Desire their revel-raiment be their shroud.
Yet, fierce insurgent, cease vain wars to wage!
Art thou so pure as to decline, forsooth,
These penitential usages of age
That expiate proud cruelties of youth,
And bring thee to the last and perfect art,
To love the lovely with a selfless heart?

LIV

AFTER MANY YEARS

By mute communions and by salt sad kisses,
By Pity's webs that still with fiery strands
Wove us together, by the unplumbed abysses
Where we have gazed and never loosened hands,
By holy water we have given each other
At Beauty's blessed doors, and by the hearts
Of sweet Delight and Agony her brother,
By bright new marriages in all great arts,
By the rare wisdom like miraculous amber
Won by the desolate grey sound of tears,
By wedding-music of the flute and tambour
Prevailing o'er Time's cruel plot of years,
By all the proud prayers granted and denied us,
Fate has no sword at all that can divide us.

LV

TREASURE

Not mine the silver ride of the redeemer,
Not mine the secret vision of the saint,
Not mine the martyrdoms of Truth's dark dreamer
Nor bitter beatitudes of Art. O quaint
Undoing of youth's horoscope! No splendours
Nor laurels, nor wisdom in a myrrhine bowl!
Here is the treasure that the past surrenders,
A spoil of roses coffered in the soul,--
Much like another woman's! Rare perfumes
And cleaving thorns, faded pathetic store
Of kisses and sighs, would those heroic dooms
I craved of old have yet enriched me more?
I have not dwelt in Galilee nor Tyre
Nor Athens. But I have my heart's desire.

LVI

THE SOUL TO THE BODY

I know thou hast a secret of thine own
Which I desire. But once I broke with thee
And walked among the asphodel alone:
Therefore thou wilt reserve this reverie,
Like sumptuous flame closed up in alabaster.
They half betray, these curious magian hands:
Faint music of thy breast has throbbed the faster,
If I have touched it with my charming-wands.
And yet,--the wonder any woman knows
Thou dost deny the proud Soul that has fed
Among the lilies of the White Eros.--
Ere I go down among the witless Dead
Give, give the secret, for my bliss or rue,
Lest lack of that should craze my wisdom through.

LVII

THE IRONIST

Among high gods the absolute ironist
Is Love. Therefore, when some cleft lightning mocks
Thine arrogant rapture,