Classic Poem

When we, who walk in paths unneighbourly,
Beyond the gateway of the grave shall meet,
I shall make answer, as you pause & greet,
— Of all life's gifts what gifts have you for me?
Like masks across a crowded ballroom, we
Stumbled through life with unfamiliar feet,
And passed each other as strangers in the street,
Yet all the while you held my soul in fee! —

— Behold my gifts, the sunset none but I
Remembered, or the book none other read;
The picture that I treasured for your eye;
And, last of all, these bitterest tears unshed —
Take them! but, if you bring no gift, go by,
And leave me doubly dead among the dead. —