Desolate

I strain my worn-out sight across the sea;
I hear the wan waves sobbing on the strand;
My eyes grow weary of the sea and land,
Of the wide deep, and the forsaken lea.
Ah, love, return! ah, love, come back to me! —
As well these ebbing waves I might command
To turn and kiss the moist, deserted sand!
The joy that was, i? not, and cannot be.

The salt shore, furrowed by the foam, smells sweet;
Oh, blest for me, if it were now my lot.
To make this shore my rest, and hear all strife
Die out, like yon tide's faint receding beat:
If he forgot so easily in life,
I may in death forget that he forgot.