Page:Poems Whitney.djvu/119

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camille.
113
   Plunged through the heart, until
It rocked to madness, and the o'erstrained will
Grew wild, then weak, in the despairing strife.

And ever I think, What warning voice should call,
Or show me bane from food, with tedious art,
When love, the perfect instinct, flower of all
Divinest potencies of choice, whose part
   Was set 'mid stars and flame,
To keep the inner place of God, became
A blind and ravening fever of the heart!

I laugh with scorn that men should think them praised
In women's love;—chance-flung in weary hours,
By sickly fire to bloated worship raised!
O dream long-lost, so sweet of vernal flowers!—
   Wherein I stood, it seemed,
And gave a gift of queenly mark;—I dreamed
Of passion's joy aglow in rounded powers.