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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


A LOST MEMORY by PHILIP C. PECK

First Line: LISTENING IN THE TWILIGHT, VERY LONG AGO
Last Line: SOME ONE SANG AT TWILIGHT, VERY SWEET AND LOW.
Subject(s): MEMORY;

LISTENING in the twilight, very long ago,
To a sweet voice singing very soft and low.

Was the song a ballad of a lady fair,
Saved from deadly peril by a bold corsair,

Or a song of battle and a flying foe?
Nay, I have forgotten, 'tis so long ago.

Scarcely half remembered, more than half forgot,
I can only tell you what the song was not.

Memory, unfaithful, has not kept that strain,
Heard once in the twilight, never heard again.

Every day brings twilight, but no twilight brings
To my ear that music on its quiet wings.

After autumn sunsets, in the dreaming light,
When long summer evenings deepen into night,

All that I am sure of, is that, long ago,
Some one sang at twilight, very sweet and low.



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