Page:Eight Harvard Poets.djvu/67

 THE RECOMPENSE

HEN the last song is sung, and the last spark Of light dies out forever, and the dark, The voiceless dark eternal shrouds the earth; When the last cries of pain and shouts of mirth Sink in the desolate silences of space; Where then shall flower the beauty of your face, O Love the laughing. Youth the rose-in-hand, In what unknown and undiscovered land Shall flower then the beauty of your face?

I know not but I know that all returns At last unchanged, and to the heart that yearns Shall be repaid all loneliness and loss. Sometime with shadowy sails shall fly across The shoreless ocean of infinity A ship from out the past, and the great sea Of life shall bear you from the strange worlds over The waves, and back again to the old lover.

Yes, in some future far beyond surmise You will dream here with half-remembering eyes, And I shall write these words, content awhile In the slow round of time to see you smile. 56