At dusk there fell a shower:
The leaves were dripping yet:
Each fern and rain-weighed flower
Around was gleaming wet,
When, through the evening glower,
His feet towards her were set.
The dust’s damp odor sifted
Around him, cool with rain,
Mixed with the musk that drifted
From woodland and from plain,
Where white her garden lifted
Its pickets down the lane.
And there she stood! ’mid scattered
Clove-pink and pea and whorl
Of honeysuckle,—flattered
To sweetness wild,—a girl,
O’er whom the clouds hung shattered
In moonlit peaks of pearl.
She made the night completer
For him; and earth and air,
In that small spot, far sweeter
Than heaven or anywhere.—
Swift were his lips to greet her,
Her lips love lifted there.