Page:American Poetry 1922.djvu/171



"the rose, the lover's gift, is loved of love," he said it, "loved of love;" I waited, even as he spoke, to see the room filled with a light, as when in winter the embers catch in a wind when a room is dank: so it would be filled, I thought, our room with a light when he said (and he said it first) "the rose, the lover's delight, is loved of love," but the light was the same.

Then he caught, seeing the fire in my eyes, my fire, my fever, perhaps, for he leaned with the purple wine stained in his sleeve, and said this: "Did you ever think a girl's mouth caught in a kiss is a lily that laughs?"

I had not. I saw it now 157