AMBERGRIS 
39 
To comprehend the other’s loveliness. 
We cannot grasp the ecstasy of this ; 
Only we strain and struggle and renew 
The utter bliss of the unending kiss, 
The mutual pang that shudders through and through, 
Repeated and repeated, as the light 
Can build a partial palace of the day. 
So in our anguish for the infinite, 
One moment gives, the other takes away. 
(I, the mere rimer, she, the queen of rime, 
As sweeps her sickle in the falling wheat, 
Her body’s sleek intoxicating time, 
The music of the motion of her feet !) 
 
I swoon in that imperial embrace— 
Lay we asleep till evening, or dead ? 
I knew not, but the wonder of her face 
Grew as the dawn and never satiated. 
She knew not in her strong imperial soul 
How hopeless was the slavery of life, 
How by the part man learns to love the whole, 
How each man’s mistress calls herself a wife. 
I tired not of the tigress limbs and lips— 
Only, my soul was weary of itself, 
Being so impotent, who only sips 
The dewdrops from the flower-cup of an elf, 
Not comprehending the mysterious sea 
Of black swift waters that can drink it up, 
Not trusting life to its own ecstasy, 
Not mixing poison with the loving-cup. 
I, maker of mad rimes, the reaper she ! 
We lingered but a day upon the lawn. 
O Thou, the other Reaper !  come to me ! 
Thy dark embraces have a germ of Dawn !