Invocation

Whither, O, my sweet mistress, must I follow thee?      For when I hear thy distant footfall nearing,      And wait on thy appearing,     Lo! my lips are silent: no words come to me.     Once I waylaid thee in green forest covers,      Hoping that spring might free my lips with gentle fingers;      Alas! her presence lingers     No longer than on the plain the shadow of brown kestrel hovers.     Through windless ways of the night my spirit followed after;      Cold and remote were they, and there, possessed      By a strange unworldly rest,     Awaiting thy still voice heard only starry laughter.     The pillared halls of sleep echoed my ghostly tread.      Yet when their secret chambers I essayed      My spirit sank, dismayed,     Waking in fear to find the new-born vision fled.     Once indeed - but then my spirit bloomed in leafy rapture -      I loved; and once I looked death in the eyes:      So, suddenly made wise,     Spoke of such beauty as I may never recapture....     Whither, O, divine mistress, must I then follow thee?      Is it only in love ... say, is it only in death      That the spirit blossometh,     And words that may match my vision shall come to me?