Some day I shall rise and leave my friends <br />And seek you again through the world’s far ends, <br />You whom I found so fair <br />(Touch of your hands and smell of your hair!), <br />My only god in the days that were. <br />My eager feet shall find you again, <br />Though the sullen years and the mark of pain <br />Have changed you wholly; for I shall know <br />(How could I forget having loved you so?), <br />In the sad half-light of evening, <br />The face that was all my sunrising. <br />So then at the ends of the earth I’ll stand <br />And hold you fiercely be either hand, <br />And seeing your age and ashen hair <br />I’ll curse the thing that once you were, <br />Because it is changed and pale and old <br />(Lips that were scarlet, hair that was gold!), <br />And I loved you before you were old and wise, <br />When the flame of youth was strong in your eyes, <br />—And my heart is sick with memories.<br /><br />Rupert Brooke<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-beginning-4/
