University of Virginia Library


134

II. TO E.—1.

[_]

Written in early youth.

Sweet tears commingling with our youthful smiles
Made them more balmy in life's happy dawn:
Ah, friend belovèd, whither is it gone,
That power whose infant tenderness beguiles
Our childhood's sorrows with its lovely wiles?
Still lies the dew upon our own green lawn;
The peaceful gleam can never be withdrawn
From yon dim lake, and all its glistening isles:
Yet on all these how vainly do we gaze
Seeking for something nowhere to be found;
And in the wind we listen for a sound
That now is buried with departed days;
And wonder at the smiles that strangely pass
Over the tears that lie on either wildered face.