Classic Poem

Thine were the frail, slight hands
That might have taken and swayed this soul, and bent
Its stubborn fabric to thy soft intent,
And bound it unresisting, with such bands
As not the arm of envious heaven had rent.

Thine were the calming eyes
That round my course could well have stilled the sea,
And drawn thy voyager home, and bidden him be
Pure with their pureness, with their wisdom wise,
Merged in their light, and greatly lost in thee.

But thou—thou passed'st on,
With odour and bloom of dedicated days
About thy spirit; and me in alien ways
Thou leftest following life's chance lure, where shone
The wandering gleam that beckons and betrays.