Page:The Yellow Book - 13.djvu/213

As a sphynx-moth with shivering wings
Hangs over the thyme in the garden
But an instant, then fairyward brings
The honey he gathers for guerdon;


So you the oases of life
Just touched with your frayed, rapid wings,
Poor poet, and drew from the strife
The peculiar honey that clings


To your magical measures and ways,
As they sway with the moods of the soul,
Semi-conscious, through haze, in amaze,
Making on toward a dim distant goal.


"Be always a poet or saint"—
Poor Lilian was saint and was poet,
But not always for sometimes we faint—
Then he must forget that we know it;


In iris and opal forget—
His iris, his bow in the sky,
Fickle bow for the storm, and that yet
Was his only storm-bow to steer by.


Good-bye, then, poor poet, good-bye!
You will not be long there alone:
Very soon for your help we shall cry,
Lost souls in a country unknown.