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AND thou art dead, as young and fair,
As aught of mortal birth;
And form so soft, and charms so rare.

Too soon returned to Earth! Though Earth received them in her bed, And o'er the spot the crowd may tread

In carelessness or mirth,

There is an eye which could not brook
A moment on that grave to look.

I will not ask where thou liest low,
Nor gaze upon the spot;
There flowers or weeds at will may
grow,

So I behold them not:
It is enough for me to prove
That what I loved, and long must love

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The flower in ripened bloom unmatched

Must fall the earliest prey;

Though by no hand untimely snatched,

The leaves must drop away:
And yet it were a greater grief
To watch it withering, leaf by leaf,
Than see it plucked to-day;
Since earthly eye but ill can bear
To trace the change to foul from fair.

I know not if I could have borne
To see thy beauties fade;
The night that followed such a morn
Had worn a deeper shade:
Thy day without a cloud hath passed,
And thou wert lovely to the last :

Extinguished, not decayed;
As stars that shoot along the sky
Shine brightest as they fall from high.

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One vigil o'er thy bed; To gaze, how fondly! on thy face, To fold thee in a faint embrace, Uphold thy drooping head; And show that love, however vain, Nor thou nor I can feel again.

Yet how much less it were to gain,
Though thou hast left me free,
The loveliest things that still remain,
Than thus remember thee!
The all of thine that cannot die
Through dark and dread Eternity
Returns again to me,

And more thy buried love endears
Than aught, except its living years.

IF SOMETIMES IN THE HAUNTS OF MEN.

IF sometimes in the haunts of men Thine image from my breast may fade,

The lonely hour presents again

The semblance of thy gentle shade: And now that sad and silent hour

Thus much of thee can still restore, And sorrow unobserved may pour The plaint she dare not speak before.

Oh, pardon that in crowds awhile

I waste one thought I owe to thee, And, self-condemned, appear to smile, Unfaithful to thy memory! Nor deem that memory less dear,

That then I seem not to repine; I would not fools should overhear One sigh that should be wholly thine.

If not the goblet pass unquaffed,

It is not drained to banish care; The cup must hold a deadlier draught, That brings a Lethe for despair. And could Oblivion set my soul

From all her troubled visions free, I'd dash to earth the sweetest bowl That drowned a single thought of thee.

For wert thou vanished from my mind,

Where could my vacant bosom turn? And who would then remain behind

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