Day and night
I sought around each neighboring spot;
And in the chase of this sweet light,
My task and heaven and all forgot;--
All but the one, sole, haunting dream
Of her I saw in that bright stream.
Nor was it long ere by her side
I found myself whole happy days
Listening to words whose music vied
With our own Eden's seraph lays,
When seraph lays are warmed by love,
But wanting _that_ far, far above!--
And looking into eyes where, blue
And beautiful, like skies seen thro'
The sleeping wave, for me there shone
A heaven, more worshipt than my own.
Oh what, while I could hear and see
Such words and looks, was heaven to me?
Tho' gross the air on earth I drew,
'Twas blessed, while she breathed it too;
Tho' dark the flowers, tho' dim the sky,
Love lent them light while she was nigh.
Throughout creation I but knew
Two separate worlds--the _one_, that small,
Beloved and consecrated spot
Where LEA was--the other, all
The dull, wide waste where she was _not_!
But vain my suit, my madness vain;
Tho' gladly, from her eyes to gain
One earthly look, one stray desire,
I would have torn the wings that hung
Furled at my back and o'er the Fire
In GEHIM'S[4] pit their fragments flung;--
'Twas hopeless all--pure and unmoved
She stood as lilies in the light
Of the hot noon but look more white;--
And tho' she loved me, deeply loved,
'Twas not as man, as mortal--no,
Nothing of earth was in that glow--
She loved me but as one, of race
Angelic, from that radiant place
She saw so oft in dreams--that Heaven
To which her prayers at morn were sent
And on whose light she gazed at even,
Wishing for wings that she might go
Out of this shadowy world below
To that free, glorious element!
Well I remember by her side
Sitting at rosy even-tide,
When,--turning to the star whose head
Lookt out as from a bridal bed,
At that mute, blushing hour,--she said,
"Oh! that it were my doom to be
"The Spirit of yon beauteous star,
"Dwelling up there in purity,
"Alone as all such bright things are;--
"My sole employ to pray and shine,
"To light my censer at the sun,
"And cast its fire towards the shrine
"Of Him in heaven, the Eternal One!"
So innocent the maid, so free
From mortal taint in soul and frame,
Whom 'twas my crime--my destiny--
To love, ay, burn for, with a flame
To which earth's wildest fires are tame.
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