Page:The poems of Edmund Clarence Stedman, 1908.djvu/386

THE CARIB SEA The sighs we mingle, the words we utter,—

Here, oh here, let us make our bower!

Love is not perfect, sweet, that like a dream

Flows on without a forecast or a pain;

Some burden must betide to make it strong,

Some toil, to make its briefest bliss seem long,—

Ay, longer than the crossing of a stream

Mist-haunted, lit by moons that surely wane.

Here, for a round of moons unbroken,

A spell that holds shall your loss requite;

The fleet, sweet moments shall pass unreckoned

And all to our constant love be second,

And the fragrant lily shall be our token,

That folds itself on the waves at night.

Yonder, or here, and whether summer's star

Burn overhead, or rains of autumn fall!

Or snows of winter in the frozen North?

Love, never doubt it!

Take me with you forth!

And oh, forget not in that land afar,

I am your summer,—you, my life, my all!

ASTRA CAELI

the Carib Sea to-night

The stars hang low and near

From the inexplicable dome,—

Nearer, more close to sight, 356