THY name was once the magic spell, by which my thoughts were bound, <br />And burning dreams of light and love were wakened by that sound; <br />My heart beat quick when stranger tongues, with idle praise or blame, <br />Awoke its deepest thrill of life, to tremble at that name. <br /> <br />Long years--long years have passed away, and altered is thy brow; <br />And we who met so gladly once, must meet as strangers now: <br />The friends of yore come round me still, but talk no more of thee; <br />'Tis idle ev'n to wish it now--for what art thou to me? <br /> <br />Yet still thy name, thy blessed name, my lonely bosom fills, <br />Like an echo that hath lost itself among the distant hills, <br />Which still, with melancholy note, keeps faintly lingering on, <br />When the jocund sound that woke it first is gone--for ever gone.<br /><br />Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-name-7/
