Charles Lotin Hildreth (1858?–1896)

WHAT we miscall our life is Memory:

We walk upon a narrow path between

Two gulfs—what is to be, and what has been,

Led by a guide whose name is Destiny;

Beyond is sightless gloom and mystery,

From whose unfathomable depths we glean

Chaotic hopes and terrors, dimly seen

Reflections of a past reality.

Behind, pursuing through the twilight haze,

The phantom people of the past appear;

Hope, happiness and sorrow, fruitless strife,

And all the loved and lost of other days;

They crowd upon us closer year by year,

Till we as phantoms haunt some other life.