"HOW SMALL THE THREAD THAT HOLDS UP HAPPINESS"
How small the thread that holds up happiness;
But one frail life between the dark and me,
Your life, dear love—and here I seem to see
You whimsically smile, that I confess
The whole round world, with its vast energy,
Its summers, and its sunshine, and its aims,
Its splendid hopes, the faith that unquenched, flames
—All sunk into the compass of you and me.
Yes, you are right, the single leaves that fall
Mar not the summer; do I think one leaf
Denudes a forest?—We are nought at all.
Yet the bereaved small bird within the tree
May break its heart above its nest for grief
—And perhaps this must happen, love, to me.