One Way of Love

How do I love you. Dear? 
I love you as the moonlight loves the mere 
That all the day waits for it, and keeps close 
Its beauty from the bold eyes of the sun.
But when the day-flower shuts and night's begun 
Under the moonlight wakes the dreaming mere. 
Drinks the soft lights and draws its beauty in; 
Opens and beats and glows — 
A white rose made of water, yea, a rose. 

Yours is a subtler music than my ear 
Can follow into silence when I hear. 
Yours is a rarer colour than one traces 
On a dove's breast, or in the windflowers' faces. 
More strange of scent is this your water-rose 
And deeper-hearted than the moonlight knows 
Perhaps. But in your dark moods and your clear. 
Your sweetness and your sorrow and your sin, 
Your doubt, your toil, your idleness, your fear, 
I see them all; and love you always, Dear.