 | Annus Amoris |  |
37
FOR PITY'S SAKE.
Sweet! I have seen a river's barren bed,With just one line of heaven-reflecting light,
That once from a pure bubbling fountain-head
Had bounded onward with a loving might.
Hast thou not felt from death a cruel shock,
When life to thee so rich in joy seemed dry
And desolate of verdure as a rock?
As river's bed and barren rock, so I,
Denied of thee to sing, am hard and cold
And out of tune with all the beauteous world.
O life so dead! O youth so passing old!
O barren present! memory far hurled
From happy thought embracing fleeting time,—
If Love may not, let Pity give me rhyme.
| Annus Amoris | |