WHEN we were idlers with the loitering rills, <br />The need of human love we little noted: <br /> Our love was nature; and the peace that floated <br />On the white mist, and dwelt upon the hills, <br />To sweet accord subdued our wayward wills: <br /> One soul was ours, one mind, one heart devoted, <br /> That, wisely doting, ask'd not why it doted, <br />And ours the unknown joy, which knowing kills. <br />But now I find how dear thou wert to me; <br /> That man is more than half of nature's treasure, <br />Of that fair beauty which no eye can see, <br /> Of that sweet music which no ear can measure; <br /> And now the streams may sing for others' pleasure, <br />The hills sleep on in their eternity.<br /><br />Hartley Coleridge<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/friendship-32/
