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When Love becomes a stranger
In the temple he has built
Of remembered nights and days,
When he sighs and turns away
From the altar in the temple
With unreturning feet,
When the candles flicker out
And the magical-sweet incense
Vanishes . . .
Do you think there is grief born
In any god's heart?
From On a Grey Thread (Will Ransom, 1923) by Elsa Gidlow. This poem is in the public domain.
If I have wished for skies unscarred by storm,
Shrunk from the grievous bitterness of things,
The days’ perplexities, the nights’ unrest,
The cruel, fruitless beating with clipped wings
The agonies of disillusionment are the growing-pains of Truth
Now I am done with ineffectual dreams,
Kindly play-toys of the unsure years,
And unencumbered, proud and free and light,
With even pulses and a lifting heart,
I mount the future’s twisting stairs.
Stars, turn from your courses,
Stars, stars, I want you,
Spill into my hands.
I have found a new loneliness,
A new strong loneliness,
That no one understands.
I know a new joy, stars,
A joy of the still peak,
The wonder of airs knife-sharp;