Pike County Ballads and Other Poems

UNA.

  In the whole wide world there was but one;
  Others for others, but she was mine,
  The one fair woman beneath the sun.

  From her gold-flax curls' most marvellous shine
  Down to the lithe and delicate feet
  There was not a curve nor a waving line

  But moved in a harmony firm and sweet
  With all of passion my life could know.
  By knowledge perfect and faith complete

  I was bound to her,—as the planets go
  Adoring around their central star,
  Free, but united for weal or woe.

  She was so near and Heaven so far—
  She grew my heaven and law and fate,
  Rounding my life with a mystic bar

  No thought beyond could violate.
  Our love to fulness in silence nursed
  Grew calm as morning, when through the gate

  Of the glimmering east the sun has burst,
  With his hot life filling the waiting air.
  She kissed me once,—that last and first

  Of her maiden kisses was placid as prayer.
  Against all comers I sat with lance
  In rest, and, drunk with my joy, I sware

  Defiance and scorn to the world's worst chance.
  In vain! for soon unhorsed I lay
  At the feet of the strong god Circumstance—

  And never again shall break the day,
  And never again shall fall the night,
  That shall light me, or shield me, on my way

  To the presence of my sad soul's delight.
  Her dead love comes like a passionate ghost
  To mourn the Body it held so light,

  And Fate, like a hound with a purpose lost,
  Goes round bewildered with shame and fright.