Love's Awakening

SOMETIMES my hair would brush her rosy cheek,
Our hands clasped timidly with touch that thrilled,
Tears trembled in our eye-lids, we were filled
With a strange joy that would not let us speak.

But as in trance we laughed, and silence tense
Followed, while we were listening to the bees
Humming among the flowering elder-trees,
A gold noise in the green, warm somnolence.

And then our lips opened to murmur words
Infinite, which with lips unparted seemed
To sing as with the voice of distant birds,

And, rising like the echo of things dreamed,
Quivered upon our lips, ecstatic, hot ...
But we could only smile, and speak them not.