WHERE has Maid Quiet gone to,
Nodding her russet hood?
The winds that awakened the stars
Are blowing through my blood.
O how could I be so calm
When she rose up to depart?
Now words that called up the lightning
Are hurtling through my heart.

Oh, to gently enter the water’s embrace,
to be weighed down by
something other than my grief.
The currents look strong, the water rushing
and swirling, voracious in its appetite.
One by one, I drop the flowers into the water,
their petals leave the stems,
they are so bright and pretty against the clear blue swirling currents.
I am on the branch of a tree, gazing down after them,
my ***** blonde hair in my eyes.
Slowly, I prize my fingers off the branch,
and swing my legs over one side.
I jump.
The water is chilling, exhilarating.
I have never felt so alive.
My white dress gathers tightly around my ankles
and I can’t kick them free,
so I lean back, gazing at the green canopy above me,
looking at the bright glow of the flowers
swirling about my head.
Rosemary for remembrance,
pansies, rue and columbine,
daisies, sweet and innocent, like how I used to be.
The water rushes over my head;
I meet my watery grave; I think no more.

Girl of silver moon,

Hunting in dark woods with just

Arrows and pure pride.

A girl runs in the woods
Deep and dark and daring,
Black is the velvet night
Bleeding are her bare feet
Pounding is her heart;
A girl runs under the sickle moon
Both are pure and white and chaste
Glowing with innate pride,
One bearing down on prey
The other bearing in the tide;
A girl is ancient goddess
Her silver arrows sure of aim
Utterly self-contained,
At the pink dawn of the day
She sighs and fades away.

Once more into my arid days like dew,
Like wind from an oasis, or the sound
Of cold sweet water bubbling underground,
A treacherous messenger, the thought of you
Comes to destroy me; once more I renew
Firm faith in your abundance, whom I found
Long since to be but just one other mound
Of sand, whereon no green thing ever grew.
And once again, and wiser in no wise,
I chase your colored phantom on the air,
And sob and curse and fall and weep and rise
And stumble pitifully on to where,
Miserable and lost, with stinging eyes,
Once more I clasp,—and there is nothing there.

A la fin de la nuit longue et noir,
Les étoiles disparaissent avec le clair de lune ;
Quand le premier rayon de soleil arrive,
L’ombre du ciel mêle violet, rose et bleu.
Dans ce moment le monde est encore muet,
Et pale, et doux, et vaste,
Les oiseaux gazouillent, leurs ailes déployées
Et rosée reste sur les roses comme des larmes.
Les nuages semblent comme flocons d’or,
Et le flot de la brise gonfle doucement,
Il chuchote un songe pour mon cœur
Belle, et triste et charmant.
Je sente les lilas, je sente les herbes,
De ma fenêtre ouverte ;
J’écoute leur musique, comme un proverbe :
La vie est belle, lui garder précieusement.

For you my darling, you my muse,
I write this billet-doux.
For your soft skin and violet scent,
Your fingers pale and ears meant
Only to hear words of love,
Oh my dove,
For your mind sharp and erudite,
Your pearly tears for other’s plight,
The love that swells your heart to pain,
Your voice like falling rain,
Or whispering winds
Through a broken window pane,
For your tenderness and aching grace,
Your dear familiar face…
For you my darling, you my muse,
I write this billet-doux.