The mere brief gusts are wrinkling; A thousand ripples twinkling Have caught the stars on polished spars Their rustling ridges sprinkling: And all the shadow lurking in its bosom Is touched and bursten into golden blossom.
Stoop! and my being flatter, love; With sudden starlight scatter, love, From the starry grace of thy rare face, Whose might can make or shatter, love! Come, raiment love in love's own radiant garments. And kindle all my soul to rapturous torments!
Bow all thy beauty to me, love, Lips, eyes, and hair to woo me, love, As bows and blows some satin rose Snow-soft and tame, that knew thee, love. Unto the common grass, that worshiping cowers, Dowering its love with all her musk of flowers.
My dream was such: It seemed the afternoon Of some deep tropic day, and yet a moon Stood round and full with largeness of white gleams High in a Heaven that knew not a sun's beams; A vast, still Heaven of unremembered dreams. Long, lawny lengths of perishable cloud Hung in a West o'er rolling forests bowed; Clouds raining colors, gold and violet That, opening, seemed from hidden worlds to let Down hints of mystic beauty and old charms Wrought of frail creatures fair with silvery forms. And all about me fruited orchards grew Of quince and peach and dusty plums of blue; Wan apricots and apples red with fire, Kissed into ripeness by some sun's desire, And big with juice; and on far, fading hills, Down which it seemed a hundred torrent rills Flashed leaping silver, vines and vines and vines Of purple vintage swollen with cool wines; Pale pleasant wines and fragrant as the June, Their delicate life robbed from the foam-fair moon. And from the clouds o'er this sweet world there dripp'd An odorous music strange and feverish lipped, That swung and swooned and panted in mad sighs, Invoking at each wave sad rapturous eyes Of limpid, willowy beings fair as night, Decked spangly with crisp flower-like stars of white; Dim honeyed booming of the boisterous bee In purple myriads of faint fleurs-de-lis; Of surf far-foaming on forgotten strands Of immemorial seas in fairy lands Of melting passion, who, with crimson lips Of many shells laid to each swell that dips, Sigh secret hope of unrequited love In murmurous language to wan winds above.