The Lover’s Day

Gorse-plains that flower their gold into the streams Beneath the opal blossoms of the sky; Sea-floods that weave their blue and purple seams; White sails that lift the billows as they fly: Not these in their abounding rapture vie With love’s diviner dreams.

Those lovers tire not when the sun is pale; No statelier awning than a bristled tree With branches cedared by the salten gale, Stretched back, as if with wings that cannot flee: They linger, and the sun departs by sea; He spreads his crimson sail.

They watch him as he piles his busy deck With golden treasure; as his sail expands; They see him sink; they gaze upon the wreck Through the still twilight of the silvery sands. One cloud is left to the deserted lands: The blue-set moon’s cold fleck.

They linger though the pageant hath gone by, The opal cloud is lit o’er sea and plain; The moon is full of one day’s memory, And tells the tale of Nature o’er again, Its glory mingled in the soul’s refrain Under that lover’s sky.