Page:The Hundred Best Poems (lyrical) in the English language - second series.djvu/59

 The love where Death has set his seal, Nor age can chill, nor rival steal, Nor falsehood disavow: And, what were worse, thou canst not see Or wrong, or change, or fault in me.

The better days of life were ours; The worst can be but mine: The sun that cheers, the storm that lowers, Shall never more be thine. The silence of that dreamless sleep I envy now too much to weep; Nor need I to repine, That all those charms have passed away I might have watched through long decay

The flower in ripened bloom unmatched Must fall the earliest prey; Though by no hand untimely snatched, The leaves must drop away: And yet it were a greater grief To watch it withering, leaf by leaf, Than see it plucked to-day; Since earthly eye but ill can bear To trace the change to foul from fair.

I know not if I could have borne To see thy beauties fade; The night that followed such a morn Had worn a deeper shade: 37