SONNET VI.
Like Summer-birds, when Summer-hours are fled:
Like Summer-skies when Autumn-clouds are nigh:
So from my heart did Hope, the watcher, fly,
When in thy arms my darling girl lay dead.
O fatal bolt! and all too surely sped:
Yet sadder far when in her love-lit eye
I saw the smile of recognition die,
And felt the death-damp on her fair young head.
If Love renewed have ever safe return
To its far bourne, what matters it which way
Our scarce-fledged hopes and blighted joys have fled?
Or why is it that we cannot discern
This last great truth, that our best treasures lie
Beyond the silent barriers of the dead?