Page:The Poems of Oscar Wilde.pdf/197



, let us walk from fire unto fire,

From passionate pain to deadlier delight,—

I am too young to live without desire,

Too young art thou to waste this summer night

Asking those idle questions which of old

Man sought of seer and oracle, and no reply was told.

For, sweet, to feel is better than to know,

And wisdom is a childless heritage,

One pulse of passion—youth's first fiery glow,—

Are worth the hoarded proverbs of the sage:

Vex not thy soul with dead philosophy,

Have we not lips to kiss with, hearts to love and eyes to see!

Dost thou not hear the murmuring nightingale,

Like water bubbling from a silver jar,

So soft she sings the envious moon is pale,

That high in heaven she is hung so far 183