II

But if the day should ever rise--
It could not and it cannot be--
Yet, if the sun should ever see,
Looking upon us from his skies,
A day that took thy heart from me;

If loving thee still more and more,
And still so willing to be blind,
I should the bitter knowledge find,
That Time had eaten out the core
Of love, and left the empty rind;

If the poor lifeless words, at last,
(The soul gone, that was once so sweet,)
Should cease my eager heart to cheat,
And crumble back into the past,
And show the whole a vain deceit;

If I should see thee turn away,
And know that prayer, and time, and pain,
Could no more thy lost love regain,
Than bid the hours of dying day
Gleam in their mid-day noon again;

If I should loose thy hand, and know
That henceforth we must dwell apart,
Since I had seen thy love depart,
And only count the hours flow
By the dull throbbing of my heart;

If I should gaze and gaze in vain
Into thine eyes so deep and clear,
And read the truth of all my fear
Half mixed with pity for my pain,
And sorrow for the vanished year;

If not to grieve thee overmuch,
I strove to counterfeit disdain,
And weave me a new life again,
Which thy life could not mar, or touch,
And so smile down my bitter pain;

The ghost of my dead Past would rise
And mock me, and I could not dare
Look to a future of despair,
Or even to the eternal skies,
For I should still be lonely there.

All Truth, all Honour, then would seem
Vain clouds, which the first wind blew by;
All Trust, a folly doomed to die;
All Life, a useless empty dream;
All Love--since thine had failed--a lie.

But see, thy tender smile has cast
My fear away: this thought of mine
Is treason to my Love and thine;
For Love is Life, and Death at last
Crowns it eternal and divine!