Beloved Lesbian! we would dare to claim By that same tear fond union with thy lot; Yet 'tis enough, if when we breathe thy name Thy soul but listens, and forgets us not.
To-day I hate that bitter creed, Whereby the groaning soul is taught That God Almighty finds the need Of pain, ere true salvation's wrought!
Dear God, who did create the trees, The scented flowers, the misty view, The uplands' breezy ecstasies, The Ocean's iridescent blue,
The arches of the endless sky, The magic of a day in Spring, The down upon a butterfly, The anthem that the skylarks sing.
All perfect growing harmonies, Each tuneful sound and beauteous sight, That lifts us from our miseries To raptures of supreme delight,
Can I believe that Thou hast willed Each bitter moment I have spent? Whereby in anguish were fulfilled Thy hard decrees of punishment?
To-day is June! Since early dawn My heart has felt the sun's caress, I bless the hour that I was born To witness so much loveliness.
And I would have a _God_ of love, A tender God, who looks and smiles From some not distant throne above Upon His fair created miles.
I know not who has placed the thorns That pierce, on our human brow, But I would pray on these sweet morns. Dear God, Oh! Let it not be Thou.
The faintness of my heart When strife and evil rose, The worse and lesser part Which it for ever chose, God knows.
The passions that have bound My soul with chains of earth, The sorrows that have found Their home with me since birth, The dearth
Of all these nobler things That make existence fair, The stain of sin that clings Until we cease to care For prayer,
All this must I atone: And though eternal woes My banished soul alone, Must bear without repose, Yet I am not afraid To know God knows.
I turn'd to you, the sky was amber gold, Blue haze and flaming bracken stretched away In undulating mystery to the day, Reclining that the evening might behold And hide her softly 'neath his starlit wings. A trembling breeze caressed the nearer things About us, pausing now and then to play Within the tender shadows of your hair, Across the sky, like darts flung high in air A flight of swallows struck against the glow An instant, ere they melted quite away, Like thoughts consumed by passion, and the lay Of home birds grew emotional and low. My very soul came forth and sought your eyes, But in their depth no raptured awe took birth, You stood indifferent to the throb of earth, You gazed unseeing at the burning skies, And all it meant you could not realize!