A Lovers Quarrel

I.     Oh, what a dawn of day!     How the March sun feels like May!     All is blue again     After last nights rain,     And the South dries the hawthorn-spray.     Only, my Loves away!     Id as lief that the blue were grey, II.     Runnels, which rillets swell,     Must be dancing down the dell,     With a foaming head     On the beryl bed     Paven smooth as a hermits cell;     Each with a tale to tell,     Could my Love but attend as well. III.     Dearest, three months ago!     When we lived blocked-up with snow,     When the wind would edge     In and in his wedge,     In, as far as the point could go,     Not to our ingle, though,     Where we loved each the other so! IV.     Laughs with so little cause!     We devised games out of straws.     We would try and trace     One anothers face     In the ash, as an artist draws;     Free on each others flaws,     How we chattered like two church daws! V.     Whats in the Times? a scold     At the Emperor deep and cold;     He has taken a bride     To his gruesome side,     Thats as fair as himself is bold:     There they sit ermine-stoled,     And she powders her hair with gold. VI.     Fancy the Pampas sheen!     Miles and miles of gold and green     Where the sunflowers blow     In a solid glow,     And, to break now and then the screen     Black neck and eyeballs keen,     Up a wild horse leaps between! VII.     Try, will our table turn?     Lay your hands there light, and yearn     Till the yearning slips     Thro the finger-tips     In a fire which a few discern,     And a very few feel burn,     And the rest, they may live and learn! VIII.     Then we would up and pace,     For a change, about the place,     Each with arm oer neck:     Tis our quarter-deck,     We are seamen in woeful case.     Help in the ocean-space!     Or, if no help, well embrace. IX.     See, how she looks now, dressed     In a sledging-cap and vest!     Tis a huge fur cloak     Like a reindeers yoke     Falls the lappet along the breast:     Sleeves for her arms to rest,     Or to hang, as my Love likes best. X.     Teach me to flirt a fan     As the Spanish ladies can,     Or I tint your lip     With a burnt sticks tip     And you turn into such a man!     Just the two spots that span     Half the bill of the young male swan. XI.     Dearest, three months ago     When the mesmerizer Snow     With his hands first sweep     Put the earth to sleep:     Twas a time when the heart could show     All, how was earth to know,     Neath the mute hands to-and-fro? XII.     Dearest, three months ago     When we loved each other so,     Lived and loved the same     Till an evening came     When a shaft from the devils bow     Pierced to our ingle-glow,     And the friends were friend and foe! XIII.     Not from the heart beneath,     Twas a bubble born of breath,     Neither sneer nor vaunt,     Nor reproach nor taunt.     See a word, how it severeth!     Oh, power of life and death     In the tongue, as the Preacher saith! XIV.     Woman, and will you cast     For a word, quite off at last     Me, your own, your You,     Since, as truth is true,     I was You all the happy past,     Me do you leave aghast     With the memories We amassed? XV.     Love, if you knew the light     That your soul casts in my sight,     How I look to you     For the pure and true     And the beauteous and the right,     Bear with a moments spite     When a mere mote threats the white! XVI.     What of a hasty word?     Is the fleshly heart not stirred     By a worms pin-prick     Where its roots are quick?     See the eye, by a flys foot blurred     Ear, when a straw is heard     Scratch the brains coat of curd! XVII.     Foul be the world or fair     More or less, how can I care?     Tis the world the same     For my praise or blame,     And endurance is easy there.     Wrong in the one thing rare     Oh, it is hard to bear! XVIII.     Heres the spring back or close,     When the almond-blossom blows:     We shall have the word     In a minor third     There is none but the cuckoo knows:     Heaps of the guelder-rose!     I must bear with it, I suppose. XIX.     Could but November come,     Were the noisy birds struck dumb     At the warning slash     Of his drivers-lash     I would laugh like the valiant Thumb     Facing the castle glum     And the giants fee-faw-fum! XX.     Then, were the world well stripped     Of the gear wherein equipped     We can stand apart,     Heart dispense with heart     In the sun, with the flowers unnipped,     Oh, the worlds hangings ripped,     We were both in a bare-walled crypt! XXI.     Each in the crypt would cry     But one freezes here! and why?     When a heart, as chill,     At my own would thrill     Back to life, and its fires out-fly?     Heart, shall we live or die?     The rest, . . . settle by-and-by! XXII.     So, shed efface the score,     And forgive me as before.     It is twelve oclock:     I shall hear her knock     In the worst of a storms uproar     I shall pull her through the door     I shall have her for evermore!