Twilight Vigil

Here in the stillness of this fading day,
Moveless, with lips apart and folded eyes
Lovely in dreamless calm my lady lies;
And as one who, by some long weary way,
Has gained the land he longed for, will delay
His sleep at night, because in heart he tries
To walk once more 'neath bleak and unloved skies,
And lose this azure in their distant gray.

That he may start with rapturous surprise
To find anew his bliss, — so, even now.
From looking on her loveliness I turn
To fancy that the seas between us flow.
O foolish heart! dost thou not still discern
That gulfs impassable between us rise?