Three-Fold
Somewhere I’ve read a thoughtful mind’s reflection:
'All perfect things are three-fold’; and I know
Our love has the rare symbol of perfection;
The brain’s response, the warm blood’s rapturous glow,
The soul’s sweet language, silent and unspoken.
All these unite us with a deathless tie.
For when our frail, clay tenement is broken,
Our spirits will be lovers still, on high.
My dearest wish, you speak before I word it.
You understand the workings of heart.
My soul’s thought, breathed where only God has heard it,
You fathom with your strange divining art.
And Like a fire, that cheers, and lights, and blesses,
And floods a mansion full of happy heat,
So does the subtle warmth of your caresses,
Pervade me with rapture, keen as sweet.
And so sometimes, as you and I together
Exult in all dear love’s three-fold delights,
I cannot help but vaguely wonder whether
When our free souls attain their spirit heights,
E’en if we reach that upper realm where God is,
And find the tales of heavenly glory true,
I wonder if we shall not miss our bodies,
And long, at times, for hours on earth we knew.
As now, we sometimes pray to leave our prison
And soar beyond all physical demands,
So may we not sigh, when we have arisen,
For just one old-time touch of lips and hands?
I know, dear heart, a thought like this seems daring
Concerning God’s vast Government above,
Yet, even There, I shrink from wholly sparing
One element, from this, our Three-fold Love.
Other works by Ella Wheeler Wilcox...
