Page:Dreams and Images.djvu/292

 So let it be, O music, music, though you wake in me No joy, no joy at all; Although you only wake Uttermost sadness, measure of delight, Which else I could not credit to the height, Did I not know, Did I not know, That ill is statured to its opposite; And even of sadness so, Of utter sadnes, make Of extreme sad a rod to mete The incredible excess of unsensed sweet, And mystic wall of strange felicity. So let it be, Though sweet be great, and though my heart be small, And bitter meat The food of Gods for men to eat; Yea, John ate daintier, and did tread Less ways of heat, Than whom to their wind-carpeted High banquet hall, And golden love-feasts, the fair stars entreat.

But ah! withal, Some hold, some stay, O difficult joy, I pray, Some arms of thine, Not only, only arms of mine! Lest like a weary girl I fall From clasping love so high, And lacking thus thine arms, then may Most hapless I