearing, as each bud is blown, His own spirit breathe and breathe.

Three sweet things love lives upon.

Three sweet things love lives upon: Color, to whose rainbow he Lifts his dark eyes burningly; Feeling, as the wild hues dawn, His own immortality.

Three sweet things love lives upon.

IX.

Memories of other days, With the whilom happiness, Rise before my musing gaze In the twilight ... And your dress Seems beside me, like a haze Shimmering white; as when we went 'Neath the star-strewn firmament, Love-led, with impatient feet Down the night that, summer-sweet, Sparkled o'er the lamp-lit street.

Every look love gave us then Comes before my eyes again, Making music for my heart On that path, that grew for us Roses, red and amorous, On that path, from which oft start, Out of recollected places, With remembered forms and faces, Dreams, love's ardent hands have woven In my life's dark tapestry, Beckoning, soft and shadowy, To the soul. And o'er the cloven Gulf of time, I seem to hear Words, once whispered in the ear, Calling--as might friends long dead, With familiar voices, deep, Speak to those who lie asleep, Comforting--So I was led Backward to forgotten things, Contiguities that spread Sudden unremembered wings; And across my mind's still blue From the nest they fledged in, flew Dazzling shapes affection knew.

X.

Ah! over full my heart is Of sadness and of pain; As a rose-flower in the garden The dull dusk fills with rain; As a blown red rose that shivers And bends to the wind and rain.

So give me thy hands and speak me As once in the days of yore, When love spoke sweetly to us, The love that speaks no more; The sound of thy voice may help him To speak in our hearts once more.

Ah! over grieved my soul is, And tired and sick for sleep, As a poppy-bloom that withers, Forgotten, where reapers reap; As a harvested poppy-flower That dies where reapers reap.

So bend to my face and kiss me As once in the days of yore, When the touch of thy lips was magic That restored to life once more; The thought of thy kiss, which awakens To life that love once more.

XI.

Sitting often I have, oh!

Often have desired you so-- Yearned to kiss you as I did When your love to me you gave, In the moonlight, by the wave, And a long impetuous kiss Pressed upon your mouth that chid, And upon each dewy lid-- That, all pa.s.sion-shaken, I With love language will address Each dear thing I know you by, Picture, needle-work or frame: Each suggestive in the same Perfume of past happiness: Till, meseems, the ways we knew Now again I tread with you From the oldtime tryst: and there Feel the pressure of your hair Cool and easy on my cheek, And your breath's aroma: bare Hand upon my arm, as weak As a lily on a stream: And your eyes, that gaze at me With the sometime witchery, To my inmost spirit speak.

And remembered ecstacy Sweeps my soul again ... I seem Dreaming, yet I do not dream.

XII.

When day dies, lone, forsaken, And joy is kissed asleep; When doubt's gray eyes awaken, And love, with music taken From hearts with sighings shaken, Sits in the dusk to weep:

With ghostly lifted finger What memory then shall rise?-- Of dark regret the bringer-- To tell the sorrowing singer Of days whose echoes linger, Till dawn unstars the skies.

When night is gone and, beaming, Faith journeys forth to toil; When hope's blue eyes wake gleaming, And life is done with dreaming The dreams that seem but seeming, Within the world's turmoil:

Can we forget the presence Of death who walks unseen?

Whose scythe casts shadowy crescents Around life's glittering essence, As lessens, slowly lessens, The s.p.a.ce that lies between.

XIII.