| Rupert Brooke (1887–1915). Collected Poems. 1916. |
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| VI. Other Poems |
| 4. The Chilterns |
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| YOUR hands, my dear, adorable, | |
| Your lips of tenderness | |
| —Oh, I’ve loved you faithfully and well, | |
| Three years, or a bit less. | |
| It wasn’t a success. | 5 |
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| Thank God, that’s done! and I’ll take the road, | |
| Quit of my youth and you, | |
| The Roman road to Wendover | |
| By Tring and Lilley Hoo, | |
| As a free man may do. | 10 |
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| For youth goes over, the joys that fly, | |
| The tears that follow fast; | |
| And the dirtiest things we do must lie | |
| Forgotten at the last; | |
| Even Love goes past. | 15 |
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| What’s left behind I shall not find, | |
| The splendour and the pain; | |
| The splash of sun, the shouting wind, | |
| And the brave sting of rain, | |
| I may not meet again. | 20 |
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| But the years, that take the best away, | |
| Give something in the end; | |
| And a better friend than love have they, | |
| For none to mar or mend, | |
| That have themselves to friend. | 25 |
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| I shall desire and I shall find | |
| The best of my desires; | |
| The autumn road, the mellow wind | |
| That soothes the darkening shires. | |
| And laughter, and inn-fires. | 30 |
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| White mist about the black hedgerows, | |
| The slumbering Midland plain, | |
| The silence where the clover grows, | |
| And the dead leaves in the lane, | |
| Certainly, these remain. | 35 |
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| And I shall find some girl perhaps, | |
| And a better one than you, | |
| With eyes as wise, but kindlier, | |
| And lips as soft, but true. | |
| And I daresay she will do. | 40 |
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