A book of verses underneath the boughA flask of wine, a loaf of bread and thouBeside me singing in the wildernessAnd wilderness is paradise now.
Ah Love! could you and I with him conspire To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire Would we not shatter it to bits - and then Re-mould it nearer to the Heart's Desire?
And that inverted Bowl they call the Sky Whereunder crawling coop'd we live and die Lift not your hands to it for help - for it As impotently moves as you or I.
And this I know whether the one True Light Kindle to Love or Wrath consume me quite One flash of it within the Tavern caught Better than in the temple lost outright.
Now the New Year reviving old Desires, The thoughtful Soul to Solitude retires.
Ah love! could you and I with Him conspire To grasp this sorry scheme of things entire Would not we shatter it to bits - and then Re-mold it nearer to the heart's desire!
Strange - is it not? - that of the myriads who Before us passed the door of Darkness through Not one returns to tell us of the road Which to discover we must travel too.
Myself when young did eagerly frequent Doctor and Saint and heard great argument About it and about: but evermore Came out by the same door where in I went.
Drink! for you know not whence you came nor why: Drink! for you know not why you go nor where.
O friend, for the morrow let us not worryThis moment we have now, let us not hurryWhen our time comes, we shall not tarryWith seven thousand-year-olds, our burden carry
Yet Ah that Spring should vanish with the Rose. That Youth's sweetscented manuscript should close! The Nightingale that in the branches sang Ah whence and whither flown again who knows?
I sometimes think that never blows so red The Rose as where some buried Caesar bled That every Hyacinth the Garden wears Dropt in her Lap from some once lovely Head.
One thing is certain and the rest is lies The Flower that once has blown for ever dies.
