A New Years Message

To Joseph Mazzini     Send the stars light, but send not love to me.     - SHELLEY.     Out of the dawning heavens that hear     Young wings and feet of the new year     Move through their twilight, and shed round     Soft showers of sound,     Soothing the season with sweet rain,     If greeting come to make me fain,     What is it I can send again?     I know not if the year shall send     Tidings to usward as a friend,     And salutation, and such things     Bear on his wings     As the soul turns and thirsts unto     With hungering eyes and lips that sue     For that sweet food which makes all new.     I know not if his light shall be     Darkness, or else light verily:     I know but that it will not part     Hearts faith from heart,     Truth from the trust in truth, nor hope     From sight of days unscaled that ope     Beyond one poor years horoscope.     That faith in love which loves self gives,     O master of my spirit, lives,     Having in presence unremoved     Thine head beloved,     The shadow of thee, the semitone     Of thy voice heard at heart and known,     The light of thee not set nor flown.     Seas, lands, and hours, can these divide     Love from loves service, side from side,     Though no sound pass nor breath be heard     Of one good word?     To send back words of trust to thee     Were to send wings to love, when he     With his own strong wings covers me.     Who shall teach singing to the spheres,     Or motion to the flight of years?     Let soul with soul keep hand in hand     And understand,     As in one same abiding-place     We keep one watch for one same face     To rise in some short sacred space.     And all space midway is but nought     To keep true heart from faithful thought,     As under twilight stars we wait     By Times shut gate     Till the slow soundless hinges turn,     And through the depth of years that yearn     The face of the Republic burn.