Meditations - His

I was so proud of you last night, dear girl,     While man with man was striving for your smile.     You never lost your head, nor once dropped down     From your high place     As queen in that gay whirl.     (It takes more poise to wear a little crown     With modesty and grace     Than to adorn the lordlier thrones of earth.)     You seem so free from artifice and wile:     And in your eyes I read     Encouragement to my unspoken thought.     My heart is eloquent with words to plead     Its cause of passion; but my questioning mind,     Knowing how love is blind,     Dwells on the pros and cons, and God knows what.     My heart cries with each beat,     'She is so beautiful, so pure, so sweet,     So more than dear.'     And then I hear     The voice of Reason, asking:    'Would she meet     Life's common duties with good common sense?     Could she bear quiet evenings at your hearth,     And not be sighing for gay scenes of mirth?     If, some great day, love's mighty recompense     For chastity surrendered came to her,     If she felt stir     Beneath her heart a little pulse of life,     Would she rejoice with holy pride and wonder,     And find new glory in the name of wife?     Or would she plot with sin, and seek to plunder     Love's sanctuary, and cast away its treasure,     That she might keep her freedom and her pleasure?     Could she be loyal mate and mother dutiful?     Or is she only some bright hothouse bloom,     Seedless and beautiful,     Meant just for decoration, and for show?'     Alone here in my room,     I hear this voice of Reason.    My poor heart     Has ever but one answer to impart,     'I love her so.'