Classic Poem

I wonder, can the night go by,
Can this shot arrow of travel fly
Shaft-golden with light, sheer into the sky
Of a dawned to-morrow,
Without ever sleep delivering us
From each other, or loosing the dolorous
And turgid sorrow!

What is it then that you can see,
That at the window endlessly
You watch the red sparks whirl and flee
And the night look through?
Your presence peering lonelily there
Oppresses me so, I can hardly bear
To share the night with you

You hurt my heart-beat's privacy;
I wish I could put you away from me;
I suffocate in this intimacy
In which I half love you;
How I have longed for this night in the train!
Yet now every fibre of me cries in pain
To God to remove you!

Though surely my soul's best dream is still
That a new night pouring down shall swill
Us away in an utter sleep, until
We are one, smooth-rounded!
Yet closely bitten in to me
Is this armour of stiff reluctancy,
And my dream is ill-founded.

So, Helen, when another night
Comes on us, lift your fingers white
And strip me naked, touch me light
Light, light all over.
For I ache most earnestly for your touch,
Yet I cannot move, however much
I would be your lover.

Night after night with a blemish of day
Unblown and unblossomed has withered away;
Come another night, come a new night, say
Will you pluck it apart?
Will you open the amorous, aching bud
Of my body, and loose the essential flood
That would pour to you from my heart?