Is it so long? Do you forget That first and last time that we met? The time was summer; The trees were green; the sky was blue; Our host presented me to you-- A tardy comer. You look’d demure, but when you spoke You made a little, funny joke, Yet half pathetic. Your gown was grey, I recollect, I think you patronized the sect They call “æsthetic.” I brought you strawberries and cream, I plied you long about a stream With duckweed laden; We solemnly discussed the--heat. I found you shy and very sweet, A rosebud maiden. Ah me, to-day! You passed inside To where the marble gods abide: Hermes, Apollo, Sweet Aphrodite, Pan; and where, For aye reclined, a headless fair Beats all fairs hollow. And I, I went upon my way, Well--rather sadder, let us say; The world looked flatter. I had been sad enough before, A little less, a little more, What _does_ it matter? _In a Minor Key._ (AN ECHO FROM A LARGER LYRE.) [Illustration: text decoration] That was love that I had before, Years ago, when my heart was young; Ev’ry smile was a gem you wore, Ev’ry word was a sweet song sung. You came--all my pulses burn’d and beat. (O sweet wild throbs of an early day!) You went--with the last dear sound of your feet The light wax’d dim and the place grew grey. And I us’d to pace with a stealthy tread By a certain house which is under a hill; A cottage stands near, wall’d white, roof’d red-- Tall trees grow thick--I can see it still! How I us’d to watch with a hope that was fear For the least swift glimpse of your gown’s dear fold! (You wore blue gowns in those days, my dear-- One light for summer, one dark for cold.) Tears and verses I shed for you in show’rs; I would have staked my soul for a kiss; Tribute daily I brought you of flow’rs, Rose, lily, your favourite eucharis. There came a day we were doomed to part; There’s a queer, small gate at the foot of a slope: We parted there--and I thought my heart Had parted for ever from love and hope. * * * * * Is it love that I have to-day? Love, that bloom’d early, has it bloom’d late For me, that, clothed in my spirit’s grey, Sit in the stillness and stare at Fate? Song nor sonnet for you I’ve penned, Nor passionate paced by your home’s wide wall; I have brought you never a flow’r, my friend, Never a tear for your sake let fall. And yet--and yet--ah, who understands? We men and women are complex things! A hundred tunes Fate’s inexorable hands May play on the sensitive soul-strings.