Page:Poems Welby.djvu/34

They linked their hands, but, ere I caught
 Their sprinkled drops of dew,
They kissed my feet, and, quick as thought,
 Away the ripples flew.

The twilight hours, like birds, flew by,
 As lightly and as free;
Ten thousand stars were in the sky,
 Ten thousand on the sea;
For every wave with dimpled face,
 That leaped upon the air,
Had caught a star in its embrace
 And held it trembling there.

The young moon too with upturned sides
 Her mirrored beauty gave,
And, as a bark at anchor rides,
 She rode upon the wave;
The sea was like the heaven above,
 As perfect and as whole,
Save that it seemed to thrill with love
 As thrills the immortal soul.

The leaves, by spirit-voices stirred,
 Made murmurs on the air,
Low murmurs, that my spirit heard
 And answered with a prayer;
For 't was upon that dewy sod,
 Beside the moaning seas,