The Symbol Seduces

THERE in her old-world garden smiles
A symbol of the world’s desire,
Striving with quaint and lovely wiles
To bind to earth the soul of fire.

And while I sit and listen there,
The robe of Beauty falls away
From universal things to where
Its image dazzles for a day.

Away! the great life calls; I leave
For Beauty, Beauty’s rarest flower;
For Truth, the lips that ne’er deceive;
For Love, I leave Love’s haunted bower.