Page:Poems, Alan Seeger, 1916.djvu/111

 Speak not of other worlds of happiness to be,

As though in any fond imaginary sphere

Lay more to tempt man's soul to immortality

Than ripens for his bliss abundant now and here!

Flowerlike I hope to die as flowerlike was my birth.

Rooted in Nature's just benignant law like them,

I want no better joys than those that from green Earth

My spirit's blossom drew through the sweet body's stem.

I see no dread in death, no horror to abhor.

I never thought it else than but to cease to dwell

Spectator, and resolve most naturally once more

Into the dearly loved eternal spectacle.

Unto the fields and flowers this flesh I found so fair

I yield; do you, dear friend, over your rose-crowned wine,

Murmur my name some day as though my lips were there,

And frame your mouth as though its blushing kiss were mine.

Yea, where the banquet-hall is brilliant with young men,

You whose bright youth it might have thrilled my breast to know,

Drink ... and perhaps my lips, insatiate even then

Of lips to hang upon, may find their loved ones so.

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