Spring
'YES, Spring has come,' the grocer said,
And tied a final knot of string,
Rang up the change and becked his head,
Elated at the breath of Spring.
'Yes, Spring has come,' the poet said,
And poured his ecstasy in rhymes,
Which eager, homesick exiles read
Long winter-locked in frozen climes.
Perhaps the grocer's way was best,
If joy can better be, or worse:
He saved his rapture unexpressed,
The poet spent his for a verse.
Final Poem
The consciousness of my mortality
Which used to blind and limit all my life
Weighs on me not since I have been your wife.
Death is the price of our felicity;
And life eternal would not leave us free
To love each other thus, setting above
The grace of God, a common human love,
Untouched, unthreatened by any heaven to be.
For who, while waiting to be crowned a king
Can relish all the humble every day?
Who but must hasten when she sets a goal?
For me, I could not make our life a thing
So wise, so real, so tender and so gay
Had I this other care - to save my soul.
