Classic Poem

How lightly up the winding stair
We ran together, she and I;
And still I see her lovely face
Look downward from the landing-place;
For she outsped me. Through the gloom
Of the great hall, into her room,
She led me on that summer day,
In years that fled too quickly by.

I pray you, if you ever pass
This sunken grave, within the grass,
Touch tenderly the crumbling stone,
And say, for me, in undertone —
" O Helen, Helen dear! "

How fair she was, how straight and tall,
My Helen in that far-off day!
Like living things that longed to go,
The curtains fluttered to and fro,
As up and down the room we walked,
Perhaps of love and lovers talked,
As girls have always done, and will,
And nothing whispered " yea " or " nay. "

I pray you, if you ever pass
This sunken grave, within the grass,
Touch tenderly the crumbling stone,
And say, for me, in undertone —
" O Helen, Helen dear! "

What trifling things the heart will keep!
They seem too simple to be told.
That day she lifted from its place
A dainty thing of flowers and lace,
And held it up that I might see.
O little bonnet, plain to me,
Your ribbon streams across the mist,
A shadowy streak of palest gold!

I pray you, if you ever pass
This sunken grave, within the grass,
Touch tenderly the crumbling stone,
And say, for me, in undertone —
" O Helen, Helen dear! "