| |
| TEN years!—and to my waiting eye | |
| Once more the roofs of Berne appear; | |
| The rocky banks, the terrace high, | |
| The stream,—and do I linger here? | |
| |
| The clouds are on the Oberland, | 5 |
| The Jungfrau snows look faint and far; | |
| But bright are those green fields at hand, | |
| And through those fields comes down the Aar, | |
| |
| And from the blue twin lakes it comes, | |
| Flows by the town, the churchyard fair, | 10 |
| And ’neath the garden-walk it hums, | |
| The house,—and is my Marguerite there? | |
| |
| Ah, shall I see thee, while a flush | |
| Of startled pleasure floods thy brow, | |
| Quick through the oleanders brush, | 15 |
| And clap thy hands, and cry, ’T is thou! | |
| |
| Or hast thou long since wandered back, | |
| Daughter of France! to France, thy home; | |
| And flitted down the flowery track | |
| Where feet like thine too lightly come? | 20 |
| |
| Doth riotous laughter now replace | |
| Thy smile, and rouge, with stony glare, | |
| Thy cheek’s soft hue, and fluttering lace | |
| The kerchief that enwound thy hair? | |
| |
| Or is it over?—art thou dead?— | 25 |
| Dead?—and no warning shiver ran | |
| Across my heart, to say thy thread | |
| Of life was cut, and closed thy span! | |
| |
| Could from earth’s ways that figure slight | |
| Be lost, and I not feel ’t was so? | 30 |
| Of that fresh voice the gay delight | |
| Fail from earth’s air, and I not know? | |
| |
| Or shall I find thee still, but changed, | |
| But not the Marguerite of thy prime? | |
| With all thy being rearranged, | 35 |
| Passed through the crucible of time; | |
| |
| With spirit vanished, beauty waned, | |
| And hardly yet a glance, a tone, | |
| A gesture,—anything,—retained | |
| Of all that was my Marguerite’s own? | 40 |
| |
| I will not know!—for wherefore try | |
| To things by mortal course that live | |
| A shadowy durability | |
| For which they were not meant, to give? | |
| |
| Like driftwood spars which meet and pass | 45 |
| Upon the boundless ocean-plain, | |
| So on the sea of life, alas! | |
| Man nears man, meets, and leaves again. | |
| |
| I knew it when my life was young, | |
| I feel it still, now youth is o’er! | 50 |
| The mists are on the mountains hung, | |
| And Marguerite I shall see no more. | |
| |
