Once my wide world was ideal,
Fair it was—all! very fair.
Wherefore hast thou made it real?
Wherefore is thy image there?
Ah! no more to me is given
Fancy’s far and fairy birth;
Chords upon my lute are riven,
Never more to sound on earth.
Once, sweet music could it borrow
From a look, a word, a tone;
I could paint another’s sorrow—
Now I think but of mine own.
Life’s dark waves have lost the glitter
Which at morning-tide they wore,
And the well within is bitter;
Naught its sweetness may restore:
For I know how vainly given
Life’s most precious things may be,
Love that might have looked on heaven,
Even as it looked on thee.
Ah, farewell!—with that word dying,
Hope and love must perish too.
For thy sake themselves denying,
What is truth with thee untrue
Farewell!—’tis a dreary sentence,
Like the death-doom of the grave,
May it wake in thee repentance,
Stinging when too late to save!
54
