Page:Eight Harvard Poets.djvu/123

 THE NEW PLATONIST

Circa 1640

UR loves as flowers fall to dust; The noblest singing hath an end; No man to his own soul may trust, Nor to the kind arms of his friend; Yet have I glimpsed by lonely tree, Bright baths of immortality.

My faultless teachers bid me fare The cypress path of blood and tears, Treading the thorny wold to where The painful Cross of Christ appears; 'Twas on another, sunnier hill I met you first, my miracle.

The painted windows burn and flame Up through the music-haunted air; These were my gods — and then you came With flowers crowned and sun-kissed hair, Making this northern river seem Some laughter-girdled Grecian stream.

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