THE NAME

IT shifts and shifts from form to form,

It drifts and darkles, gleams and glows;

It is the passion of the storm,

The poignance of the rose;

Through changing shapes, through devious ways,

By noon or night, through cloud or flame,

My heart has followed all my days

Something I cannot name.

In sunlight on some woman's hair,

Or starlight in some woman's eyne,

Or in low laughter smothered where

Her red lips wedded mine,

My heart hath known, and thrilled to know,

This unnamed presence that it sought;

And when my heart hath found it so,

“Love is the name,” I thought.

Sometimes when sudden afterglows

In futile glory storm the skies

Within their transient gold and rose

The secret stirs and dies;

Or when the trampling morn walks o'er

The troubled seas, with feet of flame,

My awed heart whispers, “Ask no more,

For Beauty is the name!”

Or dreaming in old chapels where

The dim aisles pulse with murmurings

That part are music, part are prayer —

( Or rush of hidden wings )

Sometimes I lift a startled head

To some saint's carven countenance,

Half fancying that the lips have said,

All names mean God, perchance!”