I saw his fool's bauble. I knew his old grief.
I knew that old greenwood and the shadow that haunted it,—
My fool, my lost jester, my Shadow-of-a-Leaf!
And "why," I said, "why, all this while, have you left me so
Luckless in melody, lonely in mirth?"
"Oh, why," he sang, "why has this world then bereft me so
Soon of my Marian, so long laid in earth?
"In the years that are gone," he said, "love was more fortunate.
Grief was our minstrel of things that endure.
Now, ashes and dust and this world grow importunate.