The Return Home, 42

As the gleaming moon is piercing
Through the darksome clouds above,
So from out time’s darksome mirror
Peeps a vision full of love.

All upon the deck were sitting,
Proudly sailing down the Rhine,
And the shores, in summer verdure,
In the setting sun did shine.

Thoughtfully was I reclining,
Bent before a lovely maid;
In her beauteous, pallid features
Lo, the golden sunlight play’d.

Lutes were sounding, youths were singing,
Wondrous was our joy that day;
And the heavens became still bluer,
And our souls soar’d high away.

Hills and castles, woods and meadows,
Like a vision fleeted by,
And I saw them all reflected
In the lovely maiden’s eye.