Classic Poem

First in fair youth I sang the love of earth:
The flowers of youth before me bright as fire
Flickered,—I cherished many a winged desire;
To eager thoughts the laughing days gave birth.
Love had not known chill sorrow, nor the dearth
Of strength:—he rested on a bed of flowers:
Sweet joy was his, and tuneable soft hours,—
Pleasure, and mutual toil; and silvery mirth.

But Love was stricken. Then the earth became
No more a bower of roses, but of snow,—
One vast deep charnel-house, one waste of woe,
Lighted at times by lurid leaping flame.
Just where the rose of earth was blushing red
One morn, at eve my rose-lipped love lay dead.