Classic Poem

A REJECTED LOVER.

You " never loved me, " Ada.
These slow words,
Dropp'd softly from your gentle woman-tongue
Out of your true and kindly woman-heart,
Fell, piercing into mine like very swords
The sharper for their kindness.
Yet no wrong
Lies to your charge, nor cruelty, nor art,
Ev'n while you spoke, I saw the tender tear-drop start.
You " never loved me. "
No, you never knew,
You, with youth's morning fresh upon your soul,
What't is to love: slow, drop by drop, to pour
Our life's whole essence, perfumed through and through
With all the best we have or can control
For the libation - cast it down before
Your feet — then lift the goblet, dry for evermore.
I shall not die as foolish lovers do:
A man's heart beats beneath this breast of mine,

7'3 The breast where —
Curse on that fiend-whispering
" It might have been! " - Ada, I will be true
Unto myself- the self that so loved thine:
May all life's pain, like these few tears that spring
For me. glance off as rain-drops from my white dove's wing!
May you live long, some good man's bosom-flower,
And gather children round your matron knees:
So, when all this is past, and you and I
Remember each our youth-days as an hour
Of joy — or anguish, one, serene, at ease,
May come to meet the other's stedfast eye,
Thinking, " He loved me well! " clasp hands, and so pass by.