I marked her ruined hues,

Her custom-straitened views,

And asked, “Can there indwell

   My Amabel?”

I looked upon her gown,

Once rose, now earthen brown;

The change was like the knell

   Of Amabel.

Her step’s mechanic ways

Had lost the life of May’s;

Her laugh, once sweet in swell,

   Spoilt Amabel.

I mused: “Who sings the strain

I sang ere warmth did wane?

Who thinks its numbers spell

   His Amabel?”—

Knowing that, though Love cease,

Love’s race shows undecrease;

All find in dorp or dell

   An Amabel.

—I felt that I could creep

To some housetop, and weep,

That Time the tyrant fell

   Ruled Amabel!

I said (the while I sighed

That love like ours had died),

“Fond things I’ll no more tell

   To Amabel,

“But leave her to her fate,

And fling across the gate,

‘Till the Last Trump, farewell,

   O Amabel!’”

1865.

Sketch of hour-glass