I. Excuses
Ah would you turn me back now from the flowers,
You who are different as the air from sea is,
Ah for the pollen from our wreath of hours,
You who are magical, not mine as she is,
Say will you call us from our time of flowers?
You whom I loved and love, not understanding,
Yea we were ever torn with constant striving,
Seeing our gods are different, and commanding
One good from them, and in my heart reviving
Old discords and bent thought, not understanding.
We who have wept, we who have lain together
Upon the green and sere and white of every season,
We who have loved the sun but for the weather
Of our own hearts have found no constant reason,
What is your part, now we have come together?
What is your pain, Dear, what is your heart now
A little sad, a little … Nay, I know not
Seeing I never had and have no part now
In your own secret councils wherein blow not
My roses. My vineyard being another heart now?
You who were ever dear and dearer being strange,
How shall I “go” who never came anear you?
How could I stay, who never came in range
Of anything that halved; could never hear you
Rightly in your silence; nay, your very speech was strange.
You, who have loved not what I was or will be,
You who but loved me for a thing I could be,
You who love not a song whate’er its skill be
But only love the cause or what cause should be,
How could I give you what I am or will be?
Nay, though your eyes are sad, you will not hinder,
You, who would have had me only near not nearer,
Nay though my heart had burned to a bright cinder
Love would have said to me: “Still fear her,
Pain is thy lot and naught she hath can hinder,”
So I, for this sad gladness that is mine now,
Who never spoke aright in speaking to you,
Uncomprehending anything that’s thine now,
E’en in my spoken words more wrong may do you
In looking back from this new grace that’s mine now.
Sic semper finis deest.
II. Satiemus
What if I know thy speeches word by word?
And if thou knew’st I knew them wouldst thou speak?
What if I know thy speeches word by word,
And all the time thou sayest them o’er I said,
“Lo, one there was who bent her fair bright head,
Sighing as thou dost through the golden speech.”
Or, as our laughters mingle each with each,
As crushed lips take their respite fitfully,
What if my thoughts were turned in their mid reach
Whispering among them, “The fair dead
Must know such moments, thinking on the grass;
On how white dogwoods murmured overhead
In the bright glad days!”
How if the low dear sound within thy throat
Hath as faint lute-strings in its dim accord
Dim tales that blind me, running one by one
With times told over as we tell by rote;
What if I know thy laughter word by word
Nor find aught novel in thy merriment?
III. Abelard
“Pere Esbaillart a Sanct Denis.”
—Villon
“Because my soul cried out, and only the long ways
Grown weary, gave me answer and
Because she answered when the very ways were dumb
With all their hoarse, dry speech grown faint and chill.
Because her answer was a call to me,
Though I have sinned, my God, and though thy angels
Bear no more now my thought to whom I love;
Now though I crouch afraid in all thy dark
Will I once cry to thee:
Once more! Once more my strength!
Yea though I sin to call him forth once more,
Thy messengers for mine, Their wings my power!
And let once more my wings fold down above her,
Let their cool length be spread
Over her feet and head
And let thy calm come down
To dwell within her, and thy gown of peace
Clothe all her body in its samite.
O Father of all the blind and all the strong,
Though I have left thy courts, though all the throng
Of thy gold-shimmering choir know me not,
Though I have dared the body and have donned
Its frail strong-seeming, and although
Its lightening joy is made my swifter song,
Though I have known thy stars, yea all, and chosen one.
Yea though I make no barter, and repent no jot,
Yet for the sunlight of that former time
Grant me the boon, O God,
Once more, once more, or I or some white thought
Shall rise beside her and, enveloping
All her strange glory in its wings of light,
Bring down thy peace upon her way-worn soul.
Oh sheathe that sword of her in some strong case,
The doe-skin scabbard of thy clear Rafael!
Yea let thy angels walk, as I have seen
Them passing, or have seen their wings
Spread their pavilions o’er our twin delight.
Yea I have seen them when the purple light
Hid all her garden from my drowsy eyes.