Under Her Balcony

by Frank Dempster Sherman

Up, slender vine, your love is mine;
I watch you as you go,
A lyric budding line on line
With blossom-rhymes a-row!
Up, up, until her window-sill,
Like Heaven's gate in sight,
Makes all your heart with hope to fill
And bloom with its delight!

And when her eyes' soft twilight lies
Upon you nestled there,
When all about you is surprise,
And all below, despair,
Then to my Sweet, my love repeat;
Yield her one perfect bloom,
Which, though it perish at her feet,
May, ghostlike, haunt her room.

But if her mind and heart be kind,
And grant you gracious rest,
And for this gift a pillow find,
And fold it to her breast, --
Up, up! I burn my fate to learn
From her who waits above;
Let but a leaf to earth return, --
Her answer and her love!