I. ROSEATE darling, Dimpled with laughter, Nursed on the bosom Pierced by thee after; Fed with the rarest Milk of the fairest Fond Aphrodite, Child as thou art, as a god thou art mighty! II. Thou art the only Demigod left us; Fate hath bereft us, Science made lonely. Visions and fables Shrink from our portals; Long have we banished The stately Immortals; Yet, when we sent them Trooping to Hades -- Olympian gentlemen, Paphian ladies -- Thou hadst re-risen Ere the dark prison Closed for the last time, Slipped from the gate and returned to thy pastime! III. Ever a mystery, All of our history Brightens with thee! Systems have chained us, Rulers restrained us, Fortune disdained us, Still thou wert free! Lofty or lowly, Brutish or holy, Spacious or narrow, Never a life was secure from thy arrow! IV. Ah, but they 've told us Love is a system! They would withhold us When we have kissed him! All that perplexes Sweetly the sexes They would control, And with Affinity Drive the Divinity Out of the soul! Better, they say, is Phryne or Lais Than the immutable Faith, and its suitable Vow, he hath taught us Foolish the tender Pang, the surrender, When he has caught us; Fancies and fetters are all he has brought us. V. Future parental, Physical, mental Laws they prescribe us; And with ecstatic Strict mathematic Blisses would bribe us. Alkali, acid, They with a placid Mien would unite, And the wild rapture Of chasing and capture Curb with a right; Measuring, dealing Even the kiss of the twilight of feeling! VI. Who shall deliver Thee from their credo? Rent is thy quiver, Darling Cupido! Naked, yet blameless, Tricksily aimless, Secretly sure, Who, then, thy plighting, Wilful uniting, Now will endure? Now, when experiment Based upon Science Sets at defiance, Harshly, thy merriment, Who shall caress thee Warm in his bosom, and bliss thee and bless thee? VII. Ever 't is May-time! Ever 't is play-time Of Beauty and Youth! Freed from confusion, Hides in illusion Nature her truth. Books and discourses, What can they tell us? Blood with its forces Still will compel us! Cold ones may fly to Systems, or try to; Innocent fancy Still will enwind us, Love's necromancy, Snare us and bind us, Systems and rights lie forgotten behind us. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...STREET CORNER COLLEGE by KENNETH PATCHEN NEW PRINCE, NEW POMP by ROBERT SOUTHWELL THE DISCOVERY; SONNET by JOHN COLLINGS SQUIRE THE PUMPKIN by JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER A PASSING OF FAITH by GORDON BOTTOMLEY |