Rosemary and Pansies/Farewell
FAREWELL
Farewell! there's music in the sound,
It fits full well the poet's metre;
It wakens thoughts the most profound;
No other on fair lips sounds sweeter.
The sweetest and the saddest word!
How much of meaning it compresses,
How the soul's depths are by it stirred,
What infinite pathos it possesses!
Think what the simple word may mean—
An end of passion and endeavour;
A sodden shifting of the scene
From bright To-day to dark For-ever:
The loss of all we hold most dear,
The loss of love and warm caresses,
The end alike of hope and fear,
The end of all that soothes or blesses!
Yet lightly oft the word we say,
And from it no forebodings borrow,
As though life were a summer's day,
Unvexed by care or pain or sorrow.
Alas! how many sad Farewells
Even in a happy life are taken!
How often sound Death's tolling bells
Our sorrow and regret to waken!
Yet who would choose to be unmoved
When death our dearest from us rendeth?
Or not to love or be beloved
Since all our love in sorrow endeth?
1899