An open window where the blue
Wind washed the snowy flowers with dew,
My lateness to deride,
Across my sunken pillow threw
The morning’s silver pride
When I from sullen dreams awoke
And to my doubts, before they spoke,
Unbidden thoughts replied—
“We were not idle though you slept
But, secret spiders, we have kept
The track of wasted hours:
In corners you had left unswept
The busy toil was ours
By which, before the dawn was red,
A thousand suns of silk were spread
To catch the falling showers.”
“Our webs are lit with stars of dew:
Pulleyed with pearls, each frosty clue
Its maze of glory runs,
While we, reflecting every hue,
As eager as the Sons
Of Morning to exalt their Sire,
Shoot forth our rays of liquid fire
To multiply the sun’s.”
“Before the lark had left the corn,
Your love had bathed, and to the morn
Was up to show the way:
We saw how with her blood the dawn
Had fused its silver ray
Till on your bed’s cool-quilted snows,
Flushed as the phantom of a rose,
Her lighted shadow lay.”
“Nor slow to follow in her way
See how, in lovely disarray,
New hope, with limbs aglow,
Stands at the chilly brink of day
And hesitating so,
In that clear current, half in fright
At the swift tremor of delight,
Has dipped a rosy toe.”