So oft I invoke thee for my Muse
And found such fair assistance in my verse
As every alien pen hath got my use
And under thee their posey disperse.
Thine eyes that taught the dumb on high to sing
And heavy ignorance aloft to fly
Have added feathers to the learned’s wing
And given grace a double majesty.
Yet be most proud of that which I compile,
Whose influence is thine and born of thee:
In others’ works thou dost but mend the style,
And arts with thy sweet graces graced be;
    But thou art all my art and dost advance
    As high as learning my rude ignorance.

I dreamt—before death made such dreaming vain—
That sometime, on a day of wind and rain,
I would come home to you at fall of night
And see your window flushed with firelight.
There in the chill dark lonesomeness I’d wait
A moment, standing at the garden gate
Scarce trusting that my happiness was true,—
The kind warm lights of home and love and you.

Then, lest they’d vanish to be mine no more,
I’d speed my steps along the garden path,
Cross my own threshold, close the wind-blown door
And find you in the firelight of the hearth.
O happiness! to kneel beside you there
And feel your fingers resting on my hair.

You looked inside
For what the perishable flesh might hide; 
And now you say that inner part
Will represent her in my heart. 

I tell you no.
Philosopher, I say I loved her so
I did not dig within—content
When seasons came, when seasons went.

When she would frown,
You think I set the meaning of it down?
The meaning goes; but something stays
I shall have with me all my days—

Her forehead bare
One instant, then blown over by her hair; 
A sudden turn; her hand at rest
Upon a window toward the west. . . .

Oh, seek, my love, your newer way;
     I’ll not be left in sorrow.
So long as I have yesterday,
     Go take your damned to-morrow!

There is something about Death
Like love itself!
If with someone with whom you have known passion,
And the glow of youthful love,
You also, after years of life
Together, feel the sinking of the fire,
And thus fade away together,
Gradually, faintly, delicately,
As it were in each other’s arms,
Passing from the familiar room –
That is a power of unison between souls
Like love itself!