The First Smile

Turn away the profanation
    Of unsympathizing eyes, 
Set with icy speculation
    Where my lily Baby lies,
    Overflowed with phantasies
            Of divinest birth— 
Dreams that down his wordless brain 
Tremble like a golden rain, 
Stirring lip and dimpled cheek
    Into eddies of fine mirth.
            All too fine to speak !

Ah, I see thee, and I fed thee, 
    O thou roseate first Smile!
How thy tiny circles wheel me 
    Up, where cherubs, in long file, 
    All my Baby's thoughts beguile
            With their loving ways.
Shaking down rich flakes of light, 
Feather-like, from winglets bright, 
Round my darling's living bed, 
    Till for joy he closer lays
            To my breast his head!

Sweeter light than ever fluttered,
    Timorous, through the barren sky, 
When the anthems, planet-uttered, 
    Spoke in silence to the eye — 
    Or flashed pale Aurora by,
            In the northern night, 
Bubbles up from spirit deeps, 
And so, fountain-like, o'erleaps 
The sweet mouth and all the form 
    Of my beautiful Delight,
            Flowing out love- warm.

'Tis the flush of new creation, 
    'Tis a Sun-Soul's rolling up,
Pouring light's divine libation 
    Over young Life's brimming cup, 
    As from earth's horizon top 
            Overflows the day.
Dimples open into bloom
In the track its beams illume,
And the odorous wreaths untwist 
    Their dim folds, and float away 
            Like the morning mist.

Ah, thou need'st not wake to tell it
    By the laughing of thine eye, 
Into mine, until thou swell it
    Full with tears of ecstasy, —
    Nor with palms struck daintily,
            Baby! — for thy Dream 
Shone out clearly, through the fresh 
Unopacity of flesh 
New and pure from hands of God,
    As it were a lucid stream
            From a crystal sod.

I have felt the warmer pulses
    Of the hopeful heart of Spring, 
When they bore, with swift revulses,
    Far away, the Frigid King;
    Felt the thrill o' the forward swing
            Of joy's opening gates, 
In my girlhood; and have known — 
Deeper yet — the awakening tone 
Of Love's cithern- voiced call;
    But thy sweet first Smile creates 
            Bliss above them all!

Smile on, Memory-haunted Baby, 
    In the heaven thou hast not left!
And in after years, it may be, 
    Grave Mnemosyne with deft 
    Fingers may untwine the weft
            Of thy wordless thought ;
And some Muse of her's may teach
All thy smiles to flow in speech.
Tempered to the sounding lyre, 
    And with tones celestial, caught
            From the Eternal Choir !