Page:Poems of Emma Lazarus vol 2.djvu/261

Rh Like a light, enchanted dream, float the shadows of the past.

My days of work ! sole days whereon I lived ! thrice-helovèd solitude ! Now Grod be praised, once more I have arrived In this old study bare and rude. These oft-deserted walls, this shabby den. My faithful lamp, my dusty chair. My palace, my small world I greet again. My Muse, immortal, young and fair. Thank God! we twain may sing here side by side, 1 will reveal to thee my thought. Thou shalt know all, to thee I will confide The evil by a woman wrought. A woman, yes ! (mayhap, poor friends, ye guess. Or ever I have said the word !) To such a one my soul was bound, no less Than is the vassal to his lord. Detested yoke ! within me to destroy The vigor and the bloom of youth ! Yet only through my love I caught, in sooth, A fleeting glimpse of joy. When by the brook, beneath the evening-star. On silver sands we twain would stray, The white wraith of the aspen tree afar Pointed for us the dusky way. Once more within the moonlight do I see