Alice Meynell

To O——, of Her Dark Eyes

Across what calm of tropic seas,
    'Neath alien clusters of the nights,
Looked, in the past, such eyes as these!
    Long-quenched, relumed, ancestral lights!

The generations fostered them;
    And steadfast Nature, secretwise—
Thou seedling child of that old stem—
    Kindled anew thy dark-bright eyes.

Was it a century or two
    This lovely darkness rose and set,
Occluded by grey eyes and blue,
    And Nature feigning to forget?

Some grandam gave a hint of it—
    So cherished was it in thy race,
So fine a treasure to transmit
    In its perfection to thy face.

Some father to some mother's breast
    Entrusted it, unknowing. Time
Implied, or made it manifest,
    Bequest of a forgotten clime.

Hereditary eyes! But this
    Is single, singular, apart:—
New-made thy love, new-made thy kiss,
    New-made thy errand to my heart.