Poems (Forrest)/The whispering stair
THE WHISPERING STAIR
Did you ever lie in the warm dark silence,
When the air seemed waking with budding flowers,
And the stars were lords of the mystic hours,
And the moon was a round rose, white and rare?
Did you ever listen with quickened breath
For a thing which spelled to you life and death—
Love's footfall on the stair?
When the air seemed waking with budding flowers,
And the stars were lords of the mystic hours,
And the moon was a round rose, white and rare?
Did you ever listen with quickened breath
For a thing which spelled to you life and death—
Love's footfall on the stair?
Did you ever open your arms to hold him?
Feel night knew only the gods and love,
And a world shut out, lest it disapprove,
Was only dust of a stupid past,
Some buried city of cast-off creeds
That had never a grace for poor human needs,
While those arms could hold him fast?
Feel night knew only the gods and love,
And a world shut out, lest it disapprove,
Was only dust of a stupid past,
Some buried city of cast-off creeds
That had never a grace for poor human needs,
While those arms could hold him fast?
Did you feel the stir of the bygone ages,
When strong men captured, and women clung?
Did some doom cry out with a muffled tongue
To warn you, "Dear is the price you pay?"
Did you laugh to the sob of that warning note,
With your lips so near to his pulsing throat,
That all else seemed swept away?
When strong men captured, and women clung?
Did some doom cry out with a muffled tongue
To warn you, "Dear is the price you pay?"
Did you laugh to the sob of that warning note,
With your lips so near to his pulsing throat,
That all else seemed swept away?
Since kings went wooing in masks of velvet,
Old stairs have whispered of stealthy feet.
When dawn and dusk at the mid-hour meet,
They have told their story of broken bars;
And the nodding roses have drawn more near them,
And the wind of the night has leaned to hear them
And carry it to the stars.
Old stairs have whispered of stealthy feet.
When dawn and dusk at the mid-hour meet,
They have told their story of broken bars;
And the nodding roses have drawn more near them,
And the wind of the night has leaned to hear them
And carry it to the stars.
Oh, wedded loves, that have grasped so much!
Where a world will smile and a priest will pray
Till the gipsy god has been shamed away,
Oh, never your star shines so hot and white
(Like a sword-point freed in the laughing air!)
For you no step on the whispering stair
And never a moon like our moon that night!
Where a world will smile and a priest will pray
Till the gipsy god has been shamed away,
Oh, never your star shines so hot and white
(Like a sword-point freed in the laughing air!)
For you no step on the whispering stair
And never a moon like our moon that night!