Page:The Poems and Prose remains of Arthur Hugh Clough, volume 2 (1869).djvu/47

 And the odour unto stench. Let alone and leave to bloom; Pass aside, nor make to die, —In the woodland, on the mountain, Thou art mine, and I am thine.

So I passed.—Amid the uplands, In the forests, on whose skirts Pace unstartled, feed unfearing Do the roe-deer and the red, While I hungered, while I thirsted, While the night was deepest dark, Who was I, that thou should’st meet me? Who was I, thou didst not pass? Who was I, that I should say to thee Thou art mine, and I am thine?

To the air from whence thou camest Thou returnest, thou art gone; Self-created, discreated, Re-created, ever fresh, Ever young! As a lake its mirrored mountains At a moment, unregretting, Unresisting, unreclaiming, Without preface, without question, On the silent shifting levels Lets depart, Shows, effaces and replaces! For what is, anon is not; What has been, again ’s to be; Ever new and ever young Thou art mine, and I am thine. Rh