A thousand songs I might have made

Of You, and only You;

A thousand thousand tongues of fire

That trembled down a golden wire

To lamp the night with stars, to braid

The morning bough with dew.

Within the greenwood girl and boy

Had loiter'd to their lure,

And men in cities closed their books

To dream of Spring and running brooks

And all that ever was of joy

For manhood to abjure.

And I'd have made them strong, so strong

Outlasting towers and towns—

Millennial shepherds 'neath the thorn

Had piped them to a world reborn,

And danced Delight the dale along

And up the daisied downs.

A thousand songs I might have made...

But you required them not;

Content to reign your little while

Ere, abdicating with a smile,

You pass'd into a shade, a shade

Immortal—and forgot!