Poems (Forrest)/Our speech
OUR SPEECH
Oh, speak to me never in words you use
To other women who please your eyes!
But in the silence, when lightning plays
Its lance low down in the summer skies,
Or at midnight's hush, when some shrinking flower
That feared the prying of garish day
Rustles a petal and bares a heart
That is cool as starshine and sweet as May,
When the rare dream-tremor goes thro' your soul
And you feel the thrill that must bring forth song,
Then the night will carry your speech to me
The happy hills of the world along!
To other women who please your eyes!
But in the silence, when lightning plays
Its lance low down in the summer skies,
Or at midnight's hush, when some shrinking flower
That feared the prying of garish day
Rustles a petal and bares a heart
That is cool as starshine and sweet as May,
When the rare dream-tremor goes thro' your soul
And you feel the thrill that must bring forth song,
Then the night will carry your speech to me
The happy hills of the world along!
Oh, reach your hand in no swift caress,
For such love-life holds a death within!
But send me a token I can keep
On the long caress of a violin:
Some joy you found in a printer word
That fixed the thought of a poet-brain,
Some major note of a shaft of sun,
Some minor lilt of the friendly rain!
The wind that came from a mountain-top,
(But swept a garden of roses thro'),
Some pine-boughs sighing in gyves of mist,
Some laugh of leaves on a wash of blue,
The golden sand in a dashing wave,
The tip of a gannet's wing of snow:
The fluted lip of a sea-tost shell
That lisps its tale of the green below,
Let these spell softly my answer, hold
My soul's wild hymn to your music bars,
The sun and wind are our alphabet,
God gave us words in His silver stars!
For such love-life holds a death within!
But send me a token I can keep
On the long caress of a violin:
Some joy you found in a printer word
That fixed the thought of a poet-brain,
Some major note of a shaft of sun,
Some minor lilt of the friendly rain!
The wind that came from a mountain-top,
(But swept a garden of roses thro'),
Some pine-boughs sighing in gyves of mist,
Some laugh of leaves on a wash of blue,
The golden sand in a dashing wave,
The tip of a gannet's wing of snow:
The fluted lip of a sea-tost shell
That lisps its tale of the green below,
Let these spell softly my answer, hold
My soul's wild hymn to your music bars,
The sun and wind are our alphabet,
God gave us words in His silver stars!