I was reading a letter of yours to-day, <br />The date--O a thousand years ago! <br />The postmark is there--the month was May: <br />How, in God's name, did I let you go? <br />What wonderful things for a girl to say! <br />And to think that I hadn't the sense to know-- <br />What wonderful things for a man to hear! <br />O still beloved, O still most dear. <br /> <br />'Duty' I called it, and hugged the word <br />Close to my side, like a shirt of hair; <br />You laughed, I remember, laughed like a bird, <br />And somehow I thought that you didn't care. <br />Duty!--and Love, with her bosom bare! <br />No wonder you laughed, as we parted there-- <br />Then your letter came with this last good-by-- <br />And I sat splendidly down to die. <br /> <br />Nor Duty, nor Death, would have aught of me: <br />'He is Love's,' they said, 'he cannot be ours;' <br />And your laugh pursued me o'er land and sea, <br />And your face like a thousand flowers. <br />'Tis her gown!' I said to each rustling tree, <br />'She is coming!' I said to the whispered showers; <br />But you came not again, and this letter of yours <br />Is all that endures--all that endures. <br /> <br />These aching words--in your swift firm hand, <br />That stirs me still as the day we met--- <br />That now 'tis too late to understand, <br />Say 'hers is the face you shall ne'er forget;' <br />That, though Space and Time be as shifting sand, <br />We can never part--we are meeting yet. <br />This song, beloved, where'er you be, <br />Your heart shall hear and shall answer me.<br /><br />Richard Le Gallienne<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/an-old-love-letter/
