Renascence

We have bit no forbidden apple, Eve and I, Yet the splashes of day and night Falling round us no longer dapple The same Eden with purple and white.

This is our own still valley Our Eden, our home, But day shows it vivid with feeling And the pallor of night does not tally With dark sleep that once covered its ceiling.

My little red heifer, to-night I looked in her eyes, --She will calve to-morrow: Last night when I went with the lantern, the sow was grabbing her litter With red, snarling jaws: and I heard the cries Of the new-born, and after that, the old owl, then the bats that flitter.

And I woke to the sound of the wood-pigeons, and lay and listened, Till I could borrow A few quick beats of a wood-pigeon's heart, and when I did rise The morning sun on the shaken iris glistened, And I saw that home, this valley, was wider than Paradise.

I learned it all from my Eve This warm, dumb wisdom. She's a finer instructress than years; She has taught my heart-strings to weave Through the web of all laughter and tears.

And now I see the valley Fleshed all like me With feelings that change and quiver: And all things seem to tally With something in me, Something of which she's the giver.