| Alfred H. Miles, ed. Women Poets of the Nineteenth Century. 1907. | | | Horæ Amoris: Songs and Sonnets (1903)
IV. To an Instrument | | By Rosa Newmarch (1857–1940) |
| | | OTHERS, before he came with mastery | |
| To set thy stops to choral songs of praise, | |
| Or draw thy subtlest undertones from thee, | |
| Essayed to wake thy spirit in past days. | |
| His touch is stilled for ever. Yet I stand | 5 |
| And listen while thy soulless, fickle keys, | |
| In dull obedience to a stranger’s hand, | |
| For other ears give forth fresh voluntaries. | |
| And some there be, whose hearts thus lightly move | |
| In shallow melody to each new touch, | 10 |
| And deem these mutable vibrations Love. | |
| O Unforgotten, mine is not of such! | |
| |
| My heart shall be like some rare instrument, | |
| Whose strings broke when its only player went. | | | | |
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