And do you mind that sunny day,
When he, as on the sward he lay,
Told of Lassalle who bore away
The false Louise?
Thrice-favoured bard! to him alone
That green and snug retreat was shown,
Where to the vulgar herd unknown,
Our pens we plied.
(For, in those distant days, it seems,
We cherished sundry idle dreams,
And with our flowing foolscap reams
The Fates defied.)
And after, when the day was gone,
And the hushed, silver night came on,
He showed us where the glow-worm shone;—
We stooped to see.
There, too, by yonder moon we swore
Platonic friendship o’er and o’er;
No folk, we deemed, had been before
So wise and free.
* * * * * * *
And do I sigh or smile to-day?
Dead love or dead ambition, say,
Which mourn we most? Not much we weigh
Platonic friends.
On you the sun is shining free;
Our Poet sleeps in Italy,
Beneath an alien sod; on me
The cloud descends.
UNWIN BROTHERS, LONDON, E.C.
