If at some future day we two should meet,
Stand face to face before the staring crowd,
And pull from Love's dead form the decent shroud
That time has wound about from head to feet—
I scarcely know what words would come to greet
Your presence, if they would be soft or loud,
Would your head be held high or humbly bowed,
And would the moment bitter be or sweet
To me, as you pushed back the long past years,
Would I rejoice, perhaps, at this new pain ?
At least 'twould mean that I could live again,
And had not washed away my soul with tears.
I think there might be much that I could bless
In that deliverance out of nothingness.
