Her word is steadfast, and I know That plighted firm are we: But she has caught new love-calls since She smiled as maid on me! AT A HASTY WEDDING (TRIOLET) IF hours be years the twain are blest, For now they solace swift desire By bonds of every bond the best, If hours be years. The twain are blest Do eastern stars slope never west, Nor pallid ashes follow fire: If hours be years the twain are blest, For now they solace swift desire. THE DREAM-FOLLOWER A DREAM of mine flew over the mead To the halls where my old Love reigns; And it drew me on to follow its lead: And I stood at her window-panes; And I saw but a thing of flesh and bone Speeding on to its cleft in the clay; And my dream was scared, and expired on a moan, And I whitely hastened away. HIS IMMORTALITY I I SAW a dead man’s finer part Shining within each faithful heart Of those bereft. Then said I: “This must be His immortality.” II I looked there as the seasons wore, And still his soul continuously upbore Its life in theirs. But less its shine excelled Than when I first beheld. III His fellow-yearsmen passed, and then In later hearts I looked for him again; And found him—shrunk, alas! into a thin And spectral mannikin. IV Lastly I ask—now old and chill— If aught of him remain unperished still; And find, in me alone, a feeble spark, Dying amid the dark. _February_ 1899. THE TO-BE-FORGOTTEN I I HEARD a small sad sound, And stood awhile amid the tombs around: “Wherefore, old friends,” said I, “are ye distrest, Now, screened from life’s unrest?” II —“O not at being here; But that our future second death is drear; When, with the living, memory of us numbs, And blank oblivion comes! III “Those who our grandsires be Lie here embraced by deeper death than we; Nor shape nor thought of theirs canst thou descry With keenest backward eye. IV “They bide as quite forgot; They are as men who have existed not; Theirs is a loss past loss of fitful breath; It is the second death. V “We here, as yet, each day Are blest with dear recall; as yet, alway In some soul hold a loved continuance Of shape and voice and glance. VI “But what has been will be— First memory, then oblivion’s turbid sea; Like men foregone, shall we merge into those Whose story no one knows. VII