At last I put off love,
         For twice ten years
The daysman of my thought,
         And hope, and doing;
Being ashamed thereof,
         And faint of fears
And desolations, wrought
        In his pursuing,

Since first in youthtime those
         Disquietings
That heart-enslavement brings
         To hale and hoary,
Became my housefellows,
         And, fool and blind,
I turned from kith and kind
         To give him glory.

I was as children be
         Who have no care;
I did not shrink or sigh,
         I did not sicken;
But lo, Love beckoned me,
         And I was bare,
And poor, and starved, and dry,
         And fever-stricken.
Too many times ablaze
         With fatuous fires,
Enkindled by his wiles
         To new embraces,
Did I, by wilful ways
         And baseless ires,
Return the anxious smiles
         Of friendly faces.

No more will now rate I
         The common rare,
The midnight drizzle dew,
         The gray hour golden,
The wind a yearning cry,
         The faulty fair,
Things dreamt, of comelier hue
         Than things beholden! . . .

—I speak as one who plumbs
         Life's dim profound,
One who at length can sound
         Clear views and certain.
But—after love what comes?
         A scene that lours,
A few sad vacant hours,
         And then, the Curtain.