When last we parted, thou wert young and fair-- <br />How beautiful let fond remembrance say! <br />Alas! since then old Time has stol'n away <br />Nigh forty years, leaving my temples bare:-- <br />So hath it perished, like a thing of air, <br />That dream of love and youth:--we now are gray; <br />Yet still remembering youth's enchanted way, <br />Though time has changed my look, and blanched my hair, <br />Though I remember one sad hour with pain, <br />And never thought, long as I yet might live, <br />And parted long, to hear that voice again;-- <br />I can a sad, but cordial greeting, give, <br />And for thy welfare breathe as warm a prayer, <br />Lady, as when I loved thee young and fair!<br /><br />William Lisle Bowles<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/on-accidentally-meeting-a-lady-now-no-more/
