passion-flower died;--my heart is tir'd
With the troublesome sudden thoughts that spring;
And mine eyes are filling with foolish tears,
And the pang that I feel is sharp and keen,
As I see the empty unhappy years,
And I think of all that might _not_ have been.

* * * * *

Treason to love, that such thoughts should arise!
In Heaven I _know_ our marriage was made;
Heaven _is_ somewhere beyond those blue skies,
Why am I weeping and feeling afraid?

Happy the angels, who tenderly plan
These beautiful compacts to glorify man!
Happy the man and the woman who take
Humbly their crown for the dear angels' sake!

Love in our hearts giving strength to endure,
Eternal itself, makes eternity sure;
Earth growing perfect, unspeakably dear,
Only makes heaven seem yet more near.

Why do I tremble in fanciful doubt?
All things--or nothing--had brought it about;
Whatever might happen, _I must_ be his;
What signifies _talking_, since _so it is_?

So there came the last of the careless days:
Did time in the very same manner move?
(My heart almost stops in a mute amaze
To think that it ever was _not_ in love.)

Up in the morning, as gay as a lark,
With a glad good-bye to the pleasant night;
Without an idea I am in the dark,
Or that just beyond is the real light;

Running down stairs, with a laugh as I ran,
Free as 'the blossom that hangs on the bough'--
I never had given a thought to a man,
And why in the world should I give one now.

Dancing along through the hawthorn-crown'd lane,
'Neath showers of flowers whose name I bear,
Was it not strange I should find Harry Vane
Coming to meet me just then and just there?

Is it for this our two lives have been led,
Each travelling on its different way,
To meet with the blue sky over our head
Shaded by delicate blossoms of may?

Little reck'd I whom I happened to meet,
That I had a lover I never guess'd,
As I danc'd along with my careless feet,
And the heart of a child within my breast.

I had seen him a dozen times before,
With a pleasure that brought no sudden change;
I knew that he lik'd me--but nothing more:
O Harry! to think of it _is_ so strange!

Sauntering on with the birds and the flowers,
Talking of things that we know or we knew--
Of the pretty wishes that once were ours
In long-ago times when our years were few: