Pike County Ballads and Other Poems

TOO LATE.

  Had we but met in other days,
  Had we but loved in other ways,
  Another light and hope had shone
    On your life and my own.

  In sweet but hopeless reveries
  I fancy how your wistful eyes
  Had saved me, had I known their power
    In fate's imperious hour;

  How loving you, beloved of God,
  And following you, the path I trod
  Had led me, through your love and prayers,
    To God's love unawares:

  And how our beings joined as one
  Had passed through checkered shade and sun,
  Until the earth our lives had given,
    With little change, to heaven.

  God knows why this was not to be.
  You bloomed from childhood far from me.
  The sunshine of the favoured place
    That knew your youth and grace.

  And when your eyes, so fair and free,
  In fearless beauty beamed on me,
  I knew the fatal die was thrown,
    My choice in life was gone.

  And still with wild and tender art
  Your child-love touched my torpid heart,
  Gilding the blackness where it fell,
    Like sunlight over hell.

  In vain, in vain! my choice was gone!
  Better to struggle on alone
  Than blot your pure life's blameless shine
    With cloudy stains of mine.

  A vague regret, a troubled prayer,
  And then the future vast and fair
  Will tempt your young and eager eyes
    With all its glad surprise.

  And I shall watch you, safe and far,
  As some late traveller eyes a star
  Wheeling beyond his desert sands
    To gladden happier lands.