Dear love, if you and I could sail away, <br />With snowy pennons to the wind unfurled, <br />Across the waters of some unknown bay, <br />And find some island far from all the world; <br /> <br />If we could dwell there, ever more alone, <br />While unrecorded years slip by apace, <br />Forgetting and forgotten and unknown <br />By aught save native song-birds of the place; <br /> <br />If Winter never visited that land, <br />And Summer's lap spilled o'er with fruits and flowers, <br />And tropic trees cast shade on every hand, <br />And twinèd boughs formed sleep-inviting bowers; <br /> <br />If from the fashions of the world set free, <br />And hid away from all its jealous strife, <br />I lived alone for you, and you for me-- <br />Ah! then, dear love, how sweet were wedded life. <br /> <br />But since we dwell here in the crowded way, <br />Where hurrying throungs rush by to seek for gold, <br />And all is common-place and work-a-day, <br />As soon as love's young honeymoon grows old: <br /> <br />Since fashion rules and nature yields to art, <br />And life is hurt by daily jar and fret, <br />'T is best to shut such dreams down in the heart <br />And go our ways alone, love, and forget.<br /><br />Ella Wheeler Wilcox<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/if-5/
