HOW IT HAPPENED.
I pray you pardon me, Elsie,
And smile that frown away
That dims the light of your lovely face
As thunder clouds the day.
For on the spur of the instant,
Before I thought, ’twas done,
And those great gray eyes flashed bright and cold,
Like an icicle in the sun.
I was thinking of the summer
When we were boys and girls,
And wandering in the blossoming woods,
And the gay winds romped with your curls;
And you seemed to me the same little girl
I kissed in the elder-path.
I kissed the little girl’s lips, and, alas!
I have roused a woman’s wrath.
There is not much to pardon,
For why were your lips so red?
The blonde curls fell in a shower of gold
From the proud, provoking head,
And the beauty that flashed from the splendid eyes
And played round the tender mouth
Rushed over my soul like a warm, sweet wind
That blows from the fragrant South.
And where, after all, is the harm done?
I believe we were made to be gay,
And all of youth not given to love
Is vainly squandered away,
And strewn through life-long labors,
Like gold in the desert sands,
Are love’s swift kisses and sighs and vows,
And the clasp of clinging hands.
And when you are old and lonely,
In memory’s magic shrine
You will see on your thin and wasting hands,
Like gems, those kisses of mine;
And when you muse at evening,
At the sound of some vanished name,
The ghost of my kisses shall touch your lips
And kindle your heart to flame.
John Hay.
