Love's Challenge

Love smote me with his jacinth wand and challenged me to race,
And wore me down with running till the sweat poured off my face,
Through breaks of tangled woodland, by chasms sheer to scale,
Until my heart was in my lips and at the point to fail.
Then as I felt his tender wings brush lightly round my head,
''Tis proven that thou lackest the strength to love,' he said.