| WELL, Helen, quite two years have flown | |
| Since that enchanted, dreamy night, | |
| When you and I were left alone, | |
| And wondered whether they were right, | |
| Who said that each the other loved; | 5 |
| And thus debating, yes and no, | |
| And half in earnest, as it proved, | |
| We bargained to pretend 't was so. | |
| |
| Two sceptic children of the world, | |
| Each with a heart engraven o'er | 10 |
| With broken love-knots, quaintly curled, | |
| Of hot flirtations held before; | |
| Yet, somehow, either seemed to find, | |
| This time, a something more akin | |
| To that young, natural love,—the kind | 15 |
| Which comes but once, and breaks us in. | |
| |
| What sweetly stolen hours we knew, | |
| And frolics perilous as gay! | |
| Though lit in sport, Love's taper grew | |
| More bright and burning day by day. | 20 |
| We knew each heart was only lent | |
| The other's ancient scars to heal: | |
| The very thought a pathos blent | |
| With all the mirth we tried to feel. | |
| |
| How bravely, when the time to part | 25 |
| Came with the wanton season's close, | |
| Though nature with our mutual art | |
| Had mingled more than either chose, | |
| We smothered Love, upon the verge | |
| Of folly, in one last embrace, | 30 |
| And buried him without a dirge, | |
| And turned, and left his resting-place. | |
| |
| Yet often (tell me what it means!) | |
| His spirit steals upon me here, | |
| Far, far away from all the scenes | 35 |
| His little lifetime held so dear; | |
| He comes: I hear a mystic strain | |
| In which some tender memory lies; | |
| I dally with your hair again; | |
| I catch the gleam of violet eyes. | 40 |
| |
| Ah, Helen! how have matters been | |
| Since those rude obsequies, with you? | |
| Say, is my partner in the sin | |
| A sharer of the penance too? | |
| Again the vision 's at my side: | 45 |
| I drop my head upon my breast, | |
| And wonder if he really died, | |
| And why his spirit will not rest. | |
