52

Sonnets

ii

Royal I dream myself, and realm is mine
Isled far apart in Oriental seas,

Where night is lustrous glow and balmy peace,
And the full moon doth on the waters shine.

Spices their aromatic breath consign
To lucid space untroubled by a breeze,

And ’neath the shadow of the fringing trees
Gleams the light foamwork of the lipping brine.
There I in ivory pavilion keep,

And question with myself, and find no end ;

But thou, my Love, dost wander through the glade
Of sward secluse, where moon and night contend ;

Or couched beneath a palm dost taste of sleep,

Low at thy feet thy guardian lion laid.

hi

When, hand in hand enlinked, we hie to fill
Our baskets with the valley’s modest flowers ;

Or at a bound the grassy crest is ours
Of the high mount, where dews are sparkling still ;

Or, gazing from the solitary hill,

View the pale sea remote, as evening lours
And clouds, like ruins of fantastic towers,

Are piled and crumbled at the breeze’s will:

How oft doth silence seize on thee at once !

With light, whence caught who knows ? thine eye is rife,

Thy