, when powerless to improve,
Can only mar. The gold will pale to gray;
Nothing remains tomorrow as to-day;
The lose will not seem quite so fait, and love
Must find its measures of delight made less.
Ah, how imperfect is all Perfectness!

[Illustration: LOVE AND LIFE]

ATTRACTION.

The meadow and the mountain with desire
Gazed on each other, till a fierce unrest
Surged 'neath the meadow's seemingly calm breast,
And all the mountain's fissures ran with fire.

A mighty river rolled between them there.
What could the mountain do but gaze and burn?
What could the meadow do but look and yearn,
And gem its bosom to conceal despair?

Their seething passion agitated space,
Till, lo! the lands a sudden earthquake shook,
The river fled, the meadow leaped and took
The leaning mountain in a close embrace.

GRACIA.

Nay, nay, Antonio! nay, thou shalt not blame her,
My Gracia, who hath so deserted me.
Thou art my friend, but if thou dost defame her
I shall not hesitate to challenge thee.

"Curse and forget her?" So I might another,
One not so bounteous-natured or so fair;
But she, Antonio, she was like no other--
I curse her not, because she was so rare.

She was made out of laughter and sweet kisses;
Not blood, but sunshine, through her blue veins ran
Her soul spilled over with its wealth of blisses;
She was too great for loving but a man.

None but a god could keep so rare a creature:
I blame her not for her inconstancy;
When I recall each radiant smile and feature,
I wonder she so long was true to me.

Call her not false or fickle. I, who love her,
Do hold her not unlike the royal sun,
That, all unmated, roams the wide world over
And lights all worlds, but lingers not with one.

If she were less a goddess, more a woman,
And so had dallied for a time with me,
And then had left me, I, who am but human,
Would slay her and her newer love, maybe.

But since she seeks Apollo, or another
Of those lost gods (and seeks him all in vain)
And has loved me as well as any other
Of her men loves, why, I do not complain.

AD FINEM.

On the white throat of the' useless passion
That scorched my soul with