With dull unvaried mien, my maids and I Glide through our household tasks; Gather strange herbs, weave purple tapestry, Distil, in magic flasks. Most weary am I of these men who yield So swiftly to my spell, The beastly rout now wandering afield With grunt and snarl and yell. Ah! when in place of tigers and of swine, Shall he confront me, whom My song cannot enslave, nor that bright wine Where rank enchantments fume? So close we are, and yet so far apart, O Love! Love! Love! sweet Love! So close, I feel your breath upon my we are undone, If thou indeed be gone Where lost things are. "Beyond the extremest sea's waste light and noise, As from Ghostland, thy voice Is borne afar." cheek; So far that all this love of mine is weak To touch in any way your distant heart; So close that when I hear your voice I start, To see my whole life standing bare and bleak; O Love, what was our sin that we So far that though for years and should be Forsaken thus by thee? years I seek, I shall not find thee other than So hard a lot! thou art; prey Shut from it by a floating plank I lie; Through this round window search the faithless sky, The hungry waves that fain would rend and slay, The live-long, blank, interminable way, Blind with the sun and hoarse with the wind's cry Of wild, unconquerable mutiny, Until night comes more terrible than day. No more at rest am I than wind and wave; My soul cries with them in their wild despair, | I, who am Destiny's impatient slave, Who find no help in hope, nor ease in prayer, And only dream of rest, on some dim shore Where sea and storms and life shall be no more. |