Light and darkness, brown and fair, Ha! they think I do not see,— I behind them, swiftly rowing. Rowing? Yes, but eyes are free, Eyes and fancies:— Now what fire in looks and glances! Now the dark head bends, grown bolder. Ringlets mingle—silence—broken (All unconscious of beholder) By a kiss! What could lovers ask or miss In such moonlight, such June weather, But a boat like this, (me rowing!) And forever and together To be floating? Ah! if she and I such boating Might but share one day, some fellow With strong arms behind, Pasquale, Or Luigi, with gay awning, (She likes yellow!) She—I mean Pepita—mellow Moonlight on the waves, no other To break silence or catch whispers, All the love which now I smother Told and spoken,— Listened to, a kiss for token: How, my Signor? What! so soon Homeward bound? We, born of Venice, Live by night and nap by noon. If 'twere me, now, With my brown-eyed girl, this prow Would not turn for hours still; But the Signor bids, commands, I am here to do his will, He is master. Glide we on; so, faster, faster. Now the two are safely landed. Buono mano, grazie, Signor, They who love are open-handed. Now, Pepita!

III

TORCELLO

She has said "yes," and the world is a-smite. There she sits as she sat in my dream; There she sits, and the blue waves gleam, And the current bears us along the while For happy mile after happy mile, A fairy boat on a fairy stream. The Angelus bells siring to and fro, And the sunset lingers to hear their swell, For the sunset loves such music well. A big, bright moon is hovering low, Where the edge of the sky is all aglow, Like the middle heart of a red, red shell. The Lido floats like a purple flower; Orange and rose are the sails at sea; Silk and pink the surf-line free Tumbles and chimes, and the perfect hour Clasps us and folds us in its power, Folds us and holds us, my love and me. Can there be sadness anywhere In the world to-night? Or tears or sighs Beneath such festal moon and skies? Can there be memory or despair? What is it, beloved? Why point you there, With sudden dew in those dearest eyes? Yes! one sad thing on the happy earth! Like a mourner's veil in the bridal array, Or a sorrowful sigh in the music gay, A shade on the sun, in the feast a dearth, Drawn like a ghost across our way, Torcello sits and rebukes our mirth. She sits a widow who sat as queen, Ashes on brows once crowned and bright; Woe in the eyes once full of light; Her sad, fair roses and manifold green, All bitter and pallid and heavy with night, Are full of the shadows of woes unseen. Let us hurry away from her face unblest, Row us away, for the song is done, The Angelus bells cease, one by one, Pepita's head lies on my breast; But, trembling and full of a vague unrest, I long for the morrow and for the sun.

MY RIGHTS

Yes, God has made me a woman, And I am content to be Just what He meant, not reaching out For other things, since He Who knows me best and loves me most has ordered this for me. A woman, to live my life out In quiet womanly ways, Hearing the far-off battle, Seeing as through a haze The crowding, struggling world of men fight through their busy days. I am not strong or valiant, I would not join the fight Or jostle with crowds in the highways To sully my garments white; But I have rights as a woman, and here I claim my right. The right of a rose to bloom In its own sweet, separate way, With none to question the perfumed pink And none to utter a nay If it reaches a root or points, a thorn, as even a rose-tree may. The right of the lady-birch to grow, To grow as the Lord shall please, By never a sturdy oak rebuked, Denied nor sun nor breeze, For all its pliant slenderness, kin to the stronger trees. The right to a life of my own,— Not merely a casual bit Of somebody else's life, flung out That, taking hold of it, I may stand as a cipher does after a numeral writ. The right to gather and glean What food I need and can From the garnered store of knowledge Which man has heaped for man, Taking with free hands freely and after an ordered plan. The right—ah, best and sweetest!— To stand all undismayed Whenever sorrow or want or sin Call for a woman's aid, With none to call or question, by never a look gainsaid. I do not ask for a ballot; Though very life were at stake, I would beg for the nobler justice That men for manhood's sake Should give ungrudgingly, nor withhold till I must fight and take. The fleet foot and the feeble foot Both seek the self-same goal, The weakest soldier's name is writ On the great army-roll, And God, who made man's body strong, made too the woman's soul

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