Page:Maurine and Other Poems (1910).pdf/25

For if the others all went down
Still rich and proud and glad I’d be,
If that one ship came back to me.

“If that one ship went down at sea,
And all the others came to me,
Weighed down with gems and wealth untold,
With glory, honour, riches, gold,
The poorest soul on earth I’d be
If that one ship came not to me.

“O skies be calm! O winds blow free—
Blow all my ships safe home to me.
But if thou sendest some a-wrack
To never more come sailing back,
Send any—all that skim the sea,
But bring my love-ship home to me.”

Helen was leaning by me, and her head
Rested against my shoulder: as he read,
I stroked her hair, and watched the fleecy skies,
And when he finished, did not turn my eyes.
I felt too happy and too shy to meet
His gaze just then. I said, “’Tis very sweet,
And suits the day; does it not, Helen, dear?”
But Helen, voiceless, did not seem to hear.
“’Tis strange,” I added, “how you poets sing
So feelingly about the very thing
You care not for! and dress up an ideal
So well, it looks a living, breathing real!
Now, to a listener, your love song seemed
A heart’s out-pouring; yet I’ve heard you say
Almost the opposite; or that you deemed
Position, honour, glory, power, fame,
Gained without loss of conscience or good name,
The things to live for.”
“Have you? Well, you may,”
Laughed Vivian, “but ’twas years—or months’ ago!
And Solomon says wise men change, you know!
I now speak truth! if she I hold most dear
Slipped from my life, and no least hope were left,
My heart would find the years more lonely here
Than if I were of wealth, fame, friends, bereft,
And sent, an exile, to a foreign land.”
His voice was low, and measured: as he spoke,
New, unknown chords of melody awoke