Selected Poems. Brooke Rupert

      Oh! Death will find me, long before I tire

      Of watching you; and swing me suddenly

      Into the shade and loneliness and mire

      Of the last land! There, waiting patiently,

      One day, I think, I'll feel a cool wind blowing,

      See a slow light across the Stygian tide,

      And hear the Dead about me stir, unknowing,

      And tremble. And I shall know that you have died,

      And watch you, a broad-browed and smiling dream,

      Pass, light as ever, through the lightless host,

      Quietly ponder, start, and sway, and gleam —

      Most individual and bewildering ghost! —

      And turn, and toss your brown delightful head,

      Amusedly, among the ancient Dead.

      When the white flame in us is gone,

      And we that lost the world's delight

      Stiffen in darkness, left alone

      To crumble in our separate night;

      When your swift hair is quiet in death,

      And through the lips corruption thrust

      Has stilled the labour of my breath —

      When we are dust, when we are dust! —

      Not dead, not undesirous yet,

      Still sentient, still unsatisfied,

      We'll ride the air, and shine, and flit,

      Around the places where we died,

      And dance as dust before the sun,

      And light of foot, and unconfined,

      Hurry from road to road, and run

      About the errands of the wind.

      And every mote, on earth or air,

      Will speed and gleam, down later days,

      And like a secret pilgrim fare

      By eager and invisible ways,

      Nor ever rest, nor ever lie,

      Till, beyond thinking, out of view,

      One mote of all the dust that's I

      Shall meet one atom that was you.

      Then in some garden hushed from wind,

      Warm in a sunset's afterglow,

      The lovers in the flowers will find

      A sweet and strange unquiet grow

      Upon the peace; and, past desiring,

      So high a beauty in the air,

      And such a light, and such a quiring,

      And such a radiant ecstasy there,

      They'll know not if it's fire, or dew,

      Or out of earth, or in the height,

      Singing, or flame, or scent, or hue,

      Or two that pass, in light, to light,

      Out of the garden, higher, higher…

      But in that instant they shall learn

      The shattering ecstasy of our fire,

      And the weak passionless hearts will burn

      And faint in that amazing glow,

      Until the darkness close above;

      And they will know – poor fools, they'll know! —

      One moment, what it is to love.

      "Oh! Love," they said, "is King of Kings,

      And Triumph is his crown.

      Earth fades in flame before his wings,

      And Sun and Moon bow down." —

      But that, I knew, would never do;

      And Heaven is all too high.

      So whenever I meet a Queen, I said,

      I will not catch her eye.

      "Oh! Love," they said, and "Love," they said,

      "The gift of Love is this;

      A crown of thorns about thy head,

      And vinegar to thy kiss!" —

      But Tragedy is not for me;

      And I'm content to be gay.

      So whenever I spied a Tragic Lady,

      I went another way.

      And so I never feared to see

      You wander down the street,

      Or come across the fields to me

      On ordinary feet.

      For what they'd never told me of,

      And what I never knew,

      It was that all the time, my love,

      Love would be merely you.

      When love has changed to kindliness —

      Oh, love, our hungry lips, that press

      So tight that Time's an old god's dream

      Nodding in heaven, and whisper stuff

      Seven million years were not enough

      To think on after, make it seem

      Less than the breath of children playing,

      A blasphemy scarce worth the saying,

      A sorry jest, "When love has grown

      To kindliness – to kindliness!" …

      And yet – the best that either's known

      Will change, and wither, and be less,

      At last, than comfort, or its own

      Remembrance. And when some caress

      Tendered in habit (once a flame

      All heaven sang out to) wakes the shame

      Unworded, in the steady eyes

      We'll have, —that day, what shall we do?

      Being so noble, kill the two

      Who've reached their second-best? Being wise,

      Break cleanly off, and get away,

      Follow down other windier skies

      New lures, alone? Or shall we stay,

      Since this is all we've known, content

      In the lean twilight of such day,

      And not remember, not lament?

      That time when all is over, and

      Hand never flinches, brushing hand;

      And blood lies quiet, for all you're near;

      And it's but spoken words we hear,

      Where trumpets sang; when the mere skies

      Are stranger and nobler than your eyes;

      And flesh is flesh, was flame before;

      And infinite hungers leap no more

      In