Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Jessie B. Rittenhouse, ed. (1869–1948). The Second Book of Modern Verse. 1922.

Love Songs

COME, when the pale moon like a petal

Floats in the pearly dusk of Spring,

Come with arms outstretched to take me,

Come with lips that long to cling.

Come, for life is a frail moth flying,

Caught in the web of the years that pass,

And soon we two, so warm and eager,

Will be as the gray stones in the grass.

I HEARD a cry in the night,

A thousand miles it came,

Sharp as a flash of light,

My name, my name!

It was your voice I heard,

You waked and loved me so—

I send you back this word,

I know, I know!

I AM the still rain falling,

Too tired for singing mirth—

Oh, be the green fields calling,

Oh, be for me the earth!

I am the brown bird pining

To leave the nest and fly—

Oh, be the fresh cloud shining,

Oh, be for me the sky!

I ASKED the heaven of stars

What I should give my love—

It answered me with silence,

Silence above.

I asked the darkened sea

Down where the fishers go—

It answered me with silence,

Silence below.

Oh, I could give him weeping,

Or I could give him song—

But how can I give silence

My whole life long?

LET it be forgotten as a flower is forgotten,

Forgotten as a fire that once was singing gold,

Let it be forgotten forever and ever,

Time is a kind friend, he will make us old.

If any one asks, say it was forgotten

Long and long ago,

As a flower, as a fire, as a hushed footfall

In a long forgotten snow.