Coldness

Clark Ashton Smith

Thy heart will not believe in love:
Therefore is love become to me
A dream resolved to mockery,
And death and life are less than love.

O, bright and beautiful as flame
Thy hair, and pale thy lips, and eyes
Like seas wherein the waning skies
Of autumn lie in paler flame.

Forevermore thy heart abides,
A dreaming crystal, pure and cold,
Amid whose visions manifold
No shape nor any shade abides.

Thy days are void and vain as death:
The moons and morrows weave for thee
A sleep of light eternally,
Where life is as a dream of death.

Chill as white jewels, or the moon,
And virginal as ice or fire,
Thou knowest life and life's desire
As a bright mirror knows the moon.

Lo, if thy heart believed in love,
It were not more or less to me:
I know thy love a mockery,
And all my dreams less vain than love.

Printed from: www.eldritchdark.com./writings/poetry/97
Printed on: October 31, 2024