Power in Silence

I Though I sing high, and chaunt above her, Praising my girl, It were not right To reckon her the poorer lover; She does not love me less For her royal, jewelled speechlessness, She is the sapphire, she the light, The music in the pearl. II Not from pert birds we learn the spring-tide From open sky. What speaks to us Closer than far distances that hide In woods, what is more dear Than a cherry-bough, bees feeding near In the soft, proffered blooms? Lo, I Am fed and honoured thus. III She has the star’s own pulse; its throbbing Is a quick light. She is a dove My soul draws to its breast; her sobbing Is for the warm dark there! In the heat of her wings I would not care My close-housed bird should take her flight To magnify our love.