We never say, "Good Night;"
For our eager lips are fleeter
Than the tongue, and a kiss is sweeter
Than parting words,
That out like swords;
So we always kiss Good Night.
We never say "Good Night."
Words are precious, love, why lose 'em?
Fold them up in your maiden bosom;
There let them rest,
Like love unconfessed,
While we kiss a sweet Good Night.
There comes a last Good Night.
Human life—not love—is fleeting;
Heaven send many a birth-day greeting;
Dim years roll on
To life's gray-haired dawn,
Ere we kiss our last Good Night.
———
We've kissed our last Good Night!
Love's warm tendrils torn and bleeding,
Vain all human interceding!
Oh, life! how dark!
Its one vital spark
Was quenched with our last GOOD NIGHT!
{135}
HOPELESS.
I think through the long, long evenings,
Such thoughts of intensest pain,
And I hope and watch for her coming,
But I hope and watch in vain,
My life is a long, long journey
Over a barren moor,
With nought but my own dark shadow
Hastening on before.
I'm weary of all this watching,
Aweary of life and thought;
For there's little hope in the distance,
And for peace—I know it not!
Oh, why must we think and shudder,
And shudder and think again?
When life's but a dance of shadows
Haunting a barren plain!
{139}