I SAID: "O let me sing the praise Of her who sweetly racks my days, -- Her I adore; Her lips, her eyes, her moods, her ways!" In miseries of pulse and pang I strung my harp, and straightway sang As none before: -- To wondrous words my quavers rang! Thus I let heartaches lilt my verse, Which suaged and soothed, and made disperse The smarts I bore To quiet like a sepulchre's. But, eased, the days that thrilled ere then Lost value; and I ask, O when, And how, restore Those old sweet agonies again! |