A NOCTURNE.
How oft I feast with the dearest ones, now dead,
Or stroll the gardens through at night,
Indifferent to sleep.
’Tis then our footprints turn to gold,
For these are Love’s eternal hours,
That follow me in loneliness;
How often, when the leaves are listening,
I clasp white hands, I do not feel,
More delicate than touch of moonbeams in the grass;
’Tis then the thoughts arise like incense from a silver bowl.
We never hurry through the flowers,
Or miss the color of a dreaming rose,
Nor kiss too long.
But when the careless dawn comes whispering my name,
And seeking in the ashes grey, that once were fire,
We part;
And this is what has made the silences supreme.