Poems (Piatt)/Volume 1/Twelve Hours Apart

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4617741Poems — Twelve Hours ApartSarah Piatt

TWELVE HOURS APART.
He loved me. But he loved, likewise,
This morning's world in bloom and wings;
Ah, does he love the world that lies
In dampness, whispering shadowy things,
  Under this little band of moon?

He loves me? Will he fail to see
A phantom hand has touched my hair
(And wavered, withering, over me)
To leave a subtle greyness there,
  Below the outer shine of June?

He loves me? Would he call it fair,
The flushed half-flower he left me, say!
For it has passed beneath the glare
And from my bosom drops away,
  Shaken into the grass with pain?

He loves me? Well, I do not know.
A song in plumage crossed the hill
At sunrise when I felt him go—
And song and plumage now are still.
  He could not praise the bird again.

He loves me? Veiled in mist I stand,
My veins less high with life than when
To-day's thin dew was in the land,
Vaguely less beautiful than then—
  Myself a dimness with the dim.

He loves me? I am faint with fear.
He never saw me quite so old;
I never met him quite so near
My grave, nor quite so pale and cold
  ———Nor quite so sweet, he says, to him!