Liminary
The hollow crystal of my winter dream
and silences, where thought for worship, white,
shimmer'd within the icy mirror-gleam,
vanishes down the flood of broader light.
The royal weft of arduous device
and starr'd with strangest gems, my shadowy pride
and ritual of illusive artifice
is shed away, leaving the naked side.
No more is set within the secret shrine
a wonder wherein day nor night has part;
my passing makes the ways of earth divine
with the wild splendours of a mortal heart.
A whisper thrills the living fringe of green
on my retreat; tiptoe the silence stands;
the breathless morn waits till her step be seen,
my summer bride, new life from nuptial lands.
The hidden places of her beauty hold
the savours shed o'er wastes of island air,
and her crown'd body's wealth of torrid gold
burns dusky in her summer-storm of hair.
Her breasts in baffling curves, an upward hope,
strain towards the lips pain'd with too eager life,
and the rich noons faint on each lustrous slope
where thunder-hush in the ardent brake is rife.
I cannot tell what god is in her gaze,
such depths of slumbrous passion drown my breath,
but where the charmed shadow clings and stays
Fate cowers before that high disdain of death.
Oh, take me to thy bosom's sultry beat,
steep all my sense in thy long breath of flame,
oppress me with thy summer's heavy heat,
consume all me that wears an uncrown'd name;
burn this my flesh to a clear web of light,
send thy keen airy spirit to search each vein,
that the hard pulse may throb with strong delight,
o'ermastering life and life's divinest pain.
Then, then we twain will seek each farthest way,
mingled in radiance over cloud and lea,
our joy shall swell the exultant heart of day,
our love shall tinge the rose of sky and sea.
And we shall know the steep pride of the hills
and the dark meditation of the wood,
or quench our rage where the red wine-god spills
o'er glowing rocks the madness of his blood.
Our link'd approach shall flush the water-maid
that dreams her limpid realm with wistful eyes,
our noon-tide rest shall haunt her memory's shade,
vexing her dim breast with unwonted sighs.
And where our fiercer joys have thrill'd the earth
shall burst hard stalks and cruel cups that keep
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poem by Christopher John Brennan
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