Pearls

Baroque, but beautiful, between the lunes, The valves of nacre of a mussel-shell, Behold, a pearl! shaped like the burnished bell Of some strange blossom that long afternoons Of summer coax to open: all the moon’s Chaste lustre in it; hues that only dwell With purity.... It takes me, like a spell, Back to a day when, whistling truant tunes, A barefoot boy I waded ’mid the rocks, Searching for shells strewn in the creek’s slow swirl, Unconscious of the pearls that round me lay: While, ’mid wild-roses,--all her tomboy locks Blond-blowing,--stood, unnoticed then, a girl, My sweetheart once, the pearl I flung away.