To My Dream-Love.

A poem by Walter R. Cassels

Where art thou, oh! my Beautiful? Afar
I seek thee sadly, till the day is done,
And o'er the splendour of the setting sun,
Cold, calm, and silvery, floats the evening star;
Where art thou? Ah! where art thou, hid in light
That haunts me, yet still wraps thee from my sight?

Not wholly--ah! not wholly--still Love's eyes
Trace thy dim beauty through the mystic veil,
Like the young moon that glimmers faint and pale,
At noontide through the sun-web of the skies;
But ah! I ope mine arms, and thou art gone,
And only Memory knows where thou hast shone.

Night--Night the tender, the compassionate,
Binds thee, gem-like, amid her raven hair;
I dream--I see--I feel that thou art there--
And stand all weeping at Sleep's golden gate,
Till the leaves open, and the glory streams
Down through my trancèd soul in radiant dreams.

Too short--too short--soon comes the chilly morn,
To shake from love's boughs all their sleep-born bloom,
And wake my heart back to its bitter doom,
Sending me through the land down-cast, forlorn,
Whilst thou, my Beautiful, art far away,
Bearing the brightness from my joyless day.

I stand and gaze across Earth's fairest sea,
And still the plashing of the restless main,
Sounds like the clashing of a prisoner's chain,
That binds me, oh! my Beautiful, from thee.
Oh! sea-bird, flashing past on snow-white wing,
Bear my soul to her in thy wandering.

My heart is weary gazing o'er the sea;
O'er the long dreary lines that close the sky;
Through solemn sun-sets ever mournfully,
Gazing in vain, my Beautiful, for thee;
Hearing the sullen waves for evermore
Dashing around me on the lonely shore.

But tides creep lazily about the sands,
Washing frail landmarks, Lethe-like, away,
And though their records perish day by day,
Still stand I ever, with close claspèd hands,
Gazing far westward o'er the heaving sea,
Gazing in vain, my Beautiful, for thee.