When I was one-and-twenty
I heard him say again,
"The heart out of the bosom
Was never given in vain;
'Tis paid with sighs a plenty
And sold for endless rue."
And I am two-and-twenty,
And oh, 'tis true, 'tis true.
Alfred Edward Housman [1859-1936]
"GRIEVE NOT, LADIES"
Oh, grieve not, Ladies, if at night
Ye wake to feel your beauty going;
It was a web of frail delight,
Inconstant as an April snowing.
In other eyes, in other lands,
In deep fair pools new beauty lingers;
But like spent water in your hands
It runs from your reluctant fingers.
You shall not keep the singing lark
That owes to earlier skies its duty.
Weep not to hear along the dark
The sound of your departing beauty.
The fine and anguished ear of night
Is tuned to hear the smallest sorrow:
Oh, wait until the morning light!
It may not seem so gone to-morrow.
But honey-pale and rosy-red!
Brief lights that make a little shining!
Beautiful looks about us shed—
They leave us to the old repining.
Think not the watchful, dim despair
Has come to you the first, sweet-hearted!
For oh, the gold in Helen's hair!
And how she cried when that departed!