Love-Joy, Love-Sorrow

A thousand lilies, a thousand pinks,
I take in my arms and clasp them round
Close as the loving vine-branch links
The bough in its clinging tendrils wound.

For joy has taken abode with me,
And care no longer turns pale my face,
I love all life — and if these things be,
'Tis the gift, fair dream, of thy heaven-sent grace.

I could climb the sky thy flight to follow . . .
But alas! my joy lives but a breath,
For the fleeting dream is a vision hollow,
Like clouds in the wind it vanisheth.