Poems (Chitwood)/False
For works with similar titles, see False.
FALSE.
"I've been in the world, And my heart hath grown cold;I love thee no more As I loved thee of old.I could list to the songs That once moved me to tears,Without a heart-thrill, For those long-buried years.I could roam in strange lands, And my soul never yearnFor the 'light of the days That can never return.'
"I could sit on the banks Of our old trysting-stream,And of thy lost whispers Have never a dream.I could gather wild roses, So fragile and fair,Nor dream of the garlands I wove for thy hair.I could pass by the elm, With its mosses o'ergrown,And stop not to read The dear name 'neath my own.
"Oh, start not! reprove not! Thy troth thou hast kept;Like a dove in thy bosom In peace it hath slept.I know I am dearer Than others to thee;I know how unworthy, How faithless I be.I know that thy heart Never changed or grew cold;Forgive me, I love thee No more as of old."
Oh! gaily the honest Confession was made:The youth felt the head On his false bosom laid,Slide down to his knee, And the slight little formThrilled, swayed as a primrose In some sudden storm.With the vows of a moment He strove to recallThe spirit that gave To affection its all.
But all was in vain— In day and in night,In silence and darkness, In joy and in light,Henceforth he walked never, Oh! never alone;For a form kept its shadow In one with his own,And anon, through the rustle Of shroud and of moldCame the voice, "Yet I love thee As fond as of old."