If there were in my kalendar

   No Emma, Florence, Mary,

What would be my existence now—

   A hermit’s?—wanderer’s weary?—

      How should I live, and how

      Near would be death, or far?

Could it have been that other eyes

   Might have uplit my highway?

That fond, sad, retrospective sight

   Would catch from this dim byway

      Prized figures different quite

      From those that now arise?

With how strange aspect would there creep

   The dawn, the night, the daytime,

If memory were not what it is

   In song-time, toil, or pray-time.—

      O were it else than this,

      I’d pass to pulseless sleep!