The Heights of Silence

Above the valleys, peopled, fair and warm, Rise the bleak, silent uplands where abide Wraiths of lost loves, love's recompense denied, Unspoken, unconfessed, unsatisfied.... Cold, silent heights, engirt with zones of storm, Where Love for aye unmated must abide.

The broad, sweet downward vistas of the flesh Stretch fair and far; the calm white spirit-height Is lone and chill; there dimly shines the light Of sun and star that burns and beacons bright Where Sin spreads still her guiling, glitt'ring mesh. Ah, warm the valley! Lone and chill the height!

Yet he who wins the height's sublimity— The silent height where loves unlived abide, Loves stainless, sublimated, purified— Shall glimpse that land, to grosser view denied, Where love and longing infinite shall be Or ever stilled—or ever satisfied.