The yellow book: an illustrated quarterly (12.1897)

249

By A. Bernard Miall

Yet I will deem your heart as pure
As I have wished it every day,

And call each fault the signature

Of pain that came and passed away ;

And I will love you more, my sweet,

For every stain on those white feet.

And every wound shall be a mouth

To sing of what you should have grown
Did winds blow ever from the south,

If you had never been alone :

My love, that came too late to aid,

For pity shall be threefold made.

Yet, wild rose that the wind has flawed,
But else more fair than all your kind,

O snowflake on white eyelids thawed
To leave a falling tear behind,

O wherefore are you not complete,

Or, being ruined, wherefore sweet ?