Past Friends

Are there such things as friends that pass away?
When each fresh opening season of our life,
Through the dim-struggling crowd and weary strife,
Brings kindred spirits nigh, whom we would pray
Might live with us, and by our death-bed stay,
Do these, our chosen ones, sink down at last
Into the common grave of visions past?
Ah! there are few men in the world can say
They had a dream which they do not dream still;
Few fountains in the heart which cease to play,
When those, whose touch evoked them at their will,
Sit there no more: and I my dreams fulfil,
When to high heaven my tongue still nightly bears
Old names, like broken music, in my prayers.