A Woman's Shortcomings

She has laughed as softly as if she sighed,     She has counted six, and over,     Of a purse well filled, and a heart well tried,     Oh, each a worthy lover!     They "give her time"; for her soul must slip     Where the world has set the grooving;     She will lie to none with her fair red lip:     But love seeks truer loving.     She trembles her fan in a sweetness dumb,     As her thoughts were beyond recalling;     With a glance for one, and a glance for some,     From her eyelids rising and falling;     Speaks common words with a blushful air,     Hears bold words, unreproving;     But her silence says, what she never will swear,     And love seeks better loving.     Go, lady! lean to the night-guitar,     And drop a smile to the bringer;     Then smile as sweetly, when he is far,     At the voice of an in-door singer.     Bask tenderly beneath tender eyes;     Glance lightly, on their removing;     And join new vows to old perjuries,     But dare not call it loving!     Unless you can think, when the song is done,     No other is soft in the rhythm;     Unless you can feel, when left by One,     That all men else go with him;     Unless you can know, when unpraised by his breath,     That your beauty itself wants proving;     Unless you can swear "For life, for death!"     Oh, fear to call it loving!     Unless you can muse in a crowd all day     On the absent face that fixed you;     Unless you can love, as the angels may,     With the breadth of heaven betwixt you;     Unless you can dream that his faith is fast,     Through behoving and unbehoving;     Unless you can die when the dream is past,     Oh, never call it loving!