Poems of Later Life: To Helen
I saw thee once - once only - years ago: I must not say 'how' many - but 'not' many. It was a July midnight; and from out A full-orbed moon, that, like thine own soul, soaring, Sought a precipitate pathway up through heaven, There fell a silvery-silken veil of light, With quietude, and sultriness and slumber, Upon the upturn'd faces of a thousand Roses that grew in an enchanted garden, Where no wind dared to stir, unless on tiptoe - Fell on the upturn'd faces of these roses That gave out, in return for the love-light, Their odorous souls in an ecstatic death - Fell on the upturn'd faces of these roses That smiled and died in this parterre, enchanted By thee, and by the poetry of thy presence.
Clad all in white, upon a violet bank I saw thee half-reclining; while the moon Fell on the upturn'd faces of the roses, And on thine own, upturn'd - alas, in sorrow!
Was it not Fate, that, on this July midnight - Was it not Fate (whose name is also Sorrow), That bade me pause before that garden-gate, To breathe the incense of those slumbering roses? No footstep stirred: the hated world all slept, Save only thee and me - (O Heaven! - O God! How my heart beats in coupling those two words!) - Save only thee and me. I paused - I looked - And in an instant all things disappeared. (Ah, bear in mind this garden was enchanted!) The pearly lustre of the moon went out: The mossy banks and the meandering paths, The happy flowers and the repining trees, Were seen no more: the very roses' odors Died in the arms of the adoring airs. All - all expired save thee - save less than thou: Save only the divine light in thine eyes - Save but the soul in thine uplifted eyes. I saw but them - they were the world to me. I saw but them - saw only them for hours - Saw only them until the moon went down. What wild heart-histories seemed to lie unwritten Upon those crystalline, celestial spheres! How dark a woe! yet how sublime a hope! How silently serene a sea of pride! How daring an ambition! yet how deep - How fathomless a capacity for love!
But now, at length, dear Dian sank from sight, Into a western couch of thunder-cloud; And thou, a ghost, amid the entombing trees Didst glide away. 'Only thine eyes remained.' They 'would not' go - they never yet have gone. Lighting my lonely pathway home that night, 'They' have not left me (as my hopes have) since. They follow me - they lead me through the years.
They are my ministers - yet I their slave. Their office is to illumine and enkindle - My duty, 'to be saved' by their bright light, And purified in their electric fire, And sanctified in their elysian fire. They fill my soul with Beauty (which is Hope), And are far up in Heaven - the stars I kneel to In the sad, silent watches of my night; While even in the meridian glare of day I see them still - two sweetly scintillant Venuses, unextinguished by the sun!
1846.
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