Page:Maurine and Other Poems (1910).pdf/60

 With all the hues of those that deck the sod. The grand cathedral windows were ablaze With gorgeous colours; through a sea of bloom, Up the long aisle, to join the waiting groom, The bridal cortège passed.

As some lost soul Might surge on with the curious crowd, to gaze Upon its coffined body, so I went With that glad festal throng. The organ sent Great waves of melody along the air, That broke and fell, in liquid drops, like spray, On happy hearts that listened. But to me It sounded faintly, as if miles away, A troubled spirit, sitting in despair Beside the sad and ever-moaning sea, Gave utterance to sighing sounds of dole. We paused before the altar. Framed in flowers, The white-robed man of God stood forth.

I heard The solemn service open; through long hours I seemed to stand and listen, while each word Fell on my ear as falls the sound of clay Upon the coffin of the worshipped dead. The stately father gave the bride away: The bridegroom circled with a golden band The taper finger of her dainty hand. The last imposing, binding words were said— “What God has joined let no man put asunder”— And all my strife with self was at an end; My lover was the husband of my friend.

How strangely, in some awful hour of pain, External trifles with our sorrows blend! I never hear the mighty organ’s thunder, I never catch the scent of heliotrope, Nor see stained windows all ablaze with light, Without that dizzy whirling of the brain, And all the ghastly feeling of that night, When my sick heart relinquished love and hope.

The pain we feel so keenly may depart, And e’en its memory cease to haunt the heart: But some slight thing, a perfume, or a sound Will probe the closed recesses of the wound,