style="margin-top: 4em">VESTAL FLAME

Light, light,—the last:
Till the night be done,
Keep the watch for stars and sun, and eyelids over-cast.

Once there seemed a sky,
Brooding over men.
Now no stars have come again, since their bright good-bye!

Once my dreams were wise.
Now I nothing know;
Fasting and the dark have so put out my heart's eyes.

But thy golden breath
Burns against my cheek.
I can feel and love, and seek all the rune it saith.

Do not thou be spent,
Holy thing of fire,—
Only hope of heart's desire dulled with wonderment!

While there bide these two
Hands to bar the wind;
Though such fingers chill and thinned, shed no roses through.

While this body bends
Only for thy guard;
Like a tower, to ward and worship all the light it sends.

It is not for fear
Lest there ring some cry
On the midnight, 'Rise and come. Lo, the Bridegroom near!'

It is not for pride,
To be shining fair
In a wedding-garment there, lighting home the Bride.

It is not to win
Love, for hoarded toil,
From those poor, with their spent oil, weeping, 'Light us in!'—

No; but in despite
Of all vigils set,
Do I bind me to thee yet,—strangest thing of Light!

Only, all, for thee
Whatsoe'er thou art,
Smiling through the blinded heart, things it cannot see.

Very Soul's Desire,
Take my life; and live
By the rapture thine doth give, ecstasy of fire!

Hold thy golden breath!
For I feel,—not hear—
Spent with joy and fear to lose thee, all the song it saith.

Light, light, my own:
Do not thou disown
Thy poor keeper-of-the-light, for Light's sake alone.

The dark had left no speech save hand-in-hand
Between us two the while, with others near.
Mine questioned thine with 'Why should I be here?'
'Yet bide thou here,' said thine, 'and understand.'

And mine was mute; but strove not then to go;
And hid itself, and murmured, 'Do not hear
The listening in my heart!' Said thine, 'My Dear,
I will not hear it, ever. But I know.'

Said mine to thine: 'Let be. Now will I go!—
For you are saying,—you who do not speak,
This hand-in-hand is one day cheek-to-cheek!'
And said thy hand around me, 'Even so.'

Then mine to thine.—'Yea, I have been alone;
—Yet happy.—This is strange. This is not I!
You hold me, but you can not tell me why.'
And said thy hand to mine again, 'My Own.'

THE PROPHET

All day long he kept the sheep:—
  Far and early, from the crowd,
On the hills from steep to steep,
  Where the silence cried aloud;
  And the shadow of the cloud
Wrapt him in a noonday sleep.

Where he dipped the water's cool,
  Filling boyish hands from thence,
Something breathed across the pool
  Stir of sweet enlightenments;
  And he drank, with thirsty sense,
Till his heart was brimmed and full.

Still, the hovering Voice unshed,
  And the Vision unbeheld,
And the mute sky overhead,
  And his longing, still withheld!
  —Even when the two tears welled,
Salt, upon that lonely bread.

Vaguely blessèd in the leaves,
  Dim-companioned in the sun,
Eager mornings, wistful eves,
  Very hunger drew him on;
  And To-morrow ever shone
With the glow the sunset weaves.

Even so, to that young heart,
  Words and hands, and Men were dear;
And the stir of lane and mart
  After daylong vigil here.
  Sunset called, and he drew near,
Still to find his path apart.

When the Bell, with gentle tongue,
  Called the herd-bells home again,
Through the purple shades he swung,
  Down the mountain, through the glen;
  Towards the sound of fellow-men,—
Even from the light that clung.

Dimly too, as cloud on cloud,
  Came that silent flock of his:
Thronging whiteness, in a crowd,
  After homing twos and threes;
  With the thronging memories
Of all white things dreamed and vowed.

Through the fragrances, alone,
  By the sudden-silent brook,
From the open world unknown,
  To the close of speech and book;
  There to find the foreign look
In the faces of his own.

Sharing was beyond his skill;
  Shyly yet, he made essay:
Sought to dip, and share, and fill
  Heart's-desire, from day to day.
  But their eyes, some foreign way,
Looked at him; and he was still.

Last, he reached his arms to sleep,
  Where the Vision waited, dim,
Still beyond some deep-on-deep.
  And the darkness folded him,
  Eager heart and weary limb.—
All day long, he kept the sheep.

THE LONG LANE

All through the summer night, down the long lane in flower,
      The moon-white lane,
All through the summer night,—dim as a shower,
      Glimmer and fade the Twain:
Over the cricket hosts, throbbing the hour by hour,
      Young voices bloom and wane.

Down the long lane they go, and past one window, pale
      With visions silver-blurred;
Stirring the heart that waits,—the eyes that fail
      After a spring deferred.
Query, and hush, and Ah!—dim through a moon-lit veil,
      The same one word.

Down the long lane, entwined with all the fragrance there;
      The lane in flower somehow
With youth, and plighted hands, and star-strewn air,
      And muted 'Thee' and 'Thou':—
All the wild bloom and reach of dreams that never were,
      —Never to be, now.

So, in the throbbing dark, where ebbs the old refrain,
      A starved heart hears.
And silver-bright, and silver-blurred again
      With moonlight and with tears.
All the long night they go, down the long summer lane,
      The long, long years.

Ah but, Belovèd, men may do
All things to music;—march, and die;
And wear the longest vigil through,
      … And say good-by.
All things to music!—Ah, but where
Peace never falls upon the air;—
These city-ways of dark and din
Where greed has shut and barred them in!
And thundering, swart against the sky,
That whirlwind,—never to go by—
  Of tracks and wheels, that overhead
Beat back the senses with their roar
And menace of undying war,—
  War—war—for daily bread!

All things to silence! Ah, but where
Men dwell not, but must make a lair;—
And Sorrow may not sit alone,
Nor Love hear music of its own;
And Thought that strives to breast that sea
Must struggle even for memory.
Day-long, night-long,—besieging din
To thrust all pain the deeper in!—
And drown the flutter of