Page:Prometheus Bound, and other poems.djvu/153

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, love, mere love, is beautiful indeed

And worthy of acceptation. Fire is bright,

Let temple burn, or flax! An equal light

Leaps in the flame from cedar-plank or weed.

And love is fire: and when I say at need

I love thee. . mark! . . I love thee!. . in thy sight

I stand transfigured, glorified aright,

With conscience of the new rays that proceed

Out of my face toward thine. There's nothing low

In love, when love the lowest: meanest creatures

Who love God, God accepts while loving so.

And what I feel, across the inferior features

Of what I am, doth flash itself, and show

How that great work of Love enhances Nature's.

therefore if to love can be desert,

I am not all unworthy. Cheeks as pale

As these you see, and trembling knees that fail

To bear the burden of a heavy heart,

This weary minstrel-life that once was girt

To climb Aornus, and can scarce avail

To pipe now 'gainst the woodland nightingale

A melancholy music! . . why advert

To these things? O Beloved, it is plain

I am not of thy worth nor for thy place:

And yet because I love thee, I obtain

From that same love this vindicating grace,

To live on still in love and yet in vain,. .

To bless thee yet renounce thee to thy face.