To be the theme of every hour The heart devotes to fancy's power, When her soft magic fills the mind With friends and joys we've left behind, And joys return and friends are near, And all are welcomed with a tear! In the mind's purest seat to dwell, To be remember'd oft and well By one whose heart, though vain and wild, By passion led, by youth beguiled, Can proudly still aspire to know The feeling soul's divinest glow! If thus to live in every part Of a lone weary wanderer's heart; If thus to be its sole employ Can give thee one faint gleam of joy, Believe it, Mary! oh, believe A tongue that never can deceive, When passion doth not first betray And tinge the thought upon its way! In pleasure's dream or sorrow's hour, In crowded hall or lonely bower, The business of my life shall be, For ever to remember thee! And though that heart be dead to mine, Since love is life and wakes not thine, I'll take thy image, as the form Of something I should long to warm, Which, though it yield no answering thrill, Is not less dear, is lovely still! I'll take it, wheresoe'er I stray, The bright, cold burthen of my way! To keep this semblance fresh in bloom, My heart shall be its glowing tomb, And Love shall lend his sweetest care, With memory to embalm it there! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A SOLILOQUY; OCCASIONED BY THE CHIRPING OF A GRASSHOPPER by WALTER HARTE AIRLY BEACON by CHARLES KINGSLEY TO HELEN KELLER by TOSCAN BENNETT TO LOVE IS TO BE BORN ANEW by MARION LOUISE BLISS THE NEW MOON by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN THE BRAES O' BALLOCHMYLE by ROBERT BURNS TOWARDS DEMOCRACY: PART 4. NOT THE ACCEPTED TIME by EDWARD CARPENTER |