In one year they sent a million fighters forth
    South and North,
And they built their gods a brazen pillar high
    As the sky,
Yet reserved a thousand chariots in full force—­
    Gold, of course. 
Oh heart! oh blood that freezes, blood that burns! 
    Earth’s returns 80
For whole centuries of folly, noise, and sin! 
    Shut them in,
With their triumphs and their glories and the rest! 
    Love is best.

* * * * *

MISCONCEPTIONS

This is a spray the bird clung to,
  Making it blossom with pleasure,
Ere the high tree-top she sprung to,
  Fit for her nest and her treasure. 
  Oh, what a hope beyond measure
Was the poor spray’s, which the flying feet hung to,—­
So to be singled out, built in, and sung to!

This is a heart the Queen leant on,
  Thrilled in a minute erratic,
Ere the true bosom she bent on, 10
  Meet for love’s regal dalmatic. deg. deg.11
  Oh, what a fancy ecstatic
Was the poor heart’s, ere the wanderer went on—­
Love to be saved for it, proffered to, spent on!

* * * * *

NATURAL MAGIC

All I can say is—­I saw it! 
The room was as bare as your hand. 
I locked in the swarth little lady,—­I swear,
From the head to the foot of her—­well, quite as bare! 
“No Nautch deg. shall cheat me,” said I, “taking my stand deg.5
At this bolt which I draw!” And this bolt—­I withdraw it,
And there laughs the lady, not bare, but embowered
With—­who knows what verdure, o’erfruited, o’erflowered? 
Impossible!  Only—­I saw it!

All I can sing is—­I feel it! 10
This life was as blank as that room;
I let you pass in here.  Precaution, indeed? 
Walls, ceiling, and floor,—­not a chance for a weed! 
Wide opens the entrance:  where’s cold, now, where’s gloom? 
No May to sow seed here, no June to reveal it,
Behold you enshrined in these blooms of your bringing,
These fruits of your bearing—­nay, birds of your winging! 
A fairy-tale!  Only—­I feel it!

* * * * *

APPARITIONS

(Prologue to “The Two Poets of Croisic.")

Such a starved bank of moss
  Till, that May-morn,
Blue ran the flash across: 
  Violets were born!

Sky—­what a scowl of cloud
  Till, near and far,
Ray on ray split the shroud: 
  Splendid, a star!

World—­how it walled about
  Life with disgrace, 10
Till God’s own smile came out: 
  That was thy face!