Fetching Her

AN hour before the dawn, My friend, You lit your waiting bedside-lamp, Your breakfast-fire anon, And outing into the dark and damp You saddled, and set on.

Thuswise, before the day, My friend, You sought her on her surfy shore, To fetch her thence away Unto your own new-builded door For a staunch lifelong stay.

You said: “It seems to be, My friend, That I were bringing to my place The pure brine breeze, the sea, The mews—all her old sky and space, In bringing her with me!”

—But time is prompt to expugn, My friend, Such magic-minted conjurings: The brought breeze fainted soon, And then the sense of seamews’ wings, And the shore’s sibilant tune.

So, it had been more due, My friend, Perhaps, had you not pulled this flower From the craggy nook it knew, And set it in an alien bower; But left it where it grew!

“COULD I BUT WILL” (SONG: Verses 1, 3, key major; verse 2, key minor)

COULD I but will, Will to my bent, I’d have afar ones near me still, And music of rare ravishment, In strains that move the toes and heels! And when the sweethearts sat for rest The unbetrothed should foot with zest Ecstatic reels.

Could I be head, Head-god, “Come, now, Dear girl,” I’d say, “whose flame is fled, Who liest with linen-banded brow, Stirred but by shakes from Earth’s deep core—” I’d say to her: “Unshroud and meet That Love who kissed and called thee Sweet!— Yea, come once more!”

Even half-god power In spinning dooms Had I, this frozen scene should flower, And sand-swept plains and Arctic glooms Should green them gay with waving leaves, Mid which old friends and I would walk With weightless feet and magic talk Uncounted eves.