I have a friend
And my heart from hence
Is closed to friendship,
Nor the gods’ knees hold but one;
He watches with me thru the long night,
And when I call he comes,
Or when he calls I am there;
He does not ask me how beloved
Are my husband and children,
Nor ever do I require
Details of life and love
In the grave--his home,--
We are such friends.
'Tis you who hold
My heat, my cold,
My rigour and my ecstasy.
Control my days.
Compel my ways
To action or to lethargy.
You fill my nights
With keen delights
Of a stupendous dreaming.
O! Little Seed,
Who at my need
Flowers to such splendid seeming!
I LOVE the stone of your threshold,
I love the path without it,
I love the briar in its borders,
With the brave young plants about it.
There is pleasure in sight of your windows.
And passing, in decorous night,
I smile my love to your window
And bow my love to your light.
I SAID, " I will not go to her to-night,"
When I had courage from the prudent light.
My resolution vanished with the day,
When the dark came I could not live away.
O! My dear Love, let down your hair.
Make me a tent, and let me shelter there;
That in the darkness of a screened night
I live more prudent than in loveless light.
The neighbour sits in his window and plays the flute.
From my bed I can hear him,
And the round notes flutter and tap about the room,
And hit against each other,
Blurring to unexpected chords.
It is very beautiful,
With the little flute-notes all about me,
In the darkness.
In the daytime,
The neighbour eats bread and onions with one hand
And copies music with the other.
He is fat and has a bald head,
So I do not look at him,
But run quickly past his window.
There is always the sky to look at,
Or the water in the well!
When I go away from you
The world beats dead
Like a slackened drum.
I call out for you against the jutted stars
And shout into the ridges of the wind.
Streets coming fast,
One after the other,
Wedge you away from me,
And the lamps of the city prick my eyes
So that I can no longer see your face.
Why should I leave you,
To wound myself upon the sharp edges of the night?
The moon is cold over the sand-dunes.
And the clumps of sea-grasses flow and glitter ;
The thin chime of my watch tells the quarter after midnight ;
And still I hear nothing
But the windy beating of the sea.
Coming to you along the Nihon Embankment,
Suddenly the road was darkened
By a flock of wild geese
Crossing the moon.
The chirping of crickets in the night
Is intermittent.
Like the twinkling of stars.
I shall not be afraid any more.
Either by night or day ;
What would it profit me to be afraid
With you away?
Now I am brave. In the dark night alone
All through the house I go,
Locking the doors and making windows fast
When sharp winds blow.
For there is only sorrow in my heart ;
There is no room for fear.
But how I wish I were afraid again,
My dear, my dear!
A wind rose in the night,
(She had always feared it so!)
Sorrow plucked at my heart
And I could not help but go.
Softly I went and stood
By her door at the end of the hall.
Dazed with grief I watched
The candles flaring and tall.
The wind was wailing aloud:
I thought how she would have cried
For my warm familiar arms
And the sense of me by her side.
The candles flickered and leapt,
The shadows jumped on the wall.
She lay before me small and still
And did not care at all.
Little red apple upon the tree,
If you are not in love, fall in love with me ! . . .
From me this night you shall not go.
Not till the dawn, when the first cocks crow.