Sometimes she's a merry young hoyden, A madcap—fair brimming with fun— Till sudden she shifts in her fancy and lifts The sober gray eyes of a Nun; Her moods are as wayward as winds are, They change like the leaping of flame, And for all of the grace of her form and her face, She's never exactly the same! Sometimes she's a priestess and sibyl With eyes that are brooding and sad, Or a gypsy girl fair with a rose in her hair, Or the laughing young Love of a lad, Sometimes she's Our Lady of Sorrows Who's drunken of life to the lees, Or a will-o'-the-wisp just as light as the lisp Of the leaves of the whispering trees. I've found her as true as a mother, I've known her as false as a jade, As proud and serene as a panoplied queen, As simple and sweet as a maid— So here's to My Lady Adventure Whose magic I may not defy, By hill and by hollow her footsteps I follow, And so I shall do till I die! |