Three messengers—the first was human Love;
The second voice came crying in the night
With strange and awful music from above;
None who have heard that voice forget it quite;
Birth is it named; the third, O, turn not pale!
'T was Death to the undying soul cried, Hail!
"WHEN LOVE DAWNED"
When love dawned on that world which is my mind,
Then did the outer world wherein I went
Suffer a sudden, strange transfigurement;
It was as if new sight were given the blind.
Then where the shore to the wide sea inclined
I watched with new eyes the new sun's ascent;
My heart was stirred within me as I leant
And listened to a voice in every wind.
O purple sea! O joy beyond control!
O land of love and youth! O happy throng!
Were ye then real, or did ye only seem?
Dear is that morning twilight of the soul,—
The mystery, the waking voice of song,—
For now I know it was not all a dream.
LOVE AND DEATH
I
Now who can take from us what we have known—
We that have looked into each other's eyes?
Tho' sudden night should blacken all the skies,
The day is ours, and what the day has shown.
What we have seen and been, hath not this grown
