Page:Landon in The New Monthly 1826.pdf/12

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I was not happy—Love forbade
 * Peace by its feverish restlessness;

But this was sweet, and then I had
 * Hope, which relies on happiness.

I need not say how, one by one,
 * Love's flowers have dropp'd from off Love's chain;

Enough to say that they are gone,
 * And that they cannot bloom again.

I know not what the pangs may be
 * That hearts betray'd or slighted prove—

I speak but of the misery
 * That waits on fond and mutual love.

The torture of an absent hour,
 * When doubts mock Reason's faint control:—

’Tis fearful thinking of the power
 * Another holds upon our soul!

To think another has in thrall
 * All of life's best and dearest part—

Our hopes, affections, trusted all
 * To that frail bark—the human heart.

To yield thus to another's reign;—
 * To live but in another's breath—

To double all life's powers of pain—
 * To die twice in another's death;

While these things present to me seem,
 * And what can now the past restore,

Love as I may, yet I can dream
 * Of happiness in Love no more.