Page:All quiet along the Potomac and other poems.djvu/328

 322 A BACHELOR S BRIDE.

And when, up through the blessed city, Hand in hand, the twain drew near

To waiting ones, there sounded softly, O er and over, &quot; Mother s here !&quot;

��A BACHELOR S BRIDE.

1 WONDER where I missed you, dear, My wife that should have been, And when I nearest stood to you, My little love, unseen ?

Perhaps I passed you long ago,

Yet never bird or bee, With happy song or sombre drone,

Betrayed the fact to me.

Perhaps across the ocean now You stare at foreign wonders,

Grow wise in Rome, or poetize Amid Chamounix thunders.

Perhaps we may not meet at all,

And so ask each for ever, Why some unmated souls there are

Who find love s answer never ?

I ll write out those I best have known,

With some I never knew, And choose by lot, my wife to be,

First Margaret, fair friend and true.

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