Against Death,
Warrior-girl, let us go, let us battle ...
Against great Death, the foe, foe,
Let us wheel our battle-chariot wing'd with song's white horses
And charge the slants of the sky dashing against the dragon ...

Veering we wheel, the blade of glory flashing,
And my young hair-streaming love is my charioteer in the heavens ...
" Death unto Death," she shouts, nerving me with unslayable daring ...
Up against the monster we go, and a day and a night we battle ...

Ho, we shall hack the horror

When that your beauty
Shines and is the opening of waters in the sunrise,
When that in my arms you begin to glow with a deathlessness of glory,
My heart aches, my heart aches ...

Death is my worst enemy: he is the black foe:
He is blind to the gazing of these beautiful eyes,
And deaf to the music of these lips,
He has no mercy for moon-gold hair,
And no pity for these delicate light hands ...

Great must our passion be, to conquer him:
Great must our love be ...

In an old square, in an old city square
Autumn is passing through us,
And we are in love ...

We are in love's deep passion, and sighing, we dream
The moon up, and the stars out, and the tree-tops into song.
We dream a city into being beyond the iron gratings,
An ancient moon-lamp'd city, maybe in Asia,
Where lovers kissed and Solomon sang ...

We dream the mighty top of the tower piercing golden into the heaven
Where a pebble falls in that pool of sky
And circles of silver bell-ripples widen and run
Dropping a silver chime ...

Again great song
Bubbles her stars in the pebbly spring of my spirit ...
And I am on my knees in praise
Because love, quick love, is leaping again
Like a babe, like a bird, like a brook ...

The time of Indian Summer is here,
The hazy sun and the mellow air,
Yellow leaves that drink of the golden,
Drink of the glow of the dream-gold city ...

For the city is a dream
That Golden Bird and I are dreaming ...
We babble new songs in secret as we pass among the people ...
We laugh a secret laughter in the drifting Indian Summer ...

I have been felled by beauty ...
O the amazed wonder of my soul ...
The wild-rose wonder, and wine-wonder, and moon-wonder ...

I have been snared by a white body with pointed breasts and the curves that only water and song can echo ...

The golden manacles of love on my wrists and ankles have given me freedom ...

Fire-dance of wonder! Star-dance of joy!
Such is my beloved, such is my love ...

How wonderful is love,
And how wonderful, how wonderful,
How wonderful is the belov'd ...

O my heart, melt in my body in that miracle by which blood turns into wine,
And the wine of passion becomes a music,
And the music is love ...

Let me be an instrument, let me be a stringed instrument, a violin,
And let the god breathe on it, breath of the deeps, breath of those windy stars that dance with immortal feet where all is light,
That the song of my body enter the belov'd with divine pulsations ...

Like a golden storm
That has blown me bodily through eternal days
Love came, song-circled and star-windy ...

But now?
I stand in the clear hard afternoon, and I am one
Remembering madness ... searching the west for the gone glory ...

Where am I now, alone?
And where is Golden Bird?
And where the abyss of vision, and the plighting, and immortal promises?
Where are those moments when death seemed conquered
And we dreamed our love everlasting?

O love, O love,
Is this all that thou art?

O Miracle of love —
I came clamorously conquering ...
I conquered the God for love of whom I went a weakling,
For love of whom I crawled and crept,
Whose shelter and strong protection I craved ...

Mighty monster, I conquered him. . . .

Lo, then, he appeared before me as a maiden,
Yea, as a Divine Child ...

And now at last, I surrendered to love ...
I stooped down and knelt: I cried, " My soul, lead me, I follow" ...
I cried: " I that am above thee, thy conqueror, willingly become thy slave" ...

If like your kinswoman of old,
If like that star of maidens, Pocahontas,
You found me, O my beloved, near to death,
Found me with my head laid on the stones, and the brute war-clubs raised above me,
Then, Golden Bird, I know that, never faltering, never trembling
You, too, O Star of Maidens,
Would take my head into your arms and lay your lovely head on mine,
And save me from great death in the dark moment.

Let now my soul
Ascend with the song of glorious love to the skies of the morning,
Let now my lark-soul, sun of the darkness, dawn toward the sun of the day,
Earth is too narrow: give me a sky to sing in:
Give me a sky for a golden love-song ...

I arose from the bed of night and from the arms of my beloved in the darkness:
I arose: I tasted resurrection:
The god, struggling in my breast, became a lark ...
" This is what the Earth means," I cried,
" Why our planet goes with singing down the sky-road of the stars."