Beauty

And shall not Beauty reign beyond the grave?
There Life is, Life eternal, there as here:
For none may die, tho' he desire the dear
And dark repose of Death's abysmal wave;

Thro' Life's unending round for æons still,
Even as we moved, so must we move and change
Thro' all the marvels of her mystic range:
Sea, rose or tempest, soul or star or hill.

But only here, perchance, we know the grace
Of Beauty and the magic of her dream,
And here I love to watch the things that seem:
The dawn that filters thro' the veils of space;

The noon that spreads a glare implacable
O'er all the plain, and drives the shepherd home;
The peace of forests, and the greeny dome
Of ancient oaks above a holy well.

I hold my breath until the blackbird stops;
I mark enchanted, past our cottage eaves,
The roses of the sunset shed their leaves
In shining pink upon the mountain tops.

I watch a lonely fountain dance all night
In silver music to the silent moon;
While, trembling thro' the milky skies of June,
The stars shine faintly amid the flooding light.

I dream; I mix divinely soul and earth.
But if hereafter, 'mid the moving stars,
We find thee not in our long avatars,
May I forget thee, O Beauty, and thy dearth!