Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE AFTER-ECHO (2), by HENRY VAN DYKE


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE AFTER-ECHO (2), by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: How long the echoes love to play
Last Line: And touches all the soul to tears.
Alternate Author Name(s): Civis Americanus
Subject(s): Echoes; Memory; Time


How long the echoes love to play
Around the shore of silence, as a wave
Retreating circles down the sand!
One after one, with sweet delay,
The mellow sounds that cliff and island gave,
Have lingered in the crescent bay,
Until, by lightest breezes fanned,
They float far off beyond the dying day
And leave it still as death.
But hark, --
Another singing breath
Comes from the edge of dark;
A note as clear and slow
As falls from some enchanted bell,
Or spirit, passing from the world below,
That whispers back, Farewell.

So in the heart,
When, fading slowly down the past,
Fond memories depart,
And each that leaves it seems the last;
Long after all the rest are flown,
Returns a solitary tone, --
The after-echo of departed years, --
And touches all the soul to tears.





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