Poems (Clark)/Reunited

by Annie Maria Lawrence Clark

REUNITED

Once in the years that are past and gone,
 When my life was but just begun,
I walked alone by a surging flood,
 In the light of the setting sun.

I had stood by the brink of a moss—grown spring
 With my friend in the early morn,
When the earth was gay with the dancing light
 Of a day that was newly born.

Our hands were clasped o'er the narrow stream
 That rippled away from the spring;
And our feet kept time to its merry song,—
 Life seemed such a gladsome thing.

So hand in hand we traversed our way,
 With never a shadow of fear;
The birds were gay, and the flowers were sweet,
 And each unto each was so near.

But the hours crept on, and the stream grew wide,
 While unloosed were the friendly hands,
And a silence settled where we two walked
 Apart o'er the wave—washed sands.

Since then the years, with their clouds and shine,
 Their joys and their pains, have fled;
And many the gladsome songs we've sung,
 And many the tears we've shed.

But the river of silence has rolled between,
 And never a bridge we found
O'er which we could cross for a friendly word,
 As the years circled round and round.

Till one yesterday over the meadows fair,
 And over the river's tide,
Where Memory lifted her stepping stones,
 My friend came again to my side.

And kind once more were our spoken words,
 And glad was our grasp of hands;
The river speeds on, but we once more stand
 On friendship's golden sands.

And up from my heart wells a song of praise,
 I whisper it o'er and o'er,
"The silence is broken, the stream is spanned,
 My friend is my friend once more."