For one last time my thought embraces
Your image, all but lost to me;
The heart with wistful longing traces
A dream that hour on hour effaces,
And dwells upon love’s memory.
Our years roll onward, swiftly changing;
They change, and we change in the end—
Far from your poet you are ranging,
And darkness like the tomb’s, estranging,
Has drawn you from that passionate friend.
This heart its leave of you has taken;
Accept, my distant dear, love’s close,
As does the wife death leaves forsaken,
As does the exile’s comrade, shaken
And mute, who clasps him once, and goes.