C.D. Warner, et al., comp.
The Library of the World’s Best Literature. An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.

Invitation

HOW long wilt stand outside and cower?

Come straight within, beloved guest.

The winds are fierce this wintry hour:

Come, stay awhile with me and rest.

You wander begging shelter vainly

A weary time from door to door;

I see what you have suffered plainly:

Come, rest with me and stray no more!

And nestle by me, trusting-hearted;

Lay in my loving hands your head:

Then back shall come your peace departed,

Through the world’s baseness long since fled;

And deep from out your heart upspringing,

Love’s downy wings will soar to view,

The darling smiles like magic bringing

Around your gloomy lips anew.

Come, rest: myself will here detain you,

So long as pulse of mine shall beat;

Nor shall my heart grow cold and pain you,

Till carried to your last retreat.

You gaze at me in doubting fashion,

Before the offered rapture dumb;

Tears and still tears your sole expression:

Bedew my bosom with them—come!