Poems (Curwen)/St. Valentine

by Annie Isabel Curwen

St. Valentine.

O Valentine! Saint Valentine!
The lamp burns dimly in thy shrine;
And, year by year, must we confess,
Thy votaries are growing less?

Has Cupid found more potent arts?
Or modern men got harder hearts?
Or the "new woman" put to rout
The sentiment that's dying out?

Or does thy waning light presage
The dawn of a prosaic age?
Or do the hurrying crowds decline,
To seek thy favours, Valentine?

Ah me! but in the race for gold
Minds get warped and hearts grow cold;
And fair maids wait, with eyes ashine,
In vain for somebody's Valentine.

"'Tis a foolish custom," most folks say,
But many will recall to-day
With a little thrill, a smile, or sigh,
Their Valentines of days gone by.