Classic Poem

Think not of me amid the crowd
Where with her finery and her bells
The fashion of the world is loud,
And woman shows the charms she sells.

I would not have my image rise
Among those phantoms of the street,
That pirouette like a pack of flies
And idly as they came retreat.

Give them a glance and let them pass,
Forgot as they were born to be,
But in their multitudinous mass,
O lady! never mingle me.

Rather in life's lone hour, dear love!
And thy still chamber's inmost place,
Set in thy thought my bust above
All other forms and every face;

Or when thy cheek is dewed with tears
On some dark day when friends depart,
When life before thee seems all fears
And all remembrance one long smart,

Then in the secret sacred cell
Thy soul keeps for her hour of prayer,
Breathe but my name, that I may dwell
Part of thy worship alway there.