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Home  »  The Book of Georgian Verse  »  Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822)

William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. The Book of Georgian Verse. 1909.

Time Long Past

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822)

LIKE the ghost of a dear friend dead

Is Time long past.

A tone which is now forever fled,

A hope which is now forever past,

A love so sweet it could not last,

Was Time long past.

There were sweet dreams in the night

Of Time long past:

And, was it sadness or delight,

Each day a shadow onward cast

Which made us wish it yet might last—

That Time long past.

There is regret, almost remorse,

For Time long past.

’Tis like a child’s belovèd corse

A father watches, till at last

Beauty is like remembrance, cast

From Time long past.