Poems (Jackson)/Feast

by Helen Hunt Jackson

FEAST.

OR days when guests unbidden
  Walk in my sun,
With steps that roam unchidden,
  And overrun
My vines and flowers, and hands
That rob on all my lands,—
For such days, still there stands
  One banquet, one!

One banquet which, spread under
  A magic mist,
I taste, until they wonder
  What light has kissed
My eyes, and where the grapes
Have hung, whose red escapes
In mounting, mantling shapes,
  And heats my wrist.

Crowned with its rosy flowers,
  Pouring its wine,
Glide faithful ghosts of hours
  Long dead: no sign
They show of death, or chill,
But glowing, smiling still,
Love's utmost joy fulfil
  At word of mine.

And ringeth through my garden,
  The tireless pace
Of silver-mailed warden,
  With eastward face,
Who calmly bides the night,
And in each first, red light,
Reads prophecy aright
  Of that day's grace,

When guests that are unbidden
  Shall all have ceased;
And thy dear arms unchidden,
  My love, my priest,
Shall hold me while the hours
That were, and are, fling flowers,
And Hope, the warden, pours
  Wine for our feast.