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Recollections of Love
I
How warm this woodland wild Recess ! Love surely hath been breathing here ;
And this sweet bed of heath, my dear ! Swells up, then sinks with faint caress, As if to have you yet more near.
II
Eight springs have flown, since last I lay On sea-ward Quantock`s heathy hills,
Where quiet sounds from hidden rills Float hear and there, like things astray, And high o`er head the sky-lark shrills.
III
No voice as yet had made the air Be music with your name ; yet why
That asking look ? that yearning sigh ? That sense of promise every where ? Belovéd ! flew your spirit by ?
IV
As when a mother doth explore The rose-mark on her long-lost child,
I met, I loved you, maiden mild ! As whom I long had loved before-- So deeply had I been beguiled.
V
You stood before me like a thought, A dream remembered in a dream.
But when those meek eyes first did seem To tell me, Love within you wrought-- O Greta, dear domestic stream !
VI
Has not, since then, Love`s prompture deep, Has not Love`s whisper evermore
Been ceaseless, as thy gentle roar ? Sole voice, when other voices sleep, Dear under-song in clamor`s hour.
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