Poems (Welby)/I Have a Fair and Gentle Friend

by Amelia Welby

I HAVE A FAIR AND GENTLE FRIEND.

I have a fair and gentle friend,
 Whose heart is pure, I ween,
As ever was a maiden's heart
 At joyous seventeen;
She dwells among us like a star,
 That, from its bower of bliss,
Looks down, yet gathers not a stain
 From aught it sees in this.

I do not mean that flattery
 Has never reached her ear;
I only say its syren song
 Has no effect on her;
For she is all simplicity,
 A creature soft and mild—
Though on the eve of womanhood,
 In heart a very child.

And yet, within the misty depths
 Of her dark dreamy eyes,
A shadowy something, like deep thought,
 In tender sadness lies;
For though her glance still shines as bright,
 As in her childish years,
Its wildness and its lustre, now,
 Are softened down by tears:—

Tears, that steal not from hidden springs
 Or sorrow and regret,
For none but lovely feelings
 In her gentle breast have met,
For every tear, that gems her eye,
 From her young bosom flows,
Like dew-drops from a golden star,
 Or perfume from a rose.

For e'en in life's delicious spring,
 We oft have memories,
That throw around our sunny hearts
 A transient cloud of sighs;
For a wondrous change within the heart
 At that sweet time is wrought,
When on the heart is softly laid
 A spell of deeper thought.

And she has reached that lovely time,
 That sweet poetic age,
When to the eye each floweret's leaf
 Seems like a glowing page;
For a beauty and a mystery,
 About the heart are thrown,
When childhood's merry laughter yields
 To girlhood's softer tone.

I do not know if round her heart
 Love yet hath thrown his wing,
I rather think she's like myself
 An April-hearted thing;
I only know that she is fair,
 And loves me passing well;
But who this gentle maiden is
 I feel not free to tell.