MYSTERIES:
The English lily is a bloom
Too cold and sweet ;
One might say—in the twilight gloom
A maiden’s feet.
Silent and slim and delicate
The flower shall spring,
Till there be born immaculate
A fair new thing.
Tall as the mother-lily, still
By faint winds swayed ;
Tender and pure, without a will—
An English maid.
No tree of poison, at whose feet
All men lie dead ;
No well of death, whose waters sweet
Are tinged with red.
No hideous impassioned queen
For whom love dies ;
No warm imperious Messaline
That slew with sighs.
Fiercer desires may cast away
All things most good ;
A people may forget to-day
Their motherhood.