Love

Deep in the moving depths
Of yellow wine,
I swore I'd drown your face,
O love of mine;
All clad in yellow hue,
So fair to see,
You crouched within my cup
And laughed at me.

Twice o'er a learned page
I turned and tossed,
For would I not forget
The love I lost.
All stern and robed in gloom,
You read it too,
I could not see the words-
Saw only you.

Within the hungry chase
I thought to kill
You, love, who haunted thus
Without my will,
But in the gentle gaze
Of fawn and deer,
Your eyes disarmed my hand,
And shook my spear.

Beneath a maid's dark lash
I swore you'd drown,
Sink in the laughing blue-
Give in, go down:
But no! you bathë"d there
Right joyously,
And from her liquid eyes
You laughed at me.