A SPRAY OF LILAC

Pale cluster, thy faint perfume comes to me Laden with memories of long ago, And all the present dims as o’er my soul The waves of tender recollection flow. With Spring’s young blood again my veins are thrilled, My hands are stretched to meet the coming years, The world holds all the glory that it held Ere yet mine eyes had looked on it thro’ tears. With deftest fingers fancy weaves once more Her fairy fabrics; vast horizons glow With fires of promise, for behind their veils They hid rich treasures in that long-ago. The subtle sweetness of the vanished days, The rapture of the old ecstatic bliss, All, all are mine, as once again I cling To ripe warm lips in love’s first passion-kiss. The long delicious Summer slowly weaves For Autumn’s brows a crown of living gold; Sad Winter follows with his winding-sheet, For all the glory has grown grey and old. Oh, lilac bloom, strange that so slight a thing As thou, is strong to roll away the stone From memory’s grave, and set the dead past free To claim yet once brief kinship with its own.