Does it lead to fair meadows with flowering trees,
Where thy sister-angels hail thee their own?
Was not my love to thee dearer than these?
Thine was my world and my heaven in one.
I dare not call thee aloud, nor cry,
Thou art so solemn, so rapt in rest,
But I will whisper: Dolores, 'tis I:
My heart is breaking within my breast.
Never ere now did I speak thy name,
Itself a caress, but the lovelight leapt
Into thine eyes with a kindling flame,
And a ripple of rose o'er thy soft cheek crept.
But now wilt thou stir not for passion or prayer,
And makest no sign of the lips or the eyes,
With a nun's strait band o'er thy bright black hair--
Blind to mine anguish and deaf to my cries.
I stand no more in the waxen-lit room:
I see thee again as I saw thee that day,
In a world of sunshine and springtide bloom,
'Midst the green and white of the budding May.
Now shadow, now shine, as the branches ope,
Flickereth over my love the while:
From her sunny eyes gleams the May-time hope,
And her pure lips dawn in a wistful smile.
As one who waiteth I see her stand,
Who waits though she knows not what nor whom,
With a lilac spray in her slim soft hand:
All the air is sweet with its spicy bloom.
I knew not her secret, though she held mine:
In that golden hour did we each confess;
And her low voice murmured, Yea, I am thine,
And the large world rang with my happiness.
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