Alice: An Adultery

I see through the moonlight that covers (As a mist on the mountain) your head The flame of your heart as a lover’s Shine out in your face and be shed, A ruby that flashes and hovers and droops and is dead. As a saint in a vision half hidden I see the sweet face in a mist, A nimbus of glory unbidden That shades you or shows as you list. But I, as a bridegroom, unchidden, may kiss—and am kissed. In the light and the manifest splendour That shows you in darkness a bride, Pale blossom of moonlight and slender, A lily that sways in the tide, A star that falls earthward to bend her sweet breast to my side :— No depth of the darkness may shield you From eyes that with love are aflame, No darkness, but light, as you yield you To love that is stronger than shame, No music but kisses, that pealed you their paean, proclaim : 50