Five Songs , opus 72

I know a little garden path, 
And tread it every day;
Great dusky roses grow thereby, 
And set along the way
Are strange tall lilies silver white 
And purple as they sway.

The hour is late when I go down 
Between their solemn rows,
All golden tawny is the West 
And hushed to deep repose,
A fragrance thrills upon the air, 
And silence with me goes.

Yet, as I pass, I hear a voice 
That calls again to me;
And where the lilies crowd and sigh 
I look but dare not see!
And in the dark the garden fades, 
And leaves me memory.

Fly, thistle-down, fly
From my lips to the lips that I love!
Fly through the morning light,
Flee through the shadowy night,
Over the sea and the land,
Quick as the lark
Through twilight and dark,
Through lightning and thunder;
Till no longer asunder
We stand;
For thy touch like the lips of her lover
Moves her being to mine—
We are one in a swoon divine!

Fly, thistle-down, fly
From my lips to the lips that I love!

Song like a rose should be;
Each rhyme a petal sweet;
For fragrance, melody,
That when her lips repeat 
The words, her heart may know
What secret makes them so:  -- 
Love, only Love! 

Go, then, my song  --  a rose
Fashioned of love and rhyme;
Unto her heart disclose
That secret old as time,  -- 
Old, yet forever new!
Go, then, and tell her true  --
Love, only Love! 

I think of you —
A picture framed in sombre trees, 
Eyes where a gleam of sky breaks through
Grey days on summer seas.

The Western wind,
That runs the prairies like a flame, 
Bears in his fragrant garments twined
A whisper of your name.

Then do you send
A blown kiss in the wind's long hair, 
And though I sleep at the world's end
Yet will it find me there.

The sun takes no pleasure in shining,
The night has no joy of her dew,
The summer is drooping and pining,
The ring-dove is mourning for you,
Only you, only you.
The rose-leaves are falling, are falling,
The stars glimmer few,
And my heart in the shadows is calling
To you, only you.

Come back to the summertime, bringing
The joy of the day and the dew;
To the forest her green and her singing,
To my heart, in her loneliness, you,
Only you, only you.
For the rose-leaves are falling, are falling,
And nothing stand true
Save my heart in the twilight still calling
To you, only you.