Poems (Bibesco)/XII To-gether
XIITO-GETHER
Why in the word to-gether should there lie
The desolate separation that is life?
The desolate separation that is life?
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Her image buried in unseeing sight,
His eyes alighted on unchosen spots,
Like lost ideas adventuring in a mind,
A tangled twilit wilderness of thought.
As she was ever folded in the peace
That lapped the deep seclusion of his heart,
How could he know her tortured doubting soul,
Craving for certainty, destroying faith,
Her fevered body vainly seeking rest
In the unconscious refuge of his arms.
For as he stroked her face, her arms, her hands,
His love was moored to some eternal coast
Some distant outpost of the absolute—
Yet while she sank, deep in the cool, rapt quiet
Of touch and sight and sound and certainty,
The foolish creature murmured to herself:
"These happy moments let me hold them tight,
And let our love for ever merge and fuse,
And not be sometimes mine and sometimes his.
Oh God! I'm happy; let me not forget."
So, in remembering, all the magic went,
While, battering down the ramparts of her peace,
Were silly fears and petty questionings
That clawed and tore and crumpled up her joy.
How could he know the anguish of the cry
Sheathed in a casual, charming, courteous voice,
"When shall I see you, when will you come again?"
"You must forgive me for my long, long stay.
When I am with you I forget the time;
But you, my dear, you think of everything."
His eyes alighted on unchosen spots,
Like lost ideas adventuring in a mind,
A tangled twilit wilderness of thought.
As she was ever folded in the peace
That lapped the deep seclusion of his heart,
How could he know her tortured doubting soul,
Craving for certainty, destroying faith,
Her fevered body vainly seeking rest
In the unconscious refuge of his arms.
For as he stroked her face, her arms, her hands,
His love was moored to some eternal coast
Some distant outpost of the absolute—
Yet while she sank, deep in the cool, rapt quiet
Of touch and sight and sound and certainty,
The foolish creature murmured to herself:
"These happy moments let me hold them tight,
And let our love for ever merge and fuse,
And not be sometimes mine and sometimes his.
Oh God! I'm happy; let me not forget."
So, in remembering, all the magic went,
While, battering down the ramparts of her peace,
Were silly fears and petty questionings
That clawed and tore and crumpled up her joy.
How could he know the anguish of the cry
Sheathed in a casual, charming, courteous voice,
"When shall I see you, when will you come again?"
"You must forgive me for my long, long stay.
When I am with you I forget the time;
But you, my dear, you think of everything."