Dear Love, you ask if I be true,
If other women move
The heart that only beats for you
With pulses all of love.

Out in the chilly dew one morn
I plucked a wild sweet rose,
A little silver bud new-born
And longing to unclose.

I took it, loving new-born things,
I knew my heart was warm,
'O little silver rose, come in
And shelter from the storm.'

And soon, against my body pressed,
I felt its petals part,
And, looking down within my breast
I saw its golden heart.

O such a golden heart it has,
Your eyes may never see,
To others it is always shut,
It opens but for me.

But that is why you see me pass
The honeysuckle there,
And leave the lilies in the grass,
Although they be so fair;

Why the strange orchid half-accurst—
Circe of flowers she grows—
Can tempt me not: see! in my heart,
Silver and gold, my rose.

II

Deep in a hidden lane we were,
My little love and I;
When lo! as we stood kissing there—
A flower against the sky!

Frail as a tear its beauty hung—
O spare it, little hand.
But innocence like its, alas!
Desire may not withstand.

And so I clambered up the bank
And threw the blossom down,
But we were sadder for its sake
As we walked back to town.

A LOVE-LETTER

Darling little woman, just a little line,
Just a little silver word
For that dear gold of thine,
Only a whisper you have so often heard:

Only such a whisper as hidden in a shell
Holds a little breath of all the mighty sea,
But think what a little of all its depth and swell,
And think what a little is this little note of me.

'Darling, I love thee, that is all I live for'—
There is the whisper stealing from the shell,
But here is the ocean, O so deep and boundless,
And each little wave with its whisper as well.

IN THE NIGHT

'Kiss me, dear Love!'—
But there was none to hear,
Only the darkness round about my bed
And hollow silence, for thy face had fled,
Though in my dreaming it had come so near.

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.