my letters! all dead paper, mute and white!

and yet they seem alive and quivering

against my tremulous hands which loose the string

and let them drop down on my knee to-night.

this said,—he wished to have me in his sight

once, as a friend: this fixed a day in spring

to come and touch my hand . . . a simple thing,

yet i wept for it!—this, . . . the paper’s light . . .

said, dear i love thee; and i sank and quailed

as if god’s future thundered on my past.

this said, i am thine—and so its ink has paled

with lying at my heart that beat too fast.

and this . . . o love, thy words have ill availed

if, what this said, i dared repeat at last!