  FULL well my loyal heart remembers The vow of rapture’s lavish tongue, For thee to smother grief’s Decembers In joy’s June roses and make over The world;—how easily, fond lover, Could I when life and hope were young. When troth-plight had begemmed thy finger Unhappiness should cease to be; No shape of care near thee should linger; Exultant, I, thy love to guerdon, Would weep thy tears and bear thy burden, Yea, purchase thy Gethsemane. For thee should hemlock turn to honey, Thy hand, unhurt, the thorn might hold, Darkness should light thee, and the sunny Celestial days, triumphal, singing Around the globe, should bless thee, bringing Anew to earth the Age of Gold. Thy beauty and thy grace to glory, Would I inweave thy golden name In shining weft of song and story; Would I, on love’s heroic mission, Ascend the sunned peak of ambition To pluck the Alpine flower, fame. O season of delirious passion! What knew or recked my spirit then Of deeds in less transcendent fashion Than youth’s high drama realizes In visions, dreams, and enterprises, That lift to godhood mortal men! Naught is impossible to Heaven, Nor to the puissance of youth! Imagination’s quickening leaven Works in the pulsing brain and being Till every sense hath second-seeing And all that should be true is truth. O glorious falsehood and illusion! Call not the lover’s transports lies: The white light of his heart in fusion Makes visible the far ideal, Only the low earth is unreal, Secure the lover walks the skies. I trod with thee the starry spaces, I told the only tale I knew; We dwelt in spirit, not in places, And, if the promises then spoken,— Be witness, O my God!—were broken, The promising was heavenly true. |
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