Matthew Arnold (1822–88). The Poems of Matthew Arnold, 1840–1867. 1909.
Poems, Second Series, 1855Separation
[First published 1855.]
S
Speak of the sure consolations of Time.
Fresh be the wound, still-renew’d be its smarting,
So but thy image endure in its prime.
Wills that remembrance should always decay;
If the lov’d form and the deep-cherish’d feature
Must, when unseen, from the soul fade away—
Fled, fled at once, be all vestige of thee—
Deep be the darkness, and still be the slumber—
Dead be the Past and its phantoms to me!
Scanning my face and the changes wrought there,—
Who, let me say, is this Stranger regards me,
With the grey eyes, and the lovely brown hair?