I WILL call her when she comes to me My lily, and not my wife, So whitely and so tenderly She was set in my stormy life. In vain her gentle eyes to please The year had done her best, Setting her tides of crocuses All softly toward the west: The bright west, where our love was born And grew to perfect bloom, And where the broad leaves of the corn Hang low about her tomb. I hid from men my cruel wound And sailed away on the sea, But like waves around some hulk aground Her love enfoldeth me. My clumsy hands are cracked and brown; My chin is rough as a bur, But under the dry husk soft as down Lieth my love for her. One night when storms were in the sky -- Sailing away on the sea, I dreamed that I was doomed to die, And that she came to me. They bound my eyes, but I had sight And saw her take that hour My head so bright in her apron white As if it had been a flower! No child when I sit alone at night Comes climbing on my knee, But I dream of love and my heart is light As I sail away on the sea. |