Love well who will, love wise who can,
But love, be loved, for God is love;
Love pure, like cherubim above;
Love maids, and hate not any man.
Sit as sat we by orange tree,
Beneath the broad bough and grape-vine
Top-tangled in the tropic shine,

Close face to face, close to the sea,
And full of the red-centered sun,
With grand sea-songs upon the soul,
Rolled melody on melody,
Like echoes of deep organ's roll,
And love, nor question anyone.

If God is love, is love not God?
As high priests say, let prophets sing,
Without reproach or reckoning;
This much I say, knees knit to sod,
And low voice lifted, questioning.

Let eyes be not dark eyes, but dreams,
Or drifting clouds with flashing fires,
Or far delights, or fierce desires,

Yet not be more than well beseems;
Let hearts be pure and strong and true,
Let lips be luscious and blood-red,
Let earth in gold be garmented
And tented in her tent of blue,
Let goodly rivers glide between
Their leaning willow walls of green,
Let all things be filled of the sun,
And full of warm winds of the sea,
And I beneath my vine and tree

Take rest, nor war with anyone;
Then I will thank God with full cause,
Say this is well, is as it was.

Let lips be red, for God has said
Love is like one gold-garmented,
And made them so for such a time.
Therefore let lips be red, therefore
Let love be ripe in ruddy prime,
Let hope beat high, let hearts be true,
And you be wise thereat, and you
Drink deep, and ask not any more.

Let red lips lift, proud curled, to kiss,
And round limbs lean and raise and reach
In love too passionate for speech,
Too full of blessedness and bliss
For anything but this and this;

Let luscious lips lean hot to kiss
And swoon in love, while all the air
Is redolent with balm of trees,
And mellow with the song of bees,
While birds sit singing everywhere—
And you will have not any more
Than I in boyhood, by that shore
Of olives, had in years of yore.

Let the unclean think things unclean;

I swear tip-toed, with lifted hands,
That we were pure as sea-washed sands,
That not one coarse thought came between;
Believe or disbelieve who will,

Unto the pure all things are pure;

As for the rest, I can endure
Alike their good will or their ill.

She boasted Montezuma's blood,
Was pure of soul as Tahoe's flood,
And strangely fair and princely souled,
And she was rich in blood and gold—
More rich in love grown over-bold
From its own consciousness of strength.
How warm! Oh, not for any cause

Could I declare how warm she was,

In her brown beauty and hair's length.
We loved in the sufficient sun,

We lived in elements of fire,
For love is fire and fierce desire;

Yet lived as pure as priest and nun.

We lay slow rocking in the bay In birch canoe beneath the crags

Thick, topped with palm, like sweeping flags Between us and the burning day.

The red-eyed crocodile lay low

Or lifted from his rich rank fern,
And watched us and the tide by turn,
And we slow cradled to and fro.

And slow we cradled on till night,
And told the old tale, overtold,
As misers in recounting gold
Each time do take a new delight.
With her pure passion-given grace
She drew her warm self close to me;
And, her two brown hands on my knee,
And her two black eyes in my face,
She then grew sad and guessed at ill,
And in the future seemed to see
With woman's ken of prophecy;
Yet proffered her devotion still.

And plaintive so, she gave a sign,
A token cut of virgin gold,

That all her tribe should ever hold
Its wearer as some one divine,
Nor touch him with a hostile hand.
And I in turn gave her a blade,
A dagger, worn as well by maid
As man, in that half-lawless land;
It had a massive silver hilt,

Had a most keen and cunning blade,
A gift by chief and comrades made
For reckless blood at Rivas spilt.
"Show this," said I, "too well 'tis known,
And worth an hundred lifted spears,
Should ill beset your sunny years;
There is not one in Walker's band,
But at the sight of this alone,

Will reach a brave and ready hand,
And make your right or wrong his own."

IV

Love while 'tis day; night cometh soon, Wherein no man or maiden may; Love in the strong young prime of day; Drink drunk with love in ripe red noon, Red noon of love and life and sun; Walk in love's light as in sunshine, Drink in that sun as drinking wine, Drink swift, nor question anyone; For loves change sure as man or moon, And wane like warm full days of June.

O Love, so fair of promises, Bend here thy brow, blow here thy kiss,

Bend here thy bow above the storm

But once, if only this once more.

Comes there no patient Christ to save,

Touch and reanimate thy form

Long three days dead and in the grave?
Spread here thy silken net of jet;

Since man is false, since maids forget,
Since man must fall for his sharp sin.
Be thou the pit that I fall in;

I seek no safer fall than this.

Since man must die for some dark sin,
Blind leading blind, let come to this,
And my death-crime be one deep kiss.
Lo! I have found another land,

May I not find another love,
True, trusting as a bosomed dove,
To lay its whole heart in

*

my

hand?

1

Ill comes disguised in many forms:
Fair winds are but a prophecy

Of foulest winds full soon to be-
The brighter these, the blacker they;
The clearest night has darkest day,
And brightest days bring blackest storms.
There came reverses to our arms;
I saw the signal-light's alarms
At night red-crescenting the bay.
The foe poured down a flood next day
As strong as tides when tides are high,
And drove us bleeding in the sea,
In such wild haste of flight that we
Had hardly time to arm and fly.

1 The seven following lines are omitted.