Love Poems and Others — Lilies in the Fire

I

Ah, you stack of white lilies, all white and gold, I am adrift as a sunbeam, and without form Or having, save I light on you to warm Your pallor into radiance, flush your cold White beauty into incandescence: you Are not a stack of white lilies to-night, but a white And clustered star transfigured by me to-night, And lighting these ruddy leaves like a star dropped through The slender bare arms of the branches, your tire-maidens Who lift swart arms to fend me off; but I come Like a wind of fire upon you, like to some Stray whitebeam who on you his fire unladens.

And you are a glistening toadstool shining here Among the crumpled beech-leaves phosphorescent, My stack of white lilies burning incandescent Of me, a soft white star among the leaves, my dear.

II

Is it with pain, my dear, that you shudder so?

Is it because I have hurt you with pain, my dear?

Did I shiver?

--Nay, truly I did not know-- A dewdrop may-be splashed on my face down here.

Why even now you speak through close-shut teeth.

I have been too much for you--Ah, I remember!

The ground is a little chilly underneath The leaves--and, dear, you consume me all to an ember.

You hold yourself all hard as if my kisses Hurt as I gave them--you put me away-- Ah never I put you away: yet each kiss hisses Hot as a drop of fire wastes me away.

III

I am ashamed, you wanted me not to-night-- Nay, it is always so, you sigh with me.

Your radiance dims when I draw too near, and my free Fire enters your petals like death, you wilt dead white.

Ah, I do know, and I am deep ashamed;

You love me while I hover tenderly Like clinging sunbeams kissing you: but see When I close in fire upon you, and you are flamed With the swiftest fire of my love, you are destroyed.

'Tis a degradation deep to me, that my best Soul's whitest lightning which should bright attest God stepping down to earth in one white stride, Means only to you a clogged, numb burden of flesh Heavy to bear, even heavy to uprear Again from earth, like lilies wilted and sere Flagged on the floor, that before stood up so fresh.