Alienage

Dear one, what do we here? Petal by petal falls the alien spring In gardens where we pass ungarlanded, And seek once more the doves and myrtles dead In some retrieveless year; And claim no leaf or blossom for our own…. O Paphos, and the moons of Paphos flown! My golden dove, canst thou recall Nights when delight was all, And high desire could still outlive the dawn? Hast thou forgot, Here, in the grey, sad world that knows us not, The years when we were nymph and centaur, drawn To elder forests deep That spring had turned to chrysolite and gold? Hast thou forgot the tale of kisses told By summer waters calm as sleep, When Hesperèan sunsets touched thy hair From islands lost and fair?

Dear one, what do we here? Beyond the window-pane The shifting veils of rain Bedim the bitter world that is not ours; And on dishevelled flowers There falls a hueless twilight, brief and drear…. Give me thy lips again– Let us forget the weariness and pain, And the supreme disaster of our birth, While in thy flesh my lingering Slow kisses move and cling And love alone hath verity or worth. Ah, let me find, about thy bosom’s fruit, The fragile, vague perfume Of unseen lilies crushed within the gloom Of forests lone and old; Ah, let me seek in leisured long pursuit Amid thy harvest-colored hair, For suns and summers of remembered gold; And seal my lips on throat and bosom fair, Till where my kisses fell, the phantom rose Of Paphos blows.