Fire and Water
Flame-Heart, take back your love. Swift, sure
And poignant as the dagger to the mark,
Your will is burning ever; it is pure.
Mine is vague water welling through the dark,
Holding all substances—except the spark.
Picture the pleasure of the meadow stream
When some clear striding naked-footed girl
Cuts swift and straightly as a gleam
Across its bosom ambling and aswirl
With mooning eddies and soft lips acurl;
Such was our meeting—fatefully so brief.
I have no purpose and no power to clutch.
Gleam onward, maiden, to your goal of grief;
And I more sadly flow, remembering much,
Yet doomed to take the form of all I touch.