Yet they have met. Though not fools of the flock,
On whom love like the tiger gives one bound.
And then the heart is rent—a thunderstroke
That makes men dust before they hear the sound—
A shaft that leaves dark venom in the wound—
A frost that all the buds of manhood nips—
A sea of passion in which true love's drowned—
A demon strangling virtue in his grips—
A day when reason's son is quenched in dread eclipse.
True gentle love is like the summer dew,