I slept again and it came back to me, Burning within the hollow arch of night Like some fair flame of sacrificial light, And all my soul sprang up to mix with thee-- 'Kiss me, my love! Ah, Love, thy face how fair!' So did I cry, but still thou wert not there. THE CONSTANT LOVER I see fair women all the day, They pass and pass--and go; I almost dream that they are shades Within a shadow-show. Their beauty lays no hand on me, They talk--- I hear no word; I ask my eyes if they have seen, My ears if they have heard. For why--within the north countree A little maid, I know, Is waiting through the days for me, Drear days so long and slow. THE WONDER-CHILD 'Our little babe,' each said, 'shall be Like unto thee'--'Like unto _thee_!' 'Her mother's'--'Nay, his father's'--'eyes,' 'Dear curls like thine'--but each replies, 'As thine, all thine, and nought of me.' What sweet solemnity to see The little life upon thy knee, And whisper as so soft it lies,-- 'Our little babe!' For, whether it be he or she, A David or a Dorothy, 'As mother fair,' or 'father wise,' Both when it's 'good,' and when it cries, One thing is certain,--it will be _Our_ little babe. MISCELLANEOUS THE HOUSE OF VENUS Not that Queen Venus of adulterous fame, Whose love was lust's insatiable flame-- Not hers the house I would be singer in Whose loose-lipped servants seek a weary sin: But mine the Venus of that morning flood With all the dawn's young passion in her blood, With great blue eyes and unpressed bosom sweet. Her would I sing, and of the shy retreat Where Love first kissed her wondering maidenhood, And He and She first stood, with eyes afraid, In the most golden House that God has made. SATIETY The heart of the rose--how sweet Its fragrance to drain, Till the greedy brain Reels and grows faint With the garnered scent, Reels as a dream on its silver feet. Sweet thus to drain--then to sleep: For, beware how you stay Till the joy pass away, And the jaded brain Seeketh fragrance in vain, And hates what it may not reap. WHAT OF THE DARKNESS? What of the darkness? Is it very fair? Are there great calms and find ye silence there? Like soft-shut lilies all your faces glow With some strange peace our faces never know, With some great faith our faces never dare. Dwells it in Darkness? Do you find it there? Is it a Bosom where tired heads may lie? Is it a Mouth to kiss our weeping dry? Is it a Hand to still the pulse's leap? Is it a Voice that holds the runes of sleep? Day shows us not such comfort anywhere. Dwells it in Darkness? Do you find it there? Out of the Day's deceiving light we call, Day that shows man so great and God so small, That hides the stars and magnifies the grass; O is the Darkness too a lying glass, Or, undistracted, do you find truth there? What of the Darkness? Is it very fair? AD CIMMERIOS (_A Prefatory Sonnet for_ SANTA LUCIA_, the Misses Hodgkin's Magazine for the Blind)_