 | Lyrical Poems |  |
81
THRENOS
Star-crown'd citadels, golden isles in a violet sea,
Heart-stir and music of Hope, the gleam of a glory to be:
Dreams and devotions of youth!—but youth has departed.
Heart-stir and music of Hope, the gleam of a glory to be:
Dreams and devotions of youth!—but youth has departed.
O the exultation and spirit of vague desire!
Tremblings of liquid dawn; horizons of lucid fire!
Something we gain with age: but youth has departed.
Tremblings of liquid dawn; horizons of lucid fire!
Something we gain with age: but youth has departed.
River and race and game, gay leaping of brook and hedge:
Peril on happy heights, and pleasure nearest the edge:
Something we gain as we live: but youth has departed.
Peril on happy heights, and pleasure nearest the edge:
Something we gain as we live: but youth has departed.
82
Fairest of fair ones, seen or unseen, yet alway mine:
Thine was my waking and dreaming, all joy and all sorrow thine:
The real has come as we live; but the vision departed.
Thine was my waking and dreaming, all joy and all sorrow thine:
The real has come as we live; but the vision departed.
Yes, the real is better;—and yet the vision was best!
Having nothing, and yet, by faith, of all things possess'd:
Both we ought to have kept: but youth has departed.
Having nothing, and yet, by faith, of all things possess'd:
Both we ought to have kept: but youth has departed.
Faces we could not see too much: the heart on the lip:
Feet that might stray and stumble; but friendship that could not trip:
Wisdom may come: but the faces of youth have departed.
Feet that might stray and stumble; but friendship that could not trip:
Wisdom may come: but the faces of youth have departed.
Yes, the music I hear of the future, comes flaunting and fast;
Cold and tuneless it sounds before the cry of the past:
Voices and friends of youth, why have ye departed?
Cold and tuneless it sounds before the cry of the past:
Voices and friends of youth, why have ye departed?
83
—Little voices, I hear them, the old old chase pursuing;
In the happy children the world its childhood renewing:
We see your day, and are glad: but youth has departed.
In the happy children the world its childhood renewing:
We see your day, and are glad: but youth has departed.
Little ones, in your eyes the dawn is lucid and gray;
Rosy-finger'd ye come, and golden-hair'd as the day;
Come, and with you bring him, the mourn'd, the departed.
Rosy-finger'd ye come, and golden-hair'd as the day;
Come, and with you bring him, the mourn'd, the departed.
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