And, going, took the brightness from the place,
Yet left the June day with a sweeter grace,
And my young soul, so steeped in happy dreams,
Heaven itself seemed shown to me in gleams.
There is a time with lovers, when the heart
First slowly rouses from its dreamless sleep,
To all the tumult of a passion life,
Ere yet have wakened jealousy and strife.
Just as a young, untutored child will start
Out of a long hour’s slumber, sound and deep,
And lie and smile with rosy lips and cheeks,
In a sweet, restful trance, before it speaks.
A time when yet no word the spell has broken,
Save what the heart unto the soul has spoken,
In quickened throbs, and sighs but half suppressed
A time when that sweet truth, all unconfessed,
Gives added fragrance to the summer flowers,
A golden glory to the passing hours,
A hopeful beauty to the plainest face,
And lends to life a new and tender grace.
When the full heart has climbed the heights of bliss,
And, smiling, looks back o’er the golden past,
I think it finds no sweeter hour than this
In all love-life. For, later, when the last
Translucent drop o’erflows the cup of joy,
And love, more mighty than the heart’s control,
Surges in words of passion from the soul,
And vows are asked and given, shadows rise
Like mists before the sun in noonday skies,
Vague fears, that prove the brimming cup’s alloy;
A dread of change—the crowning moment’s curse,
Since what is perfect, change but renders worse:
A vain desire to cripple Time, who goes
Bearing our joys away, and bringing woes.
And later, doubts and jealousies awaken,
And plighted hearts are tempest-tossed and shaken.
Doubt sends a test, that goes a step too far,
A wound is made, that, healing, leaves a scar,
Or one heart, full with love’s sweet satisfaction,
Thinks truth once spoken always understood,
While one is pining for the tender action
And whispered word by which, of old, ’twas wooed.
But this blest hour, in love’s glad, golden day,
Is like the dawning, ere the radiant ray
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