Why is there in the least touch of her hands <br />More grace than other women's lips bestow, <br />If love is but a slave in fleshly bands <br />Of flesh to flesh, wherever love may go? <br /> <br />Why choose vain grief and heavy-hearted hours <br />For her lost voice, and dear remembered hair, <br />If love may cull his honey from all flowers, <br />And girls grow thick as violets, everywhere? <br /> <br />Nay! She is gone, and all things fall apart; <br />Or she is cold, and vainly have we prayed; <br />And broken is the summer's splendid heart, <br />And hope within a deep, dark grave is laid. <br /> <br />As man aspires and falls, yet a soul springs <br />Out of his agony of flesh at last, <br />So love that flesh enthralls, shall rise on wings <br />Soul-centred, when the rule of flesh is past. <br /> <br />Then, most High Love, or wreathed with myrtle sprays, <br />Or crownless and forlorn, nor less a star, <br />Thee may I serve and follow, all my days, <br />Whose thorns are sweet as never roses are!<br /><br />Ernest Christopher Dowson<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/quid-non-supremus-amantes/
