And vainly note, with wan regret,
Each star of early promise set;
Till Death relieves, and they forget
      Their one Life’s time!

Westbourne park Villas, 1866.

A MAIDEN’S PLEDGE (SONG)

I do not wish to win your vow
To take me soon or late as bride,
And lift me from the nook where now
I tarry your farings to my side. 
I am blissful ever to abide
In this green labyrinth—­let all be,
If but, whatever may betide,
You do not leave off loving me!

Your comet-comings I will wait
With patience time shall not wear through;
The yellowing years will not abate
My largened love and truth to you,
Nor drive me to complaint undue
Of absence, much as I may pine,
If never another ’twixt us two
Shall come, and you stand wholly mine.

THE CHILD AND THE SAGE

You say, O Sage, when weather-checked,
   “I have been favoured so
With cloudless skies, I must expect
   This dash of rain or snow.”

“Since health has been my lot,” you say,
   “So many months of late,
I must not chafe that one short day
   Of sickness mars my state.”

You say, “Such bliss has been my share
   From Love’s unbroken smile,
It is but reason I should bear
   A cross therein awhile.”

And thus you do not count upon
   Continuance of joy;
But, when at ease, expect anon
   A burden of annoy.

But, Sage—­this Earth—­why not a place
   Where no reprisals reign,
Where never a spell of pleasantness
   Makes reasonable a pain?

December 21, 1908.

MISMET

I

   He was leaning by a face,
   He was looking into eyes,
   And he knew a trysting-place,
   And he heard seductive sighs;
      But the face,
      And the eyes,
      And the place,
      And the sighs,
Were not, alas, the right ones—­the ones meet for him —
Though fine and sweet the features, and the feelings all abrim.

II

   She was looking at a form,
   She was listening for a tread,
   She could feel a waft of charm
   When a certain name was said;
      But the form,
      And the tread,
      And the charm
      Of name said,
Were the wrong ones for her, and ever would be so,
While the heritor of the right it would have saved her soul to know!

AN AUTUMN RAIN-SCENE

There trudges one to a merry-making
      With a sturdy swing,
   On whom the rain comes down.

To fetch the saving medicament
      Is another bent,
   On whom the rain comes down.

One slowly drives his herd to the stall
      Ere ill befall,
   On whom the rain comes down.